Staying True

Sanford—the wronged wife of Mark Sanford, disgraced governor of South Carolina, who famously refused to stand by him when his affair came to light—delivers a crisp and affecting reading of her memoir of her family, career, faith, and the very public implosion of her marriage. She's surprisingly relatable and possessed of a very dry wit. When the news of her husband's affair broke, her husband asked her what to say in his first public appearance. She told him, “Don't talk about your heart.” Watching him sob (“carry on” in Jenny Sanford's words) during a mea culpa almost completely devoted to matters of his heart, she was surrounded by her posse of friends, one of whom observed, “He wasn't hiking the Appalachian trail, he was getting some Argentinean tail.” Even if Sanford's piety occasionally finds best expression in platitudes, she turns out a memorable listen; after a while her detachment and the edge to her voice seem less like drawbacks than signs of her admirable reserve and steeliness of character. A Ballantine hardcover. (Feb.)