Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 15, 1995 TAG: 9501160091
SECTION: BOOK PAGE: F-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY PEGGY C. DAVIS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Short
It's worth the price of this book to see a picture of the very stylish Cokie Roberts of NPR and ABC fame in the worst of the late '60s and early '70s hair styles sitting with her mother, Lindy Boggs, and other family members at the 1972 Democratic Convention. But fortunately for the reader, the book is not about Cokie or her lobbyist brother, or the late Hale Boggs.
It's about the diminutive woman who got into a Congressional hearing by adding a purple veil to her hat when she was a 24-year-old congressional bride in 1941 Washington, D.C.
The early chapters of this memoir of Marie Corrine Morrison Claiborne read like the opening of a Southern historical romance: the big house, the servants, the land-poor aristocracy of rural Louisiana and New Orleans. Disease, early death and chance lead to a childhood and teen-age life of variety and sophistication. The descriptions of this time and place are more interesting than you might expect. But the big story here is Lindy Boggs' life in Washington, D.C., and the circumstances that move her into a life of her own as a much admired and respected member of the U.S. House of Representatives. It's like eating peanuts; you can't stop turning the pages.
After reading this book and hearing Lindy Boggs interviewed on NPR and a couple of television programs, I believe she is just as nice as they say.
Peggy C. Davis reviews books regularly for this page.
by CNB