Condi: The Condoleezza Rice Story

Condi: The Condoleezza Rice Story

by Antonia Felix

Pocket Books $67

She was the youngest person and first black woman to be named provost of Stanford University. She is, at 48, America's youngest national security adviser, and she once dated an NFL player. Condoleezza Rice was named after a musical term, con dolcezza - to play with sweetness - by her parents who, both educators, set a standard of excellence for their only child that would give her the 'twice as good' edge that was necessary to be on an even standing with her white peers in segregated Birmingham, Alabama, in 1954. The Bushes discovered her during Ronald Reagan's presidency, when she was a political science professor at Stanford. She was the architect of George W. Bush's nuclear weapons policy, and his tutor on the Soviet Union. Rice is an interesting person, but this is a rather dry account of her life. Antonia Felix relies on secondary sources rather than interviewing Rice.