QBD Books reviewed the book as follows:
In 2007, Kevin Rudd swept to power with a 23-seat victory, bringing Labor in from eleven years in opposition, and unseated John Howard, the longest-serving prime minister since Menzies.
So who was the man behind the phenomenally successful Kevin O7 campaign, this Mandarin-speaking, family-focused, church-going, 'here-to-help', policy wonk from rural Queensland?
In the first of a two-volume autobiography, Kevin Rudd brings us to the point of his election as the 26th Prime Minister of Australia. One of our most polarising and compelling figures, this is the first time we hear from the man direct. Rudd chronicles a childhood shaped by the love of his mother and tragically disrupted by the death of his father, an event that left the family without a home or an income and which would foster Rudd's passion for social justice and forge his political vision. He tells of his years as a budding Chinese scholar, his marriage to the remarkable Thérèse Rein, and his various successes and misadventures as a career diplomat. In Canberra, he takes on the absurdities of the Labor factions, the arrogance of John Howard, the mania of Mark Latham, while chronicling the daily high drama and low farce of life in the capital.
Written with passion, conviction, wit and insight, Rudd's story chronicles the unlikely and spectacular rise of the boy from Nambour and prepares the ground for the coming of one of the most tumultuous periods in Australian political history.
I read this book over a couple of weeks in November 2017 in Bogota, Colombia. I found the first half very easy to read - it chronicled his early life and the influences that shaped his character and politics. The second half, which chronicled his time in Opposition leading up to his successful 2007 tilt at the Prime Ministership, was a more laborious read but an interesting one, as he laid bare the inner workings of the Labor party.
What comes through is what I already knew - that here we had a clever and honest politican who had come from a non-traditional political background. As PM, he was prolific in what he achieved and he has left a wonderful legacy of initiatives. His handling of the 2008 World Economic Crisis, in particular, saved Australia from the worst of the effects.
I was a big Kevin Rudd fan and felt that he was stabbed in the back by those who should have supported him within the Labor machine.
I look forward to reading Vol 2 when it is published next year.
I also have Kevin Rudd - Twice Prime Minister by Patrick Weller (see http://timsbestreads.blogspot.com.au/p/patrick-weller-kevin-rudd-twice-prime.html) as well as multiple biographies and books on Curtain, Chifley, Keating and Whitlam, the giants of the Labor movement. Needless to say, I have no books on any of the Liberal Prime Ministers who are a dull lot by comparison.
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