Did you ever hear the saying that behind every great man stands a great woman? Have you ever wondered about a great man and the mother who raised him?
In the book, That Churchill Woman we meet the woman who was the mother of Winston Churchill, who of course would go onto great prominence as leader of England during World War 2.
Jennie Jerome was her name. She was a woman raised in luxury, having been born to an American family with influence and money. She arrives in England and to all accounts becomes a woman who is followed, written about, and admired though often spoken of disparagingly. She came to Victorian England so staid in their morals and convention and married Lord Randolph Churchill. The marriage, as presented in this book, was not a happy one for Randolph was seldom home and was a closeted homosexual.
However, Jennie makes her own way. Rumored to have had many encounters with other men, she is drawn to Count Charles Kinsky and falls deeply in love with him. However, Jennie well knows the “rules” of the times and even though she could divorce Randolph, she instead charts Randolph’s rise in the environs of British politics and Parliament. She walks a narrow path of what her desires are and what the times dictate.
She was her own person, strong willed and willing to do what needed to be accomplished, even at the risk of losing the man she loved and the children she gave birth to. Jennie had an indomitable spirit and through her legacy, she was able to provide England, her adopted land with a man who would eventually lead them through the most trying time one could imagine.
Thank you to Stephanie Barron, Ballantine Books, and Net Galley for an advanced copy of this book due to be published on January 29, 2019
and here’s the author:
Francine Stephanie Barron was born in Binghamton, New York, and grew up in Washington D.C., the youngest of six sisters. She graduated from Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School, then earned a degree at Princeton University in European History. While there, she wrote for the university newspaper, which led to later jobs with The Miami Herald and The San Jose Mercury News. She pursued an MA at Stanford University in Latin American History, but left to work at the CIA for several years as an intelligence analyst. After the publication of her first book, she started writing full-time, citing John McPhee (who taught her at Princeton) and Elizabeth George as particular influences. She lives in Denver, Colorado, with her children and husband. Her husband, Mark, is a prominent lawyer in the area.[ Her eldest son, Sam, also went on to study at Princeton.
yaya_reads (Marialyce) 