Great reading that provides a sense of the city, from the Traveler online Ultimate Travel Library.
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Washington, D.C., by Gore Vidal (1967)
A novel tracing the political fortunes of a conservative senator with presidential aspirations in the time of the New Deal and McCarthy era. Vidal was raised in Washington and attended St. Albans school, attached to the National Cathedral.
All the President's Men, by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein (1974)
The two reporters who chronicled the Watergate break-in and its ensuing cover-up and exposure detail their journalistic journey through the scandal.
The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, by Langston Hughes (1995)
The first collected edition of all 860 poems published by the writer in his lifetime; his works detail African-American life. Hughes lived in D.C. with his mother and worked as a busboy at the Wardman Park Hotel.
Personal History, by Katharine Graham (1997)
Graham details her work as the publisher of the Washington Post, taking over for her husband Philip after his suicide in 1963, and helming the paper through the Watergate '70s to the Clinton-scandal '90s.
Patriot Games, by Tom Clancy (1987)
Clancy's fictional romp features CIA analyst Jack Ryan's attempt to save the Prince and Princess of Wales from a plot on their life, and along the way he encounters Naval cadets, Irish terrorists, and royal offspring.
Profiles in Courage, by John F. Kennedy (1956)
Then-Senator JFK chronicles the courageous acts of eight senators who went against popular opinion to do what they felt needed to be done in the political arena, including Sam Houston, John Quincy Adams, and Daniel Webster. The book won the Pulitzer Prize in biography.
John Adams, by David McCullough (2001)
The historian's account reads more like a novel (though is entirely nonfiction); watch his rocky relationship with Thomas Jefferson and the love story with his wife, Abigail Adams, unfold, and witness as he transforms from American Revolution zealot to second president of the United States.
The Night Gardener, by George Pelecanos (2007)
A 14-year-old girl turns up dead in a Washington, D.C. park, and Detective Gus Ramone is unable to solve the case; cut to 20 years later and his investigation of a similar style murder, this time of his son's friend. Detective fiction featuring the gritty side of D.C. streets and local characters.
