Unfettered

Pennsylvania senator Fetterman reflects on his political rise and simultaneous struggles with depression and a stroke in this uncomfortably raw memoir. The account opens with Fetterman contemplating suicide on a bridge during his 2022 Senate campaign. From there, he traces his political trajectory—from winning the mayoral race in Braddock, Pa., by just one vote to his longshot Senate victory against Mehmet Oz (with two chapters devoted to the devolution of his relationship with then Pennsylvania attorney general Josh Shapiro over their roles on the Board of Pardons). Throughout he expresses ample ire at the Democratic Party, including over its “policies against men.” But the political largely takes a backseat to the personal, as Fetterman focuses on his family and staff’s attempts to help him during his health battles, from cajoling him to go to the hospital during his stroke (“John, you are dying,” his brother Gregg told him) to encouraging him to be hospitalized for severe depression. These recollections are moving, but at times Fetterman’s openness can be disconcerting, including his dwelling on his “unplanned” birth, his second-guessing of his Senate run (“I should have quit”), his attempts to skip his own swearing-in ceremony, and his unraveling paranoia while in the Senate (“I began to convince myself there was a plot to have me committed”). It makes for a disquieting dispatch from a sitting senator. (Nov.)