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 PBS’s Victoria in this
enthralling novel of the life and loves of one of history’s
most remarkable women: Winston Churchill’s 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 Jennie—reared in the luxury of Gilded Age
Newport and the Paris of the Second Empire—lived 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, she’s 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
husband’s rise in Parliament and her young son’s difficult
passage through boyhood. But as the family’s influence
soars, scandals explode and tragedy befalls the Churchills.
Jennie is inescapably drawn to the brilliant and seductive
Count Charles Kinsky—diplomat, skilled horse-racer, deeply
passionate lover. Their impossible affair only intensifies
as Randolph Churchill’s sanity frays, and Jennie—a woman
whose every move on the public stage is judged—must walk a
tightrope between duty and desire. Forced to decide where
her heart truly belongs, Jennie risks everything—even her
son—and disrupts lives, including her own, on both sides of
the Atlantic.
Breathing new life into Jennie’s legacy and the gilded world
over which she reigned, That Churchill Woman paints a
portrait of the difficult—and sometimes impossible—balance
between love, freedom, and obligation, while capturing the
spirit of an unforgettable woman, one who altered the course
of history.
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