Pat Nixon: The Untold Story

No surprises here. Julie finds her mother devoted, loyal, thrifty, courageousa remarkable woman whose ""grit'' kept her going from her struggling student days in the Depression through the vicissitudes of political life to the nightmare of Watergate. Julie's sincere affection and admiration for her mother are the most attractive features of this otherwise lackluster book. Ironically, even in her daughter's hands Pat Nixon remains the quintessential political wife, fading into the background as events overtake the Presidency and her biography slips into a apologia for Nixon's political career. Julie remains her father's most spirited defender: Haldeman isolated him, Dean lied about him, and the press victimized him. Nixon supporters will find this valentine of a book reassuring, but everyone else will look in vain for the ``untold truth.'' Like the close-knit family scenes the author is fond of describing, the book is cozy, respectable and dull. Major ad/promo. (November 10)