It’s 1909, and Teddy Roosevelt is leaving office in a funk. Much of what he had hoped to accomplish as president remains undone and his controversial decision to follow George Washington’s example and not to run for a third term seems now like the biggest mistake of his life. But he leaves in spectacular fashion—assembling the largest safari ever undertaken and leading it on a year-long expedition through East and Central Africa. His account, African Game Trails, becomes an international bestseller. But it only tells part of the story. HUNTING TEDDY ROOSEVELT tells the rest.

Roosevelt is not only hunting in Africa, he’s being hunted. James Pierpont Morgan, the most powerful private citizen of his era, wants Roosevelt out of politics permanently. Afraid that the trust-busting ex-president’s return to power would be disastrous for American business, he plants a killer on the safari to arrange a fatal accident while the former president is out of touch with the outside world.