Hard, soft, and spiritual power
Christianity Today
November 6, 2026
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Illustration by Christianity Today
This piece was adapted from CT’s books newsletter. Subscribe here.
## The East Wing: Power, Intrigue, and the Untold Story of America's First Ladies
Azadeh Moaveni (Author)
St. Martin's Press
432 pages
$29.63
Azadeh Moaveni, The East Wing: Power, Intrigue, and the Untold Story of America’s First Ladies (St. Martin’s Press, 2026)
Last year, workers tore down the East Wing of the White House so that President Donald Trump could build a new state ballroom, demolishing in the process the headquarters for first lady Melania Trump and her staff. As Azadeh Moaveni describes in her titular book, the East Wing has been the first lady’s home base for decades, a launching pad for soft-power pushes in diplomacy, culture wars, and media relations.
The East Wing moves chronologically, beginning with Eleanor Roosevelt—who reimagined the role of the first lady to be more public-facing—and concluding with Melania Trump. Each chapter spotlights not only the first lady but her staff, with special focus on chiefs of staff and press secretaries. Compared to the power-hungry staffers of the president’s cabinet, Moaveni notes how East Wing staff have tried to remain invisible. The East Wing does an excellent job of highlighting these personalities, typically lost to time.
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I found The East Wing to be deeply informative; I loved learning about each first lady’s personality and differing approach to the role, from Jill Biden’s single-minded support of her husband’s policies to Hillary Clinton’s ambitious agenda setting and international travels. The book does lean hagiographical: Besides Obama-era social secretary Desiree Rogers, all of the first ladies and staffers are generously characterized. Still, I found The East Wing to be an enjoyable and illuminating read, helping me better understand the important contributions of the East Wing throughout American history.
## Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump
Maggie Haberman (Author), Jonathan Swan (Author)
Simon & Schuster
496 pages
$23.74
Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump (Simon & Schuster, 2026)
Regime Change also presents an insider White House perspective, though its focus is more rigidly contemporary: the first 14 months of Donald Trump’s second term as president. Beginning with Trump’s electoral victory in November 2024, Regime Change covers every major decision of the term up through Trump’s declaration of war on Iran, the book’s explosive climax.
Outside of brief introductions and conclusions that provide glimpses into its authors’ political opinions, Regime Change eschews punditry and opinion. Instead, it’s an old-school journalist’s dream, laser-focused on facts and concrete details: who, what, where, when, why. If you’ve ever wanted to be a fly on the wall in the rooms where big decisions happen, Regime Change is for you. Quoted conversations detail sparring matches with world leaders, inter-cabinet quarrels, and hastily made decisions over policies that affect millions.
Those expecting an anti-Trump screed or bombshell revelations may be disappointed or relieved, depending upon their politics. Nothing in Regime Change will be shocking to anyone who has paid attention to DC politics over the last couple of years, but it’s worth reading for the intimate portraits it provides of the administration’s central characters, figures like Vice President JD Vance, Stephen Miller, Marco Rubio, Elon Musk, and President Trump himself. While I’m used to seeing these names in headlines, Regime Change allowed me to know these characters in more detail—their day-to-day tasks, their demeanors, their office friendships and rivalries.
Indeed, Regime Change lends its principal figures a humanity that cuts both ways. Trump’s critics and fans alike may be surprised at how much the president comes off like, well, a normal old man for much of the story. He shows genuine compassion to Biden in a pre-Inauguration visit, promising not to harass his son any longer. He expresses childlike wonder at AI technology when tech executives show it off to him at a White House meeting. He annoys staff with idiosyncracies like demanding a carpeted bathroom or staying up so late watching cable television that he misses morning meetings. He mourns the death of Charlie Kirk.
Yet Regime Change also paints a picture of an administration that seeks revenge above all else, manifesting in ways both petulant—its hostile treatment of the press corps—and lawless—as when it brazenly and knowingly defies judicial orders regarding deportations. It holds up a mirror to our broken political moment, all the more horrifying for all its detail.
Tremaine Thomas, Jonathan
Thomas Nelson
October 20, 2026
Jonathan Tremaine Thomas, Make Straight the Path: Following the Just One into Righteousness and Peacemaking through Holy Activism (Thomas Nelson, 2026)
Make Straight the Path offers a distinctively countercultural approach to modern political activism. Jonathan Tremaine Thomas—the executive director of Civil Righteousness—advocates not for the regime-shaping hard power of the West Wing, nor the soft power of the East Wing, but for spiritual power as the antidote to our political woes.
Recent years have featured several excellent books on how to approach political activism from a distinctively Christian position, rather than one shaped by Republican or Democratic platforms. These include Jemar Tisby’s How to Fight Racism, Michael J. Rhodes’s Reimagining Biblical Politics, and Preston Sprinkle’s Exiles. But Make Straight the Path differentiates itself from this pack with a uniquely charismatic emphasis on the movement of the Holy Spirit.
Thomas, who self-describes at one point as “a full-time domestic missionary,” describes receiving visions and commands from the Lord that lead him into unusual situations, with parallels to the biblical prophets. At God’s command, he describes dressing in a black ministerial robe to attend a protest following Trayvon Martin’s death, which creates an unexpected opportunity to preach to the aggrieved crowd. Another time, he remembers a Juneteenth gathering—intended to bring together people of disparate political backgrounds to discuss change in his city—that was at risk of being rained out. After praying to God, Thomas says, “the rain stopped completely and the dark cloud over us rolled away. Within seconds, the Lord responded with a miracle.”
These stories break up thoughtful, if commonplace, discussions about race, justice, and unity. But there are also chapters you won’t find in other political texts: on the efficacy of fasting when interceding for liberation, on creating corporate “walls” of prayer for one’s city. Thomas’ own politics defy easy characterization on the American political spectrum: He laments Trump’s crackdown on “woke” museums but also refers to the 2008 zeal for Obama as a kind of “idolatry.” Some readers will certainly treat Thomas’s more supernatural claims with skepticism. But Make Straight the Path is ultimately a thought-provoking, challenging read for Christians living in polarized and divisive times like ours.
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