This is the second Sarah Palin book I've read this year, the first being Geoffrey Dunn's The Lies of Sarah Palin. There really is little in McGinniss's book that was not already covered in Dunn's book other than some salacious details like Palin's fling with basketball star Glenn Rice or Todd and Sarah's cocaine use. Both books paint the same general portrait of Palin, and they obtain their information from many sources who are politically simpatico with Palin (conservative Republicans) or who were at one time friends or close associates of Palin: Palin is a lying, vindictive, incompetent know-nothing who does, however, possess a canny ability to manipulate and deceive people and use them to her own political and personal ends.

McGinniss makes his book almost as much about himself and the firestorm that arose when he moved next door to Palin, and McGinniss uses far fewer named sources than does Dunn. McGinniss, though, seems to have talked to many people who were close to Palin but who would only speak as unnamed sources for fear of retribution from Palin. Most of the details that McGinniss reveals, however, have already been substantiated by named sources in Dunn's book.

What both McGinniss and Dunn's books show is that Sarah Palin is quite shrewd at manipulating people to her own ends and at playing the political game in Alaska, but she is a hypocrite, a bully, a liar, and just a generally mean-spirited person. Additionally, she is grossly ignorant about how government works, about history, about religion, and about world affairs.

Reading these two books leaves little doubt that the US is quite lucky, indeed, to have escaped this bumpkin's being elected to the office of vice-president. Little in life is scarier than the notion of Sarah Palin being second-in-line for the presidency.