This book was well researched. By adding to the bones of historical facts, Ellen Feldman fleshed out the story to convert it into a novel. It helps to understand the whole background of these fascinating principals. Perhaps it was because I had just revisited FDR's Hyde Park Home and library this past spring,that this book had such deep resonance. In this era when the media knows everything and tells everything about the president, this relationship would never have come to fruition. Across the backdrop of the World Wars, Lucy gives a love story which is never smarmy. She does not whine,or complain, but frankly states, how her relationship with Franklin endured over the years,against a turbulent time in our history. Owing to her support, she gave Franklin strength which he never could tap into through his marriage to Eleanor. As no one could ever know what transpired during her visits with Franklin in the White House and at Warm Springs.........Ms. Feldman's background as an historian lends credibility to what really may have been. I didn't want to finish the book, as I knew how it would end.

I have always been intrigued with the story of the romanance between FDR and Lucy Mercer. When I ran across this book at a local book store I bought it immediately and moved it ahead of other things that I planned to read. The story is romantic and touching. It gives a different view of Frankling and Eleanor and it shows how history could have so easily have been changed. For those interested in FDR and Eleanor its an interesting read. For those who are romantics at heart, its a warm and beautiful story about love and its lasting endurance.

This is the fictional account of a very real love affair, told by "the other woman." The relationship, by itself was not an uncommon one, although the characters could have been created by Edith Wharton. They are east coast, upper-class, elite; patricians to-the-manor-born. It is really not an epic love story like that of Josephine and Napoleon, or Cleopatra and Antony, or even the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Fortunately, for history's sake, no one gave up a throne...or the presidency for this love. The three people who comprise the love triangle, however, are of epic proportion - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt and Lucy Mercer. And each of these people, as individuals, and in their relationship to one another, had a major role to play in the course of world events, from the time that Lucy met Franklin and Eleanor, just before World War I, through the Great Depression, until the end of Franklin's life, right before the end of World War II.

While reading this novel, I initially thought it to be short on substance - more than fluff, but lacking in weight - perhaps it needed more historical detail. But after reading the book, I was left with a feeling of deep sadness at the poignancy of the love that existed between Lucy and Franklin, and between Eleanor and Franklin. Ellen Feldman has given us Lucy's voice, a woman's voice from a time long ago, (for some reason I remember Lily Bart from Edith Wharton's "House of Mirth"). And that voice tells us the history of a love which is the center of her life - so that the history of the world becomes peripheral. And that one historical viewpoint becomes unique and compelling.

I admire Ms. Feldmans work tremendously. I also admire her courage in writing a historical novel of merit about such famous, public figures. So much has been written about them already - yet few have touched on this subject. Ms. Feldman writes beautifully, with a quiet passion and a certain delicacy. Her characters are well drawn and true.

There is a quote by Eleanor Roosevelt at the end of the book that moved me very much. She says, "[If you] cannot meet the need of someone whom [you] dearly love...you must learn to allow someone else to meet the need, without bitterness or envy, and accept it."

This book was wonderful. It kept my attention throughtout the story and made you wish for more. It made FDR seem like a real person with real feelings. I also become curious about Eleanor and am now reading a biography about her. This is wonderful!

Written in the first person of Lucy, the book instantly immerses you into the styles, the tastes, the emotion of the historic triangle. No moral judgements are made, only the depiction and constancy to the voice of each of the characters. The prose reads like silk, the pace gallops, and the story unfolds as if for the first time. To read and re-read.

Marion Liniado