A FARTHER SHORE: Ireland's Long Road to Peace

Born in Belfast in 1948, Adams has spent his entire life in the nationalist movement and immediately states that he was never a member of the IRA; he similarly denies that Sinn Féin is "the political wing of the IRA." Northern Ireland politics is always a complicated array of facts and contradictions, but Adams has done a workmanlike job of defining events and personalities. He puts the 1988 Gibraltar assassinations of three IRA members squarely at the feet of Margaret Thatcher. And while he excoriates Thatcher and her ilk, he embraces Nelson Mandela ("the greatest political leader of our time"), Steve Bilko, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Rosa Parks and Ho Chi Minh as mentors and heroes. The Good Friday Agreement is at the book's heart. There are many heroes, including Nobel laureate John Hume, Irish Prime Ministers Albert Reynolds and Bertie Ahern, Tony Blair and, most prominently, Bill Clinton. Adams shows how he and his cohorts reached across the Atlantic for help and support. It was Clinton's unilateral 1994 act granting Adams a visa to enter the U.S. that started the peace process rolling. Adams takes us step-by-step through the tense negotiations, which culminated in the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. Adams's eighth book is suspenseful, biased, subversive, blunt and often funny. Edifying for both the neophyte and the veteran observer, it will open eyes as to how this master politician thinks and operates. Photos not seen by PW . (Nov. 11)

Forecast: Adams's tremendous popularity among Irish-Americans, national media appearances and a five-city publicity tour should make A Farther Shore an appealing Christmas buy in the Irish-American community.