A Signed First Edition Club Recommendation
"Told in the voice of Lorena Hickok, an AP reporter assigned to cover First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, White Houses is the wonderful story of their relationship from the early 30s until Eleanor's death in 1962. From their early friendship through their secret love affair—secret but known to many in the White House where Hick lived for a time as "First Friend"—the story is passionate, loving, and stunningly romantic. I was swept up into historical events I thought I knew, and overwhelmed by those I didn't know at all. All in all, one of the most remarkable novels I've read."
Publisher Random House
Publication Date 2018-02-13
Section New Hardcover - Fiction / All Staff Suggestions
Format Hardcover
ISBN 9780812995664
The unexpected and forbidden affair between Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok unfolds in a triumph of historical fiction from the New York Times bestselling author of Away and Lucky Us.
“I never envied a wife or a husband, until I met Eleanor. Then, I would have traded everything I ever had, every limo ride, every skinny dip, every byline and carefree stroll, for what Franklin had, polio and all.”
Lorena Hickok meets Eleanor Roosevelt in 1932 while reporting on Franklin Roosevelt’s first presidential campaign. Having grown up worse than poor in South Dakota and reinvented herself as the most prominent woman reporter in America, “Hick,” as she’s known to her friends and admirers, is not quite instantly charmed by the idealistic, patrician Eleanor. But then, as her connection with the future first lady deepens into intimacy, what begins as a powerful passion matures into a lasting love, and a life that Hick never expected to have. She moves into the White House, where her status as “first friend” is an open secret, as are FDR’s own lovers. After she takes a job in the Roosevelt administration, promoting and protecting both Roosevelts, she comes to know Franklin not only as a great president but as a complicated rival and an irresistible friend, capable of changing lives even after his death. Through it all, even as Hick’s bond with Eleanor is tested by forces both extraordinary and common, and as she grows as a woman and a writer, she never loses sight of the love of her life.
From Washington, D.C. to Hyde Park, from a little white house on Long Island to an apartment on Manhattan’s Washington Square, Amy Bloom’s new novel moves elegantly through fascinating places and times, written in compelling prose and with emotional depth, wit, and acuity.
“Amy Bloom knows the urgency of love,” wrote The Washington Post about Bloom’s acclaimed bestseller Away. The same could be said of White Houses, an unforgettable novel about the power of passion and the endurance of love.