Bill Clinton

Biographer Nigel Hamilton takes an unbiased look at the controversial and highly talked about presidency of William Jefferson Clinton--the ups and downs, highs and lows, and, yes, the sex scandal that nearly ended it all. Hamilton writes with an eye to the utmost detail yet never ceases to compel and entertain his readers. James Adams delivers the work in a tone that projects its importance, and his ear-pleasing Arkansas accent brings an air of realism. Hamilton offers his own take on the events in question but never stands on a soapbox to preach his own ideals and opinions on the matters in question. The result is a truly intriguing account of what it's like to be president of the United States. L.B. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

May 21, 2007
This second volume of the author's biography casts Clinton's first term as a Miltonian epic of fall and redemption. The years 1993–1994, culminating in the Democrats' loss of Congress in midterm elections, are “Paradise Lost”: a disastrous failure caused by a weak White House chief of staff (Mack McLarty), Clinton's own promiscuous openness to ideas and indecisiveness and, most of all, “co-president” Hillary's baleful influence. 1995–1996 are “Paradise Regained”: a new chief of staff (Leon Panetta) restores order, Hillary learns her place and Clinton grows a spine, comforts the nation after the Oklahoma City bombing, humiliates Newt Gingrich and wins reelection. (Alas, enter Monica Lewinsky, “a luscious fruit in the Garden of Eden, eager to be plucked.”) Hamilton styles this arc, with many military metaphors, as a study of Clinton's maturing capacity for “command” as he grows from “arch-baby boomer” to “undisputed leader of his country.” Unfortunately, this focus on character often overshadows the substance of policy (the treatment of Hillary's byzantine health-care plan is especially sketchy) and is not entirely convincing, since the early, feckless Clinton seems to have accomplished more than the “determinedly presidential” later Clinton, with his third way politics of triangulation. At the celebratory end of Hamilton's account, Clinton's comeback is a merely personal triumph, devoid of political significance.