Rose Kennedy: The Life and Times of a Political Matriarch

Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy (1890–1995) was the daughter of a devoutly Catholic disciplinarian and an extroverted Boston mayor whose career was blighted by his affair with a cigarette girl nearly half his age. Sounds like a recipe for a dramatic life—and it is—but Perry’s bio (after Jacqueline Kennedy), though interesting at times, is disappointingly whitewashed. When Rose married the son of her father’s political rival, her lifelong pursuit of excellence melded with her husband’s hunger for power. The profoundly religious mother of nine said that her great ambition was to have her children be as morally, physically, and mentally perfect as possible, and she expected the same of herself: a master of public composure, Rose was a svelte and smartly dressed compulsive shopper who “never publicly conceded” knowledge of her husband’s womanizing, and put on a brave face after the violent deaths of four of her children. She proved an indefatigable campaigner for her sons, yet surprisingly never bothered herself with women’s political issues (Pope Pius XII, however, granted her the title of countess in recognition of her prodigious charity work). To profile a Kennedy outshone by the men in her life is an admirable goal, but Perry uncovers little that Rose herself didn’t reveal. 16 pages of photos. (July)