This town, never one to shy away from debate, will host Mark Leibovich’s talk on his controversial new book about the place we call home: Washington, D.C. Well, not exactly. This Town (Blue Rider Press, $28) is about “Washington”, as in the inner circles that dominate the Hill and K Street. It will be interesting see how residents of the rest of the city react to the book on Tuesday, July 23, 7 p.m. at Politics and Prose.

Leibovich, the chief national correspondent for The New York Times Magazine, has been based in D.C. for 16 years. In This Town, he admits his insider status, choosing “to live, work, and raise [his] family in the murk,” and claims to not be above it all as he deftly psychoanalyzes each big name he drops. Beginning first with attendees at the somber occasion of newsman Tim Russert’s funeral, it’s clear no prisoners will be taken.

The scoop continues through the 2012 election, full of Mean Girls-style Federal Triangle gossip: Did you hear that Harry Reid says John Kerry has no friends? Don’t you know that David Gregory would “rub out a few colleagues” to get ahead? And it’s confirmed that while candidate Obama campaigned on ridding Washington of special interests, President Obama has gotten pretty into politics-as-usual. Certain revelations are valuable conversation starters; if this is American democracy in action, why even bother?

Maybe that’s how Leibovich wants readers to feel after learning “how Washington really works.” But his lambasting of select members of the “Washington elite” unabashedly generalizes those who work on policy or anything else in D.C. For a skilled journalist, it seems like a shallow interpretation of the attitudes and motivations in this whole town — much of which, by the way, is made up of people from elsewhere.

Or maybe This Town is just a roast Leibovich is holding out of deep-down affection for the “Beltway Establishment.” Wait, no, in an interview with Reason TV he said, “I don’t love this town. I’ve been looking for an excuse to live elsewhere for many years.”

So, a few questions one might pose to This Author on Tuesday night:

• As Martin Austermuhle considered in his review last week, what would “some of [your] colleagues might say about [you] were they the ones writing the book”?
• How does reinforcing stereotypes about the worst of Washington help or hurt the chances of improving the system? Or affect the country’s image of the entire District?
• Can you at least publicly disavow New York Times book reviewer David Shribman’s statement that it is impossible to find a decent sandwich in D.C.?

This Town is already inching up the bestseller list on Amazon, a promising sign that tattling on his local peers and sources will ultimately be a win for Leibovich. How Washingtonian!

Leibovich reported for The Washington Post from 1997 to 2006, then moved to the Times’ Washington bureau. He won the 2011 National Magazine Award and last year, Washingtonian Magazine called him the “reigning master of the political profile.”

The discussion is free and open to the public, and will be followed by a signing, which itself will be followed with a week’s worth of bragging about who got their copy of This Town inked by the author.