Rachel Maddow
A Biography
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4.1 • 24 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The first biography of the most popular anchor in cable news.
Rachel Maddow has beaten the odds in a way that’s novel in today’s America: she uses her brain.
In a world of banal and opinionated soundbites, she regularly crushes Sean Hannity’s ratings thanks to her deeply researched reports. And in our highly polarized world, Maddow amiably engages the staunchest conservatives, while never hesitating to expose their light-on-facts defenses.
As a result, she's become the top anchor for MSNBC and a beloved representative for all that progressive America holds dear. The news that Maddow was the first publicly-out lesbian to anchor a prime-time TV news show seemed almost anticlimactic to her millions of viewers, who will be surprised and intrigued by little-known details of her life, as written by New York Times bestselling biographer Lisa Rogak.
Growing up in a conservative California town – and viewing herself as a perennial outsider – helped spark an early interest in activism. After attending Stanford and Oxford, she opted for a minimum-wage job as a radio DJ in a tiny Massachusetts market while finishing her Ph.D. She planned to pursue a career as an activist, but 9/11 changed all that, so she returned to local radio where she could help listeners by "explaining stuff." A stint at Air America raised her national profile, which led to her groundbreaking MSNBC show where she dissects the news of the day with an approach found nowhere else on TV.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Rogak (Hillary Clinton in Her Own Words) delivers a flattering if light biography of cable news anchor Rachel Maddow, host of MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show. Rogak pieces together third-party interviews with Maddow, her family, and her colleagues to help tell the story. She covers Maddow's early work as an activist for HIV/AIDS organizations; coming out at Stanford University (which she announced by posting fliers in a bathroom); receiving a Rhodes Scholarship and studying at Oxford; her relationship with her partner, Susan; and her radio work, including on Air America, which, in 2008, led to her getting the MSNBC talk show. The Rachel Maddow Show occupies the book's second half, in which Rogak marvels at Maddow's work ethic (her schedule "would break lesser mortals inside of a week") and reports that Maddow favors doing her own research and writing for the show. Along the way, Rogak touches on Maddow's personal interests (sports, specialty cocktails) and discusses her struggles with cyclical depression. This is a pleasant though by-the-numbers profile: thoroughly researched but not especially revelatory.
Customer Reviews
If you like Rachel
If you like Rachel, you will like this book. I just wish it was more of an autobiography/memoir totally written by Rachel herself. Maybe someday….