The personification of the postwar ideal of the self-effacing homemaker, Pat Nixon was an intensely private person, in a painfully public role, at a time when America's role and a woman's role were both subjects of bitter debate. To relive that era of turmoil from the First Lady's anguished vantage point in Heath Lee’s thoroughly researched and elegantly written biography is unexpectedly enthralling. As her husband, Richard Nixon, put it, 'She also ran.

For this reader, Pat Nixon came to life in surprising ways in The Mysterious Mrs. Nixon. She was smarter than people knew, funnier than people expected and stronger than people gave her credit for. She was also a successful diplomat for her husband and contributed to his political success including her advancing of his commitment to civil rights – all documented here for the first time. As Dick later said of Pat, “She deserved so much more.” That she did... and she gets it here.

Everything I thought I knew about Pat Nixon was upended by reading Heath Hardage Lee’s astonishing new biography. Beautiful, steely, and charismatic, Pat Nixon was, in Henry Kissinger’s words, a woman ‘totally without illusions,’ who cloaked her extraordinary ambition in the guise of ‘The Nation’s Ideal Housewife.’ The Mysterious Mrs. Nixon convinced me that the tragedy of Watergate could have been avoided entirely had Dick Nixon followed the path of his remarkable First Lady.

A marvelous biography—a deeply reported, illuminating story of love, ambition, and influence.

Heath Lee reveals a strong, complex, intensely human woman. Mrs. Nixon is a mystery no more