Maggie: The First Lady by Brenda Maddox (Coronet Books, £8.99).

HERE is an attempt to paint an intimate portrait of the family background, the political life and, yes, the handbags behind a woman whose figure still looms large in British politics.

Maddox details the home life of grocer's daughter from Grantham as one of constant activity. Idleness, according to her strict Methodist upbringing, was seen as a sin, and it is easy to make parallels between this busy upbringing and her legendary ability to get by on just four hours' sleep per night..

Mrs T's student days at Oxford follow a similar pattern of hard work and driving ambition, and Maddox suggests she cut an austere figure at college.

The book stresses Margaret's femininity, a picture sometimes at odds with her public persona.

In one act of "sisterly" kindness, Maddox depicts Mrs Thatcher casting a worried glance over the hair of the BBC's Sue MacGregor and inquiring: "Would you like to borrow my rollers, dear?"

Through her many crises in office, Mrs Thatcher is depicted as a headstrong and occasionally stubborn woman who weathered her many storms with the same application and hard work she was used to back in the grocer's shop in Grantham.

Paul McGurk