My Story

Cover Type: Hardcover
Book Condition: As New
Jacket Condition: As New
Publisher: Knopf/Random House Australia P/L
Publisher Place: North Sydney
Publisher Year: 2014
Edition: First Edition

Description: 504 pages. Book and Jacket appear to have hardly been read and are both in As new condition throughout.

Publishers Description: I was Prime Minister for three years and three days. Three years and three days of resilience. Three years and three days of changing the nation. Three years and three days for you to judge. On Wednesday 23rd June 2010, with the government in turmoil, Julia Gillard asked then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for a leadership ballot. The next day, Julia Gillard became Australias 27th Prime Minister, and our first female leader. Australia was alive to the historic possibilities. Here was a new approach for a new time. It was to last three extraordinary years. This is Julia Gillards chronicle of that turbulent time - a strikingly candid self-portrait of a political leader seeking to realise her ideals. It is her story of what it was like - in the face of government in-fighting and often hostile media - to manage a hung parliament, build a diverse and robust economy, create an equitable and world-class education system, ensure a dignified future for Australians with disabilities, all while attending to our international obligations and building strategic alliances for our future. This is a politician driven by a sense of purpose - from campus days with the Australian Union of Students, to a career in the law, to her often gritty, occasionally glittering rise up the ranks of the Australian Labor Party. Refreshingly honest, peppered with a wry humour and personal insights, Julia Gillard does not shy away from her mistakes, admitting freely to errors, misjudgements, and policy failures as well as detailing her political successes. Here is an account of what was hidden behind the resilience and dignified courage Gillard showed as prime minister - her view of the vicious hate campaigns directed against her, and a reflection on what it means - and what it takes - to be a woman leader in contemporary politics. Here, in her own words, Julia Gillard reveals what life was really like as Australias first female prime minister. Read Caroline Baums Review Lets face it, most political memoirs are a self-serving bore. But I found Julia Gillards My Story far more rewarding and less revisionist than many. The backroom stuff about Rudd (and Carr) is especially juicy, but shes also strong on the legislation and reform she steered through the ugliest parliament of recent memory. Whats never in doubt is her steeliness, her resolve and her vision. I disagree with her on communication and, in some instances, policy, but admire her calm sense of purpose.

ISBN: 9780857983909