It's unclear whether a book that provides even more exposure for Martha Stewart is really necessary, given how much she already gets.
Still, this book tries, in painstaking detail, to offer some insight into her recent troubles and how she overcame them to become more successful than ever.
The problem is, there really isn't any new information here. Most of it is has been reported before, with flashbacks into her childhood and rise to power that come across as awkwardly placed and hardly enlightening.
The parts of this book that discuss Stewart's PR strategy during the investigation and her trial are interesting. Slater includes firsthand information from Lanny Davis, a PR advisor to President Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky saga, about his work for Stewart during her ordeal. He also shows examples of PR hits and misses during the indictment, trial, and prison term, highlighting her comeback as the biggest PR victory of all. But even that information isn't enough to make this book worth reading.
Title Martha: On Trial, In Jail, and on a Comeback
Author Robert Slater
Publisher Pearson Education (January 2006), 255 pages
Reviewed by Erica Iacono
