Loving Frank: A Novel
by Nancy Horan
List Price:
Our Price: $6.81
You Save: $7.19 (51%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $4.58 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Nancy HoranEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-04-08
ISBN: 0345495004
Number of pages: 400
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of Loving Frank: A Novel
Book Review: A love story through eyes of the other woman
Summary: 4 Stars
Almost everyone is familiar with the name Frank Lloyd Wright, the famous American architect. Few are familiar with the name Mamah Cheney. Frank and Mamah started an extra-martial affair after Frank was commissioned to build a house for Mamah Cheney and her husband, Edwin. Mamah has long been remembered as a home wrecker. Frank and Mrs Cheney carried on an affair and then dually abandoned their families and ran off to Europe together. Sounds pretty black and white to me, however, Loving Frank attempts to retell the story through the eyes of Mamah Cheney.
I seldom enjoy books about adultery, but Nancy Horan did an exceptional job considering the scant information available on Mrs Cheney. She somehow recreated conversations that probably took place, feelings that must have been felt, and thoughts that probably haunted both Frank and Mamah. Loving Frank introduces a very modern woman who is desperately trying to discover her true identity, regardless of the price she and everyone she loves must pay.
Although the story is told from Mamah's point of view, Mamah is depicted as a very flawed woman. She loves her children, but somehow convinces herself that they are better off without her. Being a mother just isn't enough, not anymore. She yearns for something beyond what her husband, children, and friends can provide. When she meets Frank, they each believe one is the answer to the other's prayers. Soon enough, however, Mamah begins finding flaws in Frank as well.
I felt the book dragged a bit towards the end. It's not exactly a five star book, but it attempts to tell a different side of a story that has long been written in stone. Controversial subject matter. Horrific and tragic ending. Pretty good book.
Summary of Loving Frank: A Novel
I have been standing on the side of life, watching it float by. I want to swim in the river. I want to feel the current.So writes Mamah Borthwick Cheney in her diary as she struggles to justify her clandestine love affair with Frank Lloyd Wright. Four years earlier, in 1903, Mamah and her husband, Edwin, had commissioned the renowned architect to design a new home for them. During the construction of the house, a powerful attraction developed between Mamah and Frank, and in time the lovers, each married with children, embarked on a course that would shock Chicago society and forever change their lives.
In this ambitious debut novel, fact and fiction blend together brilliantly. While scholars have largely relegated Mamah to a footnote in the life of America's greatest architect, author Nancy Horan gives full weight to their dramatic love story and illuminates Cheney's profound influence on Wright.
Drawing on years of research, Horan weaves little-known facts into a compelling narrative, vividly portraying the conflicts and struggles of a woman forced to choose between the roles of mother, wife, lover, and intellectual. Horan's Mamah is a woman seeking to find her own place, her own creative calling in the world. Mamah's is an unforgettable journey marked by choices that reshape her notions of love and responsibility, leading inexorably ultimately lead to this novel's stunning conclusion.
Elegantly written and remarkably rich in detail, Loving Frank is a fitting tribute to a courageous woman, a national icon, and their timeless love story.
Advance praise for Loving Frank:
"Loving Frank is one of those novels that takes over your life. It's mesmerizing and fascinating-filled with complex characters, deep passions, tactile descriptions of astonishing architecture, and the colorful immediacy of daily life a hundred years ago-all gathered into a story that unfolds with riveting urgency."
-Lauren Belfer, author of City of Light
"This graceful, assured first novel tells the remarkable story of the long-lived affair between Frank Lloyd Wright, a passionate and impossible figure, and Mamah Cheney, a married woman whom Wright beguiled and led beyond the restraint of convention. It is engrossing, provocative reading."
--Scott Turow
"It takes great courage to write a novel about historical people, and in particular to give voice to someone as mythic as Frank Lloyd Wright. This beautifully written novel about Mamah Cheney and Frank Lloyd Wright's love affair is vivid and intelligent, unsentimental and compassionate."
--Jane Hamilton
"I admire this novel, adore this novel, for so many reasons: The intelligence and lyricism of the prose. The attention to period detail. The epic proportions of this most fascinating love story. Mamah Cheney has been in my head and heart and soul since reading this book; I doubt she'll ever leave."
-Elizabeth Berg
From the Hardcover edition.
Amazon Significant Seven, August 2007: It's a rare treasure to find a historically imagined novel that is at once fully versed in the facts and unafraid of weaving those truths into a story that dares to explore the unanswered questions. Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Cheney's love story is--as many early reviews of Loving Frank have noted--little-known and often dismissed as scandal. In Nancy Horan's skillful hands, however, what you get is two fully realized people, entirely, irrepressibly, in love. Together, Frank and Mamah are a wholly modern portrait, and while you can easily imagine them in the here and now, it's their presence in the world of early 20th century America that shades how authentic and, ultimately, tragic their story is. Mamah's bright, earnest spirit is particularly tender in the context of her time and place, which afforded her little opportunity to realize the intellectual life for which she yearned. Loving Frank is a remarkable literary achievement, tenderly acute and even-handed in even the most heartbreaking moments, and an auspicious debut from a writer to watch. --Anne Bartholomew
Subjects Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Engineering
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Medicine
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Subjects Books
Alanna : The First Adventureby Tamora Pierce
Atheneum; Published: 2002-09-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $7.39
Price in other shops:
Redeeming Loveby Francine Rivers
Multnomah Books; Published: 1997-05-09; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
Seabiscuit: An American Legendby Laura Hillenbrand
Ballantine Books; Published: 2002-03-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.01
Price in other shops:
" Have A Nice Day "by Mick Foley
HarperCollins; Published: 2000; Audio Cassette; Book
Best price: $51.48
The Revolution: A Manifestoby Ron Paul
Grand Central Publishing; Published: 2009-09-24; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.19
Price in other shops:
The Twilight Saga (Boxed Set w/ four Collectable prints)by Stephanie Meyer
Little; Published: 2008; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $95.00
Taking Charge of Your Fertility, 10th Anniversary Edition: The Definitive Guide to Natural Birth Control, Pregnancy Achievement, and Reproductive Healthby Toni Weschler
Collins Living; Published: 2006-11-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $13.65
Price in other shops:
Ella Enchantedby Gail Carson Levine
Collins; Published: 2000-09-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.17
Price in other shops:
Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkabanby J. K. Rowling
Scholastic Press; Published: 1999; Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.95
Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire (3)Cover-to-Cover; Published: 2001; Audio CD; Book
Similar Books and other products
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Waoby Junot D?az
Riverhead Trade; Published: 2008-09-02; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.08
Price in other shops:
Death in a Prairie House: Frank Lloyd Wright and the Taliesin Murdersby William R. Drennan
University of Wisconsin Press; Published: 2008-08-21; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.76
Price in other shops:
Run: A Novelby Ann Patchett
Harper Perennial; Published: 2008-08-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.07
Price in other shops:
The Zookeeper's Wife: A War Storyby Diane Ackerman
W.W. Norton & Co.; Published: 2008-09-17; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.53
Price in other shops:
The White Tiger: A Novel (Man Booker Prize)by Aravind Adiga
Free Press; Published: 2008-10-14; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.72
Price in other shops:
Out Stealing Horses: A Novelby Per Petterson
Picador; Published: 2008-04-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.19
Price in other shops:
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle: A Novel (Oprah Book Club #62)by David Wroblewski
Ecco; Published: 2008-09-19; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.64
Price in other shops:
People of the Book: A Novelby Geraldine Brooks
Penguin Audio; Published: 2008-01-01; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $15.50
Price in other shops:
The Book Thiefby Markus Zusak
Knopf Books for Young Readers; Published: 2007-09-11; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.22
Price in other shops:
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Societyby Mary Ann Shaffer, Annie Barrows
The Dial Press; Published: 2008-07-29; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $11.50
Price in other shops: