THAT CHURCHILL WOMAN has been high on my want to read list this year. A book about Winston Churchill's notorious mother? Count me in!
Jennie Jerome was a rich, privileged, and unconventional New Yorker who married Lord Randolph Churchill and becomes the mother of Winston Churchill, one of the most prominent men of the twentieth century. Jennie hardly knew Randolph before agreeing to marry him, however, she was hellbent on marrying him despite her mother's misgivings. The marriage had its ups and downs, and Jennie had countless lovers. But, one particular will dominate her life in this book: Count Charles Kinsky. Their love affair is pretty much doomed from the start, yet they can't stay away from each other, even when Bertie, Prince of Wales, warns Jennie about the risks himself...
THAT CHURCHILL WOMAN is a perfect book to read if you want to read about a woman that wouldn't let social rules define her life. Jennie Churchill is a fascinating woman and had a shrewd political mind that Winston Churchill must have inherited. Speaking of Winston, some chapters in the second part of the book is from Winston's point of view, which is a double-edged sword because he is so dominating; his life was so interesting even as a boy, that it takes the focus away from Jennie. While I did like reading about Jennie, I found the focus on her love life and especially her relationship with Coun Kinsky dominated the story a bit too much. I felt that she was such a compelling person and far too interesting to be defined by her relationship with one man. This made the ending somewhat depressing for me because I wanted to read about her later years. Instead, you get a summary of what happened to Jennie later in life.
That being said, despite my complaints about not getting the whole story, I enjoyed reading THAT CHURCHILL WOMAN. The writing is lovely and I quite liked getting to know Jennie Churchill. Also, a sequel about Winston wouldn't be so bad...
The Paris Wife meets PBSโs Victoria in this
enthralling novel of the life and loves of one of historyโs
most remarkable women: Winston Churchillโs scandalous
American mother, Jennie Jerome.
Wealthy, privileged, and fiercely independent New Yorker
Jennie Jerome took Victorian England by storm when she
landed on its shores. As Lady Randolph Churchill, she gave
birth to a man who defined the twentieth century: her son
Winston. But Jennieโreared in the luxury of Gilded Age
Newport and the Paris of the Second Empireโlived an
outrageously modern life all her own, filled with
controversy, passion, tragedy, and triumph.
When the nineteen-year-old beauty agrees to marry the son of
a duke she has known only three days, sheโs instantly swept
up in a whirlwind of British politics and the breathless
social climbing of the Marlborough House Set, the reckless
men who surround Bertie, Prince of Wales. Raised to think
for herself and careless of English society rules, the new
Lady Randolph Churchill quickly becomes a London sensation:
adored by some, despised by others.
Artistically gifted and politically shrewd, she shapes her
husbandโs rise in Parliament and her young sonโs difficult
passage through boyhood. But as the familyโs influence
soars, scandals explode and tragedy befalls the Churchills.
Jennie is inescapably drawn to the brilliant and seductive
Count Charles Kinskyโdiplomat, skilled horse-racer, deeply
passionate lover. Their impossible affair only intensifies
as Randolph Churchillโs sanity frays, and Jennieโa woman
whose every move on the public stage is judgedโmust walk a
tightrope between duty and desire. Forced to decide where
her heart truly belongs, Jennie risks everythingโeven her
sonโand disrupts lives, including her own, on both sides of
the Atlantic.
Breathing new life into Jennieโs legacy and the gilded world
over which she reigned, That Churchill Woman paints a
portrait of the difficultโand sometimes impossibleโbalance
between love, freedom, and obligation, while capturing the
spirit of an unforgettable woman, one who altered the course
of history.
No excerpt available.
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