Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons by Charlotte Gray

Brendan’s Alternate Tagline for Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons:

Mommy knows best.

Quick synopsis:

A dual biography of Jennie Jerome Churchill and Sara Delano Roosevelt.

Fact for Non-History People:

Around the 1850s, 700 British families owned four fifths of the land in Britain.

Fact for History Nerds:

Between 1870 and 1914, 454 titled Europeans married American brides.

My Take on Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons:

There are some books which feel like pulling on your favorite sweatshirt. There is comfort level with the author who has a clear goal, easy to read prose, and a talent for choosing the interesting parts. Charlotte Gary’s Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons is a great sweatshirt. I mean book.

The passionate mothers are Jennie Churchill (mother of Winston, you may have heard of him) and Sara Roosevelt (mother of FDR, also probably heard of him). Gray’s book has a clear purpose. She wants to reevaluate these women who are not always presented in the most positive light. There is a real danger of using today’s societal standards and turning both women into heroes with no flaws. While Gray does highlight the hypocrisy of previous views of these women, she also does not shy away from pointing out their very real faults. Jennie and Sara are not saints, and they certainly weren’t feminists. However, Gray puts their lives in perspective.

There is also a comfort level that Gray clearly has with the parent-child relationship. (I checked, she has 3 boys so yeah, she didn’t need to do any research on that part.) She provides the reader the facts needed to see why these men and women acted the way they did without passing judgement. It would be so easy to call Jennie a narcissist and Winston a mama’s boy. Gray eschews easy labels and does the work showing how these relationships evolved.

Reading this book was a breeze and I highly recommend it for anyone even slightly interested in any of the subjects.

(A review copy of this book was provided by the publisher.)

Verdict:

A great read. Buy it here!