In a blistering, behind-the-scenes novel about the savagely competitive world of television news, Canadian-born journalist Robert MacNeil writes about the world he knows best -- a world where the integrity of reporting the news is being held hostage by the relentless pursuit of the bottom line.

Anchorman Grant Munro is at what should be the pinnacle of a brilliant career. Covering every major story from the Kennedy assassination to the death of Princess Diana, Munro has won the admiration, respect, and trust of his viewers. About to turn sixty in an industry no longer controlled by top-notch journalists but by profit-hungry conglomerates, Munro suddenly feels his career threatened -- especially when Bill Donovan, a handsome young reporter with little experience but a high Q rating, vies for his anchor post.

Dragged into a media circus where "soft news" and tabloid television are becoming the staples of nightly news broadcasts, Munro must negotiate a minefield of scheming, greed, and betrayal in order to hold on to what he prizes.

Born in Montreal, Robert MacNeil grew up in Halifax, attended Dalhousie University and graduated from Carleton in Ottawa. After early work as a CBC announcer, he was a journalist for forty years with Reuters News Agency, NBC News and the BBC, culminating in twenty years as Executive Editor of the MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour on PBS. His bestselling novel, Burden of Desire, won rave reviews in Canada and the U.S. He is also the author of two other novels, The Voyage and Breaking News; three memoirs, The Right Place at the Right Time, Wordstruck, and Looking for My Country; and co-author of The Story of English and its sequel, Do You Speak American? He divides his time between New York and Nova Scotia.

Robert MacNeil's profile page

"A provocative cri de couer at...our national news media wrapped neatly in a shiny literary package. Jim Lehrer's loss is fiction's gain."
--Eric Alterman, New York Times Book Review

"MacNeil calls it a novel but here, in delightfully readable style, may be the best explanation yet of that which ails television news."
--Walter Cronkite

"MacNeil has written a page-turning novel that gripped me and never let go until I reached the last page. On one level, it explores the collision between commerical and news values. On a deeper level, it is a rich human drama."
--Ken Auletta

"Breaking News is a fly on the wall of every network newsroom. Journalistic integrity battles the bottom line and guess who wins? It's also a study of the seduction of the not-so-innocent, with all the attendant absurdities."
--Morley Safer

"This is a reporter's notebook, a fly-on-the-wall account of what really goes on behind the facade of the television news business. And you'll recognize a lot of today's news heavy-hitters in the 'fictional' cast of characters Robert MacNeil has so entertainingly assembled."
--Mike Wallace

>"A devastating portrait of American TV news."
--Max Frankel

From the Hardcover edition.