Jennie Churchill: Winston's American Mother

Description

Jennie Churchill was said to have had two hundred lovers, three of whom she married. But her love for her son Winston never wavered. JENNIE CHURCHILL is an intimate picture of her glittering but ultimately tragic life, and the powerful mutual infatuation between her and her son. Anyone who wants to understand Winston must start here, with this revelatory interpretation. Anne Sebba has gained unprecedented access to private family correspondence, newly discovered archival material and interviews with Jennie's two surviving granddaughters. She draws a vivid and frank portrait of her subject, repositioning Jennie as a woman who refused to be cowed by her era's customary repression of women.

Anne Sebba is one of Britain's most distinguished biographers. Formerly a Reuters correspondent based in London and Rome, she has written ten works of non-fiction, mostly about iconic women, and presented BBC radio documentaries. She is the author of the international bestsellers That Woman, an acclaimed biography of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, and Les Parisiennes: How the Women of Paris Lived, Loved and Died Under Nazi Occupation. She is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Historical Research and lives in Richmond, Surrey.

Sharp and intelligent... An immensely enjoyable book. [Sebba's] prose is as smooth and elegant as expensive cashmere; it reads like a novel - Literary Review Retrieving Jennie Churchill in sparkling three dimensions... Sebba's biography does much to put flesh on the bones of a subject who has been reduced to a cipher for American brashness - Daily Telegraph