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Michelle: A Biography by Liza Mundy (Hardcover)

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Though they’ve spoken before, author and Washington Post reporter Mundy confesses early on, “the presidential campaign declined access to Michelle and discouraged friends from talking.” The resulting biography of Michelle Obama, wife of Democratic Presidential nominee Barack, is neither as full nor satisfying as Mundy hopes, but works as a sympathetic, gently probing profile of a strong, self-assured family- and business-woman whose husband’s meteoric rise (as Mundy puts it, “Obama had been beamed up. He had ascended”) catapulted her into the national spotlight. The product of humble Chicago origins, Princeton and Harvard Law educations and a fierce sense of self, Michelle suddenly found herself defending her background and career, her husband’s campaign, the couple’s role as parents, and her own personal philosophies and pronouncements in front of a national audience. In her broad assessment, Mundy considers seriously, if not conclusively, questions raised by some of Michelle’s now-infamous (and oft-misquoted) statements about her pride in America, as well as the controversy surrounding the Obamas’ former pastor. Though Mundy never develops a clear argument regarding Michelle’s significance as a national figure-present or future-she does document how Michelle got there: as a smart, formidable and uncompromising woman.

Product Description

She can be funny and sharp-tongued, warm and blunt, empathic and demanding. Who is the woman Barack Obama calls “the boss”? In Michelle, Washington Post writer Liza Mundy paints a revealing and intimate portrait, taking us inside the marriage of the most dynamic couple in politics today. She shows how well they complement each other: Michelle, the highly organized, sometimes intimidating, list-making pragmatist; Barack, the introspective political charmer who won’t pick up his socks but shoots for the stars. Their relationship, like those of many couples with two careers and two children, has been so strained at times that he has had to persuade her to support his climb up the political ladder. And you can’t blame her for occasionally regretting it: In this campaign, it is Michelle who has absorbed much of the skepticism from voters about Obama. One conservative magazine put her on the cover under the headline “Mrs. Grievance.”

Michelle’s story carries with it all the extraordinary achievements and lingering pain of America in the post-civil rights era. She grew up on the south side of Chicago, the daughter of a city worker and a stay-at-home mom in a neighborhood rocked by white flight. She was admitted to Princeton amid an angry debate about affirmative action and went on to Harvard Law School, where she was more comfortable doing pro-bono work for the poor than gunning for awards with the rest of her peers. She became a corporate lawyer, then left to train community leaders. She is modern in her tastes but likes to watch reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show and The Brady Bunch.

In this carefully reported biography, drawing upon interviews with more than one hundred people, including one with Michelle herself, Mundy captures the complexity of this remarkable woman and the remarkable life she has lived.

Customer Reviews

A Work in Progress
This is not the definitive biography of Michelle Obama. But it will do for now, at least until the next bio, Michelle Obama: Grace and Intelligence in a Time of Change, comes out at the end of November. (Actually, if you have Kindle you can download the newer biography now.) Liza Mundy’s biography is short and padded, but I can’t blame her for that. Michelle Obama is only 44 years old and while she is smart, ambitious, determined, and full of admirable qualities, the most remarkable thing she has done so far is to marry Barack Obama. It’s hard to make much of a biography out of that. But Mundy has buckled down and done what she can, considering the lack of material and the fact that she wasn’t able to interview Michelle Obama for this book.

Michelle and her older brother Craig grew up in Chicago and because their parents emphasized the importance of education, both of them ended up graduating from Princeton. Michelle continued on to Harvard Law School and took her law degree to various jobs in Chicago. She did well at all her jobs, but left others with the impression that she was restless and bored with those jobs, although she did quite well at all of the jobs.

I think I learned more about Barack Obama from this book than I did about Michelle. That’s okay. My impression from this book is that while Michelle still hasn’t found a job that she is passionate about, other than being a mother of course, she recognizes that Barack has focus and passion and wants to do what she can to help him realize his goals, for himself and for the country.

Before reading this book, I hadn’t read either of Barack Obama’s books, (Dreams from My Father and The Audacity of Hope), or any of the books about his life. From this bio about Michelle, I learned that Barack went to law school only after he realized that he needed to learn about law to better help the communities he was working in in Chicago. He became a member of a church when he realized that would also help him be a more credible member of the community. He ran for office in Illinois when that appeared to be the way to create the changes he was seeking. All that hard work has taken a toll on his own family though. For most of the their marriage, Barack has been a weekend husband and father, and it doesn’t appear that that situation will be improving anytime soon.

Michelle: A Biography is a short book, 217 pages including end notes. There’s no index. It isn’t a fluffy celebrity bio, but it isn’t a full-fledged scholarly biography either. It’s an unfinished work, if only because Michelle Obama has yet to do anything biography-worthy. She is obviously a smart, accomplished, elegant woman who will be an excellent diplomat in the White House and ambassador to the rest of the world. Expect a full-fledged biography in four or eight more years.

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