"This is a terrible book." It seems safe to say that very few literary efforts lead off with this sort of caveat, but that's the arresting first sentence of Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative, which marks its third week on our charts. Now in its sixth printing (copies in print: 95,000), this political apologia by David Brock, the leading right-wing scandal reporter in the '90s, was published by Crown on March 12. Print coverage highlights: a New York Times magazine feature by Frank Rich, a Washington Post Style section story by Howard Kurtz, an American Political Journal feature and a five-page review in the New Yorker. Online chats have taken place at the Washington Post and USA Today Web sites, and Brock's made the rounds of the usual media suspects--Today, CNN's Wolf Blitzer, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, Politically Incorrect, etc. Still to come are Meet the Press and CNN's Crossfire with James Carville.

With reporting by Dick Donahue