Louise Radnofsky reads about politics when she’s not reporting on politics.

There are only so many hours in the day, and we want to help you. So here’s the first in an occasional series rounding up what you need to know about big politics books you want to read, if only you could find the time.

PublicAffairs Books

In between election returns, we read “Sarah From Alaska” by Scott Conroy and Shushannah Walshe, two reporters who covered last year’s presidential race. It’s out now from PublicAffairs Books (with the teasing subtitle, “The Sudden Rise and Brutal Education of a New Conservative Superstar”). We found enough in it to sustain a week of cocktail conversations.

Here are the highlights:

— Getting the news from Fox: Sarah Palin learned from Fox News that she and John McCain wouldn’t win last year’s presidential election. When she heard anchor Brit Hume announce that Barack Obama had won Ohio, “Palin swallowed a mouthful of air. ‘Oh, well, that’s it,’ she said.”

— No concession on the concession: Palin wanted to give a concession speech, but that was nixed by McCain and his aides. It had been written by former Bush speechwriter Matthew Scully, and would have had her say, “when a black citizen prepares to fill the office of Washington and Lincoln, that is a shining moment in our history that can be lost on no one.” And Palin would have offered her own lavish praise for Obama and his “beautiful family,” McCain and the “honor of a lifetime” that he had given her, and a shout-out to a boy with Down syndrome who she had met on the campaign trail. McCain and his staff were adamantly opposed, though the authors offer no real explanation beyond the general friction between the McCain and Palin camps by the end of the campaign…