The Iron Lady

Library Journal

Young, a columnist for The Guardian , has written the first essential biography of Britain's Prime Minister Thatcher. He has produced a fair-minded but critical account of a politician with a ``driving sense of mission'' who brought together ``a cadre of like-minded people who would, with her, change the face of the Conservative Party and at the same time launch the recovery of Britain.'' He describes her confrontations with the trade unions, the IRA, the Argentine junta, and critics inside and outside her own party. This book complements Peter Riddell's The Thatcher Government (Basil Blackwell, 1986, 2d. ed.) and Andrew Gamble's The Free Economy and the Strong State (Duke Univ. Pr., 1988). A best seller in Britain, this should appeal to readers interested in European politics, the emergence of the New Right, and women in politics.-- Kent Worcester, Columbia Univ.

Booknews

A number-one bestseller upon publication in England, political journalist Young's biography offers a popular, thorough, and astute account of an extraordinary and controversial career. He follows Thatcher from her political formation as the daughter of a small-town alderman, through her apprenticeship under Harold Macmillan and her participation in the government of Edward Heath, to her election as prime minister in 1979, her systematic destruction of the "old" Conservatism, and her emergence as the senior statesman of the Western world. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)