Trueheart "has achieved something rare in the annals of diplomatic history, mining family letters, federal archives and oral history to craft a tale both riveting and revelatory, a brisk drama that toggles between Saigon and Washington to offer an inside tour of the secret diplomacy — the cajoling and conniving — as the coup fuse burned."

The publication of CHARLES TRUEHEART's Diplomats at War follows his distinguished career as a journalist and nonprofit executive. After writing for numerous news publications, Trueheart became associate director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard University and director of the Kennedy School’s Public Affairs Forum in 1983. In 1986, Trueheart returned to journalism as a reporter for The Washington Post, serving as its principal writer on books, authors, the publishing industry, and literary and intellectual issues, and later as its Canada correspondent and Paris correspondent. In 2007, Trueheart was appointed director of the American Library in Paris, the largest English-language library in Europe. He retired in 2017. Trueheart is a graduate of Phillips Exeter Academy and Amherst College.