Product Description

One year ago, Sarah Palin burst onto the national political stage like a comet. Yet even now, few Americans know who this remarkable woman really is.

On September 3, 2008 Alaska Governor and vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin delivered a speech at the Republican National Convention that electrified the nation and instantly made her one of the most recognizable women in the world.

As chief executive of America's largest state, she had built a record as a reformer who cast aside politics-as-usual and pushed through changes other politicians only talked about: Energy independence. Ethics reform. And the biggest private sector infrastructure project in U.S. history. And while revitalizing public school funding and ensuring the state met its responsibilities to seniors and Alaska Native populations, Palin also beat the political "good ol' boys club" at their own game and brought Big Oil to heel.

Like her GOP running mate, John McCain, Palin wasn't a packaged and over-produced candidate. She was a Main Street American woman: a working mom, wife of a blue collar union man, and mother of five children, the eldest of whom was serving his country in a yearlong deployment in Iraq and the youngest, an infant with special needs. Palin's hometown story touched a populist nerve, rallying hundreds of thousands of ordinary Americans to the GOP ticket.

But as the campaign unfolded, Palin became a lightning rod for both praise and criticism. Supporters called her "refreshing" and "honest," a kitchen-table public servant they felt would fight for their interests. Opponents derided her as a wide-eyed Pollyanna unprepared for national leadership. But none of them knew the real Sarah Palin.

In this eagerly anticipated memoir, Palin paints an intimate portrait of growing up in the wilds of Alaska; meeting her lifelong love; her decision to enter politics; the importance of faith and family; and the unique joys and trials of life as a high-profile working mother. She also opens up for the first time about the 2008 presidential race, providing a rare, mom's-eye view of high-stakes national politics—from patriots dedicated to "Country First" to slick politicos bent on winning at any cost.

Going Rogue traces one ordinary citizen's extraordinary journey and imparts Palin's vision of a way forward for America and her unfailing hope in the greatest nation on earth.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1 in Books
• Published on: 2009-11-17
• Released on: 2009-11-17
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 432 pages

From The Washington Post
From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by by Matthew Continetti Like a lot of people, as soon as I got my copy of Sarah Palin's "Going Rogue," I immediately thought of the German literary critic Hans Robert Jauss. Jauss is known as the father of critical reception theory. According to Jauss, every book is read in a social context. In his view, the reader's attitudes, beliefs, values and judgments are just as important as the text. Sometimes more. Palin probably didn't set out to write a book that tested Jauss's thesis. But, in so many ways, the reaction to "Going Rogue" is as interesting as its content. Palin's memoir is everything you'd expect from a politician who has no intention of leaving the national scene. With the aid of Lynn Vincent as her ghostwriter, she tells homespun stories, cracks a few jokes, provides juicy campaign gossip and lets the reader know where she stands on issues such as the right to life, government taxes and spending, health care and climate change. Like a good Republican, she invokes Ronald Reagan's name at every opportunity. The book is so packed with facts, history and encomiums about her state, she's practically a one-woman Alaska Division of Tourism: "We have the highest number of pilots per capita in the United States." Palin tells her side of a story that's usually told by her opponents. It's the tale of how she rose from small-town mayor to the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee to her current status as global celebrity and one of the most polarizing figures in American politics. She writes in the warm, casual, occasionally corny voice that has made her so lovable to some and revolting to others. I'll go out on a limb and predict that if you like Palin, you'll like "Going Rogue" -- and if you don't like Palin, well, I hear the new Stephen King is pretty good. What's unusual is that "Going Rogue" has ignited such a media firestorm. After all, politicians write books like this all the time. Nobody pays any attention. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Bill Frist, John Ashcroft, Mike Huckabee, Joe Biden, Henry Waxman -- and many, many more -- have all put pen to paper (often with help from collaborators) in order to record the authorized accounts of their political and personal lives. But they don't often go on "Oprah." For the typical pol, a book serves as the news peg for a media tour. He gets to go on "The Daily Show," comment on public affairs and remind his constituents and campaign donors that his opinions matter. Then the book disappears. The pol returns to other business. Palin is different. Her book has become the occasion to re-litigate the 2008 presidential campaign. All the raw cultural battles over abortion, feminism and populism that erupted when she strode into the limelight have sprung up again. All the stand-up comics who had a blast last year reducing this conservative reformer to a cartoon are ridiculing her once more. The press and established powers in Washington consistently hold Palin to a higher standard. The AP assigned a team of 11 reporters to "fact-check" Palin's book. I don't remember Harry Reid's "The Good Fight" getting that treatment, but then, hardly anybody remembers "The Good Fight." Among the AP's discoveries was the fact that -- I am not making this up -- Palin is ambitious. One critic described Palin as being "ungrateful" to the McCain campaign. Why? Because in her book Palin returns fire on the anonymous campaign strategists who called her a "diva" and "whackjob" to eager reporters. What was she supposed to do? Play the role of the orphan Oliver Twist and ask, "Please, sir, I want some more"? Through no fault of her own, Sarah Palin has become a sort of political lens, refracting the different ways conservatives and liberals see the world. To her supporters, she is, as she puts it, a "common-sense conservative" who isn't afraid to make moral judgments. To her detractors, she's a moronic zealot who has no place in American public life. The two interpretations are concrete. "Going Rogue" won't do much to change any minds. But for what it reveals about our current political culture, Hans Robert Jauss would say it can't be beat. bookworld@washpost.com
Copyright 2009, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

About the Author

Sarah Palin grew up in Alaska towns, from Skagway to Wasilla to Anchorage, while her dad taught science and coached high school sports. She and her future husband, Todd Palin, graduated from Wasilla High School in 1982, and she went on to earn her college degree from the School of Journalism at the University of Idaho. Palin served two terms on the Wasilla City Council, then two terms as the city's mayor and manager, and was elected by her peers as president of the Alaska Conference of Mayors. She then chaired the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, and the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission. Palin was elected Alaska's youngest, and first female, governor, serving from 2006 to 2009. While serving her state she was tapped as Senator John McCain's running mate in 2008, becoming the first female Republican vice presidential candidate in our nation's history.

The Palins reside in Wasilla with their five children, including a son in the U.S. Army, and one grandson. They enjoy an extended family throughout Alaska and the Lower 48.

Customer Reviews

Ain't afraid of no Vietcong king
There are many kinds of truth. There are truths based on facts, truths based on faith, and truths based on something that sounds as if it should be true (truthiness). Then there's the kind of truth we find in Sarah's book: stories and concepts that become truths simply because she states them. She's a lot like our Lord and Savior, Glen Beck, in that respect.

Sometimes, she states truths that would be considered ludicrous if uttered by someone else. Her claim that the McCain campaign forced her to spend $150,000 in RNC funds to dress her family in designer clothes is one example of that. Although it might be easier to believe that she acted like a trailer park Zsa Zsa who'd found a credit card left behind at a possum feed, she blames McCain staffers. That's good enough for us, because we have faith; we want to believe her truths.

But the book isn't perfect. As much as I enjoyed the few short paragraphs in which Mrs Palin laid out her policy objectives, she could have condensed it all into one sentence: "I'm going to grab an Oxo Good Grips Stainless Serving Spatula and go all mavericky on your non-white, non-Christian and non-heterosexual butts."

The book also fails to expose Mrs. Palin's intellectual brilliance and keen grasp of foreign policy issues. Why wasn't the text of her recent speech in Hong Kong included? Although it remains secret, it's rumored that she viciously rebuked the Vietcong king for his assault on the Empire State Building. That's a speech we've been waiting for nearly 75 years to hear. It's big news and should have been included.

As you read other reviews of this book, please remember that Mrs. Palin has many enemies who are eager to pan her work. The Palin family's most potent nemesis, Levi's johnston, is no dpubt fully erect and ready to spew globs of misfortune upon them for a third time. And reason-adoring intellectuals are certain to point out that an interview on Good Morning Topeka doesn't qualify as a policy summit in the Far East.

But a few bad reviews won't stop her. She's seen much worse from her kitchen window. It can't be pleasant to gaze upon Antichristograd every morning as you brew your coffee.

My review isn't complete, but I think I'll quit anyway, because writing reviews, like governing, is just too darned hard to finish.

No Sense of Calling, Of Vocation . . .
I was extremely disappointed by this book. I really have two main problems with it.

First, I was struck by the way in which she presented her role in the campaign as largely something which happened TO her, where she was the object, rather than the subject of the campaign. On the one hand, I find that sort of stance as consistent with her Christian faith -- in that she writes about how all that summer it felt like she was waiting on God, for Him to show His hand and show her what He wanted her to do next. And then, lo and behold, she found herself unexpectedly pregnant with a fifth child with special needs and shortly after that, running for Vice President. But lately I have been struck by the way that Democratic candidates frequently present themselves as being extremely, even hyperfocused, from a very young age on wanting to change the world. We're told about Bill Clinton and the Friends of Bill and the omnipresent Rolodex which he had apparently been compiling since he was in middle school. We're told about Obama and his travels and the life lessons he experienced about racism, poverty and health care and how that shaped his thinking about politics. we are not told any similar story about Republican candidates -- rather, Reagan seemingly 'fell into' politics as the result of his dealings with the Screen ACtor's Guild. Likewise, Arnold Schwarzenegger "fell into" politics. Both Bushes surely fell into politics, or perhaps were groomed for it or pushed into it by other family members. And there's this sense again with Palin.

But I feel that her lack of direction as it is presented here is actually indicative of a larger problem. Nowhere in this book do we have a sense that inside her burns this fiery need to change something or make the world a better place. Popular reviews of this book have noted this as well -- though in different words. They've noted that the only public policy issue which she talks about at all animatedly is the environment. Her prose even sounds a bit dead when she comments on September 11. I found this particularly disappointing, largely because I'm the same age as Palin, and I have such different memories of the political events which she narrates her way through in this dry, perfunctory style. For example, she makes reference to President Reagan and how much he meant to her - but we never REALLY have a strong sense of what draws her to politics. One gets the sense that she probably would (and probably could) be just as happy doing something else -- running a florist shop, or a dog grooming business. My earliest and strongest memory of politics is of being allowed to stay up late to watch Richard Nixon resign -- when I was in elementary school. And I remember knowing that this was something momentous. I remember watching an antiwar demonstration at our local university when I was in kindergarten -- and thinking it was a parade and wondering where the bands were. I remember asking questions about Vietnam as a child. And I remember SOlidarity, which occurred when I was in high school. I remember being so proud of ROnald Reagan when he stood up to the COmmunists, and so proud to be an American -- and I remember thinking that I was watching God's hand in history as I watched Solidarity take shape and the Commmunists eventually fall. I was kind of surprised that Palin, who presents herself as "interested" in politics -- didn't apparently have any similar memories. I would have liked to hear her thoughts on Nixon, Vietnam, Solidarity, the fall of Communism -- instead of endless stories about her marathons, her dog sleds, and Todd. The question I think we all wanted answered was: what animates you? why do you care about politics? what does it mean to you and what do you bring to the table? Unfortunately, this book doesn't deliver that. Is it because it isn't there?

Palin's Other Side of the Mirror
Seldom has the normally boring genre of Biography seem to ignite a firestorm on both sides of the Liberal and Conservative fence. On Nov. 17th, the much anticipated Sarah Palin's autobiography (penned with help) was released. It's almost impossible to conceive that all of the Palin Hoopla has occured within the short space of one year. Palin was demonized continually by those who saw her as a female Dan Quayle, and this book largely was written to do two things:

- help pay for her $2 million lawyer fees from having to defend 18 seperate gubanatorial violations, all of which, quietly, have vindicated her. She explains in the book that she doesn't feel too guilty about leaving her governor's position since she was forced, in her personal life, to have to defend herself from frivalous lawsuits.
In any case, this book should raise more than enough to settle the score financially.

- The right to answer her critics. In her eyes, she was held back from politically answering several misspeaks, concession speechs at the end, responding to internal conflicts with McCain, and even being able to finally address the slanderous blogging (i.e. the daughter's baby REALLY being Palin's, which has to be the Democrats equivalent of believing in the Obama Birther theory.)

She talks about her heart being torn when she heard that her daughter was pregnant, but notified the Republican Party immediately, apparently to stave off any impending scandal (which happened anyway despite all the Republican's efforts to make it sound like a normal American social problem of teen pregnancy.) Palin describes her own pregnancy, and how she even contemplated the pros and cons of succumbing to pro-choice if need be. In the end, her faith guided her decision to keep the baby, but the anguish she writes about is real, and something millions of other women have faced.

Is the book a 'Complainer document" as claimed by some? The Left will say yes, and will largely only read blogs to get the gist of the book. The Right will be split down the middle on this issue. There is little doubt that she has the right to set the record straight since during most of the campaign, there were internal gag orders on not rocking the boat.

So what is the No Spin synopsis of this book? It's an insiders look at how quickly and dangerously politicans can suddenly be brought to life in the national spotlight; it's about the infighting, and how to keep face even when losing; it's about family loss, it's an answer to a threat, a look at what extreme rural America lives like and how events can spiral out of control with painful personal results.

The book content is NOT about a bunch of segments of political platforms, or points of views. Palin critics will probably say that the book is not literate enough, that there's not too many deep thoughts in it, and probably an overemphasis of emotional discussions. But that is Sarah Palin- and she represents, to many, the other Forgotten Half of the country that is NOT in a major city or has New York, Chicago or LA values. Maybe that's why she is hated so much from the TV networks which are ALL located in either Los Angeles or New York city. They can't relate to her, and call her phony. Well, she decribes a totally different point of view of the other side of the mirror. For many, she represents a slice of middle-America.

The Republican 'Rookie of the Year' has a long way to go to get her full credibility back, but I see nothing outrageous in this book that will stop that from being repaired.
by Jeff Feezle