If the Obamas are annoyed with this author, they should be. Kantor pieces together stories we have heard already from news writers and commentators; along the way she adds what she assumes are Michelle Obama's thoughts and feelings about her public and personal life, claiming the basis for this information are interviews she held with Mrs. Obama's friends and those working in the White House. Don't waste your time with this book. You will learn nothing about the First Lady or the President that

When Kantor was signing my copy of this book during an appearance at the Chicago Public Library, I asked her why she was surprised by the "controversy" it caused--since it was a "warts and all" story, naturally all the media wanted to focus on were the warts. (Of course if there hadn't been any warts, she would have been criticized for that instead.) She just shrugged and said, "We live in strange times, don't we?" After reading the book, I think the idea that she portrays Michelle Obama as an "...

Jodi Kantor probably thought she was being objective but she paints a very unsympathetic picture of the Obamas. Michelle is shown as being controlling, defensive, uncooperative and an overprotective parent. The President is characterized as an extreme introvert, socially awkward and overconfident about his abilities. None of it rings true to me. I have seen the President and the First Lady electrify a crowd of listeners and I will never forget it. Kantor says that he is an uninspiring speaker. S...

The Obamas attempts to provide an emotional history of the Obama marriage. Jodi Kantor talks about their lives and their innermost thoughts as if she had been there, but in the tradition of such books, doesn't directly attribute her information to specific people. Michelle, she says, doesn't believe in government very much. She refused to participate in many political events, and refused to have her time frittered away to no real purpose by the disorganized West Wing. She insisted on having a fa...

NYT reporter Kantor tells a sympathetic story about the Obamas and how they've adapted to the Presidency and the White House. Personally, I'm amazed that everyone living there doesn't go stark, staring mad. The best analogy for their experience is probably that it's like living in an armor-plated goldfish bowl, with snipers swimming around at the top. Michelle Obama is the focus here, and Kantor does a good job of contrasting her professionalism with her husband's populism. They seem to compleme...

I admit that I’m struggling to write this review. I’ll nit-pick in a moment, but for now I’ll simply say that this book was like the ultimate Dessert Book. It was voyeuristic and fun—the book equivalent of picking up US Weekly or InTouch. There was mention of how Michelle Obama’s wardrobe has played into public perception, there was a section on their disastrous New York City date night, there were little political asides and well-written summaries of the President’s challenges and victories ove...

There was so much information about this book, I was reluctant to read it. That would have been a mistake. The Obamas does an excellent job of explaining the conflicts between the personal and political, being black instead of white, wanting to be private within a public view,and melding unique personalities amongst value-laden societal judgments. One theme is The Obamas growing understanding of perception and images. The book shows how the Administration in general and Michelle in particular de...

Yes we can! Yes we must!

"The Obamas" is not really about politics--when it talks about policy decisions and the frustrations of the office, it drags--but about what it is like for a fairly ordinary upper middle class family that has only recently run into fame and politics to suddenly have to adapt to life in the White House. The author really shines in her descriptions of how The Obamas were gradually stripped of their naïveté about how their private lives would continue to functions. At the beginning of the book we m...

Before the book was released, I expected to like it, mainly because I like Kantor's New York Times reporting, and assumed it would be a well-researched book. I was dismayed by the media coverage of the book's release, as the mainstream media (on both sides of the political fence) seemed to make the book sound like an expose of terrible things about the couple. Finally, warily, reading it, more than once I had to ask myself what the mainstream media was smoking. Angry Black Woman? MIchelle Obama

Jodi Kantor gives a very in depth account of the first three years of the Obama administration. It is a fascinating book and I blazed through it in just a couple of days. It explores some of the naïveté that the president had upon entering the white house, but also shows some of his steadfast characteristics that endured behind the scenes. The only area that suffers is that Kantor appears to enjoy dwelling on the low points of his presidency while giving quick summaries of the high points. Overa...

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway.It is a new (2017) edition of a 2012 book and covers just over the first two years of Obama's first term. It is the same as the previous edition but for a three-page, post-Trump-victory preface. I'd thought it was a bit of a gimmick to market it as new, given the paucity of new information, but I was still wholly prepared to like the book. However, it's terrible. Unless you were under a rock from 2008-2010, you know all the news that's in here - it's all p...

In 2004, a young state senator from Illinois gave the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention. His unusual name wasn't one anyone knew -- until that night. Barack Obama's address decried polarization as the work of pundits; he stressed the unity of the American people in their belief in simple dreams, in certain ideals like justice and equality. He called for people to work together, and created a wave of popularity that sent him from obscurity to the White House in just four years...

I'm not someone who necessarily admires or likes the first family politically, so picking this book up came more from the interesting media feedback that came about upon its release than anything else. Especially after being disappointed in the election results, a little something to read about four more years of the Obamas can't be a bad choice. Interestingly, this book ended up providing an entirely different perception of both Barack and Michelle than I anticipated it would, and the book actu...

This was a really interesting read, and the (somewhat limited) politics it contained was quite accessible. I was really interested in the subject, especially after hearing the debate in the media over whether or not it contained a positive portrayal of Michelle Obama. As far as that part is concerned, I can see why Mrs. Obama might have been unhappy with how she came across in the book, but I can't say that I got the same impression- it made her seem forceful, opinionated, strong, and unwilling

Although I don’t usually read political books, I was intrigued when I heard about Jodi Kantor’s book, The Obamas. It promised to provide insight into the first couple’s powerful partnership and talk about how these two equally successful and driven people make their marriage work while living in the spotlight. The main theme of this book is how the Obamas changed when they moved to Washington. We explore Michelle Obama’s struggle to be a modern first lady with a purpose and her conflict with the...

Kantor wrote a very personal and insightful look into the first term of President Obama and the adjustments that his family went through to settle in to the Washington lifestyle. Both Michelle and Barack came from families that struggled to make ends meet and they have reached the pinnacle of life in America. Most of us believe we would envy the life they lead, but until I read this book, I do not think I could have believed the personal sacrifice they have given up as a family to allow Presiden...

I was drawn to this book out of curiosity and must say I learned a lot from it. One thing I learned was just how truly meteoric Barack Obama's rise to power was and exactly how deeply and fundamentally Barack and Michelle Obama hope to change the country. Michelle was unsupportive of Barack's desire to invest himself in political life because she felt she'd seen enough to convince her that politics doesn't have the power to change things as deeply as she felt they needed changing. Insights into

The narrative spun by Kantor is delicious, anchored by the brilliant question of how the dynamics between Barack and Michelle Obama would shape the force and character of US policies. Inverting the typical storyline of how presidency affects the First Couple, in this case, the possibility that the private can influence the public, reveals an optimism about the Obama presidency that is nonetheless realistic and replete with the failures and disorganization of Obama's management of the White House...

A sympathetic portrayal of the Obamas. In her descriptions of the Obamas through their nomination to the White House up to the present, she is able to give readers a sense of the difficulties Barack and Michelle face in such unforgiving public roles. I was left with a sense that Barack Obama is an idealist with a big heart who took the job of President with the intention to make real, positive change and do some good in the world but was left severely disillusioned. Michelle's dilemma is intimat...