journalist and best-selling author
Susan Page
Susan Page is the Washington bureau chief of USA TODAY. She is the author of Madam Speaker: Nancy Pelosi and the Lessons of Power (2021) and The Matriarch: Barbara Bush and the Making of an American Dynasty (2019), both New York Times best-sellers. Her latest book, The Rulebreaker: The Life and Times of Barbara Walters, was published by Simon & Schuster in April 2024.
Barbara Walters was a force from the time TV was exploding on the American scene in the 1960s to its waning dominance in a new world of competition from streaming services and social media half a century later. She was not just a groundbreaker for women (Oprah announced when she was seventeen that she wanted to be Barbara Walters), but also expanded the big TV interview and then dominated the genre. By the end of her career, she had interviewed more of the famous and infamous, from presidents to movie stars to criminals to despots, than any other journalist in history. Then at sixty-seven, past the age many female broadcasters found themselves involuntarily retired, she pioneered a new form of talk TV called The View. She is on the short list of those who have left the biggest imprints on television news and on our culture, male or female. So, who was the woman behind the legacy?
The Rulebreaker paints a 365-degree portrait of the iconic journalist — from the family dramas of her childhood to her groundbreaking achievements to her lonely final years. Author Susan Page conducted about 130 interviews with Barbara Walters’ family, friends, co-workers, bosses and rivals. She talked to women who followed Barbara on TV — among them Diane Sawyer, Katie Couric, Connie Chung, Norah O’Donnell and Whoopi Goldberg — and others ranging from her long-time make-up artist to Henry Kissinger.
This biography reports events never before been made public, and it provides new dimensions and insights into some of her most famous episodes of her life.
The Rulebreaker is available for order online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.
PRAISE FOR THE RULEBREAKER
FROM OTHER GROUNDBREAKING WOMEN IN BROADCASTING
Norah O’Donnell: “A stunning account of Barbara Walters’ journey to change television – and history – as we know it.”
Katie Couric: "A smart, juicy and deeply reported book about the woman who put up with a lot of s@*# so those of us who came after wouldn’t have to—or at least as much."
Connie Chung: “I thought I knew the Barbara who valiantly paved our way and earned her divadom but Susan Page uncovered so much more.”
Leslie Stahl: “Susan Page pulls a Barbara Walters -- asking all the right questions, just as personal and sharp as Barbara used to in her X-ray-penetrating interrogations: how did she land her "gets," how did plot out her interviews, who did she think of she thought of as her rivals (and how she dealt with them)... along with questions about her far less successful personal life. “
Andrea Mitchell: . Susan Page’s brilliantly written and researched biography breaks new ground in conveying a fascinating new portrait of an American icon in a book that is impossible to put down.”
Madam Speaker: Nancy Pelosi and the Lessons of Power
The definitive biography of Nancy Pelosi, the most powerful woman in American political history. Featuring more than 150 exclusive interviews with those who know her best — and a series of in-depth, news-making interviews with Pelosi herself — Madam Speaker is unprecedented in the scope of its exploration of Nancy Pelosi’s remarkable life and of her indelible impact on American politics. Madam Speaker is available for purchase online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop. You can also check for a copy at your local library.
The Matriarch: Barbara Bush and the Making of an American Dynasty
Barbara Pierce Bush was one of the country's most popular and powerful figures, yet her full story has never been told. The Matriarch tells the riveting tale of a woman who helped define two American presidencies and an entire political era. This biography is informed by more than one hundred interviews with Bush friends and family members, hours of conversation with Mrs. Bush herself in the final six months of her life, and access to her diaries that spanned decades. The Matriarch is available for purchase online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop. You can also check for a copy at your local library.
Photo by Hannah Gaber