What’s Left Unsaid: My Life at the Center of Power, Politics & Crisis

DeRosa presents herself as the plucky sidekick of a besieged hero in this by turns cloying and combative debut memoir of her role as chief of staff to New York governor Andrew Cuomo during the myriad crises and scandals leading up to his 2021 resignation. In the final two years of her tenure (which began in 2017 after an earlier stint as communications director), DeRosa advised her boss through several headline-making episodes, including disputes over the administration’s accounting of Covid nursing home deaths and numerous sexual harassment accusations against Cuomo. DeRosa defends the former governor at every turn, suggesting that New York’s higher nursing home death rate was due to a complex quirk of accounting (and that the federal investigation was spurred by President Donald Trump’s jealousy over Cuomo’s spotlight-stealing leadership during the pandemic). Elsewhere, she posits that the sexual harassment allegations were overblown, driven by a vindictive former staffer who recruited other women to join her suit. DeRosa interlaces her accounts of these scandals with intriguing if somewhat wooden recreations of behind-the-scenes political wrangling with state and federal officials around the unprecedented crises faced by Cuomo’s administration in 2020: the Covid pandemic and protests following George Floyd’s murder. While this glowing defense of Cuomo will appeal to his supporters, it’s unlikely to mollify his detractors. (Oct.)