When WORLD senior writer and book reviewer Susan Olasky first picked up Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue at the bookstore yesterday, she didn’t have high expectations. She writes:

Most political autobiographies are boring because the candidate is afraid to write anything that might lose a vote, so I was pleasantly surprised to find the first half of the book to be vivid and revealing. Palin (helped by WORLD senior writer Lynn Vincent) describes her Alaska childhood, her teenage years, meeting Todd, working her way through college, eloping (and rustling up a couple of witnesses from a nursing home), and having babies. Meanwhile, she was developing her Christian faith and a libertarian-leaning political philosophy that eventually led her into local politics.

Susan goes on to talk about the other half of the book, which relives the 2008 presidential campaign:

I understand why she felt she had to defend herself from anonymous attacks, but that part of the book seems old, although she does include some weird tidbits: For example, McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt was apparently concerned that Palin was on the Atkins diet and told her to stop, adding that the campaign was going to bring a nutritionist on board to teach her how to eat.

Read Susan’s review in its entirety here.