It Ain't As Easy As It Looks: Ted Turner's Amazing Story.

IT AIN'T AS EASY AS IT LOOKS. Ted Turner's Amazing Story by Porter Bibb (Crown Publishing, 468 p.) tackles the difficult job of "capturing' the complex personality Ted Turner, he of CNN, WTBS and TNT, of the Atlanta Braves, of ocean racing and international diplomacy, of the Battle for the Environment and of Jane Fonda. The book is quite an accomplishment, thoroughly researched, utterly readable and because of its chief subject, fascinating in many ways.

Ted Turner comes from these pages somewhat larger than life, which is undoubtedly how Porter Bibb sees him, and how he must appear to most ordinary people. Bibb, a former White House correspondent and now an investment banker, knows Turner over the years and knows him well enough to create a vivid portrait of a single-minded, opinionated, whirlwind type of guy, a Don Quixote willing to tackle the windmills without breaking his lance, an unabashed Don Juan and certainly one of the most important media barons of this century (even including Hearst).

Bibb clearly hasn't interviewed Turner for his book, and perhaps the record is so complete, and so colorful, he didn't need to. It's a highly personal Story that doesn't always flatter its subject, and it's also a searching account of the up-and-down fortunes of Turner the multi-billionaire businessman who succeeded more often than he failed.

It's all there--the wives (he told his second wife, Jane/Shirley Smith: "Business comes first. My boat comes second, and you come third"), his tempestuous relationships and his astonishing attitudes (he advised his son's bride: "The provider must have his way"), his whirlwind romance with Jane Fonda, his failed and costly attempt to buy CBS, his relations with Kirk Kerkorian and his purchase of MGM, his giving up parts of CNN, which he built into the largest news gathering organization in the world (beating Reuter's), the Gulf War coverage, the acquisition of Hanna-Barbera and the establishing of the Turner Cartoon Network, and on and on.

Astonishing. and much to Bibb's credit, the yarn never gets dull or financially-dry. On the other hand, perhaps it's impossible to do a dull book on a man like Turner, truly an American original who, warts and all - and by Golly there are warts! - stands out as a remarkably original and exciting mind.

This is a man who took chances and who was absolutely determined to realize his vision and ambition, even if it meant death, as happened when he won the 1979 Fastnet boat race which culminated in one of the worst ocean racing disasters in history. And, typical of Turner, when it was over, he simply quit ocean racing and sold his boat. That was the end of it. No tears, no regrets. The Turner that emerges from the book is an odd mixture of a hard and calculating businessman, brilliant strategist, commercial buccaneer and sentimental Southerner with an agenda of his own. A number of the stories Bibb tells about him are hardly flattering and yet, Turner comes across as a sympathetic and daring figure, a man willing to beat the odds (and sometimes not doing it), a diplomat without portfolio, a personality willing to ride roughshod over opponents, an idealist who eventually discovered that environment and popularity weren't just phrases but very real problems that need to be addressed.

No wonder that, at one time, his eldest daughter, Laura, could speculate aloud whether her father and Jane Fonda might not make a great President and first Lady.

Bibb has a pleasing style that goes beyond just telling the facts. And he has an enormous volume of quotes to choose from.

"Ted Turner has vision, and the guts to stick to them." Bibb quotes a Turner associate. And Dan Schorr attempts to realistically analyze the Turner psyche. "He is looking around for a way to account for his sins", he observes. "I think Ted's motivation is to pay back past slights, pay back all the critics (who didn't believe in the CNN potential and stood in his way). He still wants to vindicate himself."