Hugh Brogan's trenchant Profile is a study of the Kennedy Presidency, not a full-scale political biography (and still less an intimate personal portrait). In order to understand Kennedy's aims and achievements in the White House, however, it necessarily pays attention to Kennedy the man, and reviews his background and earlier career, and the influences upon him.

Brogan concentrates on the major themes: Kennedy's successful candidacy for office; his foreign policy; his part in the civil rights revolution; his handling of economic affairs; his agenda as a reformer; and, of course, the significance of his murder. Hugh Brogan succeeds admirably in his object of presenting Kennedy as a credible statesman and human being, not as a figure of legend - nor, in the modern way, as a figure of legend to be debunked.