TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER The Bookworm Sez Advertisement

Did you ever get dragged into something in which you were never meant to be involved?

First, you wonder why the cosmos has chosen you to be in that situation, because it's no fun. Controlling the chaos isn't possible. Sitting out a round isn't an option. The best you can do is to try and unravel the fine mess you've got on your hands.

So why had fate put you in the middle of the muddle? A young presidential aide wonders the same thing, and in the new novel, "The Book of Fate" by Brad Meltzer, Wes keeps asking that question-without-an-answer.

Eight years ago, during the Manning presidency, Wes was a twenty-three-year-old at the top of his game, working as a presidential aide and loving life. It was Wes' job to anticipate what Manning wanted and to ensure that it was there. Wes never anticipated what would happen on that horrible day at the Daytona racetrack, the day when his life did a one-eighty.

Ron Boyle was running to meet Manning's limo. He was angry because Wes had denied Boyle five minutes with the President earlier in the day, and to appease Boyle, Wes put him in the presidential limo on the way to the track.

Excitement ran high at the track, until shots rang out, pop pop pop. Manning and the First Lady were whisked away to safety. Rushed to the hospital, Boyle died of his wounds. Wes took a bullet to the face and was disfigured forever.

Now, eight years and an office-ruining candid photo later, Manning has retired to Palm Beach and gives speeches to second-rate groups. Wes still works for the ex-President and deeply regrets having put Boyle in the limo. He wonders if he can ever forgive himself. He wonders if Boyle would forgive him.

He's about to have a chance to ask.

On a trip to Malaysia, Wes bumps into a rough-looking man outside an auditorium where Manning is speaking. There's no mistaking those eyes. It's Boyle. Wes is sure of it. But hasn't Boyle been dead almost a decade?

Although he never asked for trouble back then, Wes learns that he's an unwitting part of a two-hundred-year-old government-wide mystery that threatens national security and truth. Now the Secret Service wants to know Boyle's whereabouts. Does Manning know about this terrible plot? Is there anybody Wes can trust?

Don't look at me. Read the book.

Author Brad Meltzer says that doing research on this novel took him three years, and although it's a work of fiction, there are nuggets of real life within its pages. Meltzer is the Prince of Political Thrillers, and this one will keep you spinning like a caught fly in a tangle of intrigue, right up until the almost-end. All that's left to do is to decide who gets to play each role in the movie that this book is begging to become.

Go to your bookstore or library this week and take fate into your own hands. It's a book you'll be glad to be dragged into.

"The Book of Fate" by Brad Meltzer, Warner Books, $25.99, 528 pages.