The Election by Richard Warren Field (not to be confused by the Tom Perotta book of the same name) is an earnest, lovably guileless bit of a novel. Well-intentioned and endearingly cheesy, this tale of an independent Presidential candidate's race for the White House never quite finds its footing genre-wise. At times it hints at broad satire; at others, it reaches in all apparent seriousness for the moral high ground. Here, we find ourselves caught up in a web of international intrigue involving U.S. fatcats and slippery South American drug lords. There, we are suddenly caught up in a sleazy blackmail scheme resulting in murder. Schizophrenic as it seems, The Election finds a way to grow on you.

Principled, independently-wealthy network anchorman Michael Edwards feels unfulfilled as he approaches middle life. The lofty dreams of his young adulthood in the Sixties remain unrealized. The world has yet to become the better place he'd hoped for. Egged on by his beautiful and feisty wife (this is a woman who entered and won a beauty contest once just so she could refuse the title and denounce pageants), Edwards announces his candidacy for the highest office in the land. He is determined to play clean as he joins the mud-slingingest game in town. When staffers find dirt on other candidates, Edwards firmly refuses to walk down that road. His Earth-conscious goal of a "Regenerating Biosphere," rendered implausible by party-liners' political agendas, and his "Nuclear Bomb" in the war on drugs make Edwards an interesting (if inelectibly radical) alternative to the incumbent Republican President and his sleazy Democratic challenger.

Edwards' campaign kicks off a feud with rival network anchor Donald Samuelson (yes, that does sound a lot like Sam Donaldson, now that you mention it...). But as this political outsider's ideas start to look more attractive to a jaded electorate, Edwards finds his old journalistic peer to be of more off-the-record help than anything. Edwards' ideas threaten certain Texans who've gotten rich and stayed rich on fossil fuels; his plans to defuse the illegal drug situation in the nation threatens the livelihood of south-of-the-border suppliers. When these two groups put their devious heads together, it spells trouble for the intrepid grown-up hippie -- trouble, and danger. And when a seamy character from Edwards' flower-child days comes crawling out of the woodwork, there's a scandal in store. Of course, what campaign can't have one of those?

The big question in The Election is whether or not a non-partisan candidate whose platform threatens the hard-won static nature of the establishment has a realistic shot at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The somewhat simplistic view of modern politics here allows that to be achievable. For all its flaws, though, Field's story of a good guy fighting the tough fight finds a way to make you care just enough to stick with it, to hope for the Hollywood ending that will signal a new era of American politics and leadership. Sheepishly or not, if you get at least halfway into this debut, you'll probably want to stick it out to the end -- just to see, you know.