Elisabeth Sifton praises Steve Coll's book Ghost Wars, along with other books that helped stir public debate about America being at war.

"...It was books, not newspaper apologies, that finally got people's attention -- books written by reporters who understood deadline pressure but grasped the public obligation to convey the big stories about the public's business. Here came The Washington Post's Steve Coll with Ghost Wars and the peerless Anthony Shadid with Night Draws Near; George Packer of The New Yorker with The Assassins' Gate; James Risen of the Times revealing in State of War the administration's deceits about its program for warrantless wiretapping; Ron Suskind, again, with The One Percent Doctrine; Thomas Ricks's devastating Fiasco; Bob Woodward with the third in his war trilogy -- to name a few. Each of these was a well-argued, well-researched, and compelling narrative about one or another facet of America's engagement with the world, about what our leaders were doing in our name. People were desperately hungry for these books, and they fell all over them. They -- the books and their readers -- helped to change the public debate about where America was going, and, I believe, they affected the outcome of the 2006 election."