Golda: Golda Meir, the Romantic Years

Based in part on hundreds of interviews, this gossipy, intimate, bubbly portrait by the bestselling biographer of Lady Randolph Churchill ( Jennie ) and John Kennedy ( A Hero for Our Time ) strips away Meir's tough-minded politician's exterior to fathom a lonely, tender-hearted woman aching for love. Martin reveals that her marriage to bookish dreamer Morris Meyerson was a hollow shell, a protective screen that enabled her to carry on affairs with a wide variety of men. Short on political analysis and sometimes myopic, his informal narrative follows feisty ``Goldie'' from her first eight years in Kiev where she was born in 1893 to Milwaukee's lower west side where her family settled, through her early Zionist activity in Denver, her migration to Palestine and her increasingly prominent role as champion of Israeli statehood. The story ends in 1948 with Israel's creation; presumably a second installment will follow. This book should be as popular as Martin's previous biographies. Photos not seen by PW. 100,000 first printing; major ad/promo; BOMC alternate. (Nov.)