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I recommend everyone read this. This is an excellent read. It is rich in historical detail,but so well written that it makes you feel as if you were in that time period before and during WWII.
I am happy with the purchase. The book arrrived in good condition. I purchased it at a very low price, and the seller was upfront about the condition of the book.
Throughout the narrative it seems Goodwin keeps in mind the sentiment that gave great comfort to Eleanor after FDR's death: "They are not dead who live in lives they leave behind. Eleanor's influence on FDR, and her subsequent personal journey after his infidelity, are touchingly described through interviews and comments from those closest to her. The mutual influence each had on the other's ability to understand the times and lead the nation through the depression and world war - he in the political and economic sphere, and she through her insights into the social impact of governmental policy - are interwoven with accounts of the personal tradegies which fractured their marital relationship yet strengthened their love and respect for the other. After listening to an abridged audio of this book, I bought the paperback as Kearns-Goodwin is a master at getting to the heart of individuals she chronicles. In those whom they have blessed they live a life again." I became a fan of Kearns-Goodwin after reading "Team of Rivals" about Abraham Lincoln's decision to include in his cabinet those who rivaled his nomination for the presidency. I was not disappointed - the book richly fills in the details which the abridged audio simply must omit. Both Roosevelt and Lincoln led our nation through some of its most troubling history.
Insightful and interesting. We read this for our book club's April selection and everyone loved it. It is very well written and documented - we learned so much about the Roosevelt's and events that occurred during that time.
Eleanor Roosevelt, the most politically active First Lady in US history, spearheaded and pressed her husband on various issues on the home front - segregation, housing, child care, among many others - while she was held at arms length or further away from conduct of the war. Using White House ushers' diaries as a primary source, she meticulously recounts daily lives - bad food from a White House chef that FDR was too tenderhearted to hire, guests and drinks at cocktail hour, and motoring junkets (one of FDR's passions) into the countryside.The Roosevelts' several second homes are featured as well - the family estate at Hyde Park with Eleanor's separate cottage; Shangri-La (now Camp David) in Maryland, Eleanor's apartment in New York City, and the Little White House in Warm Springs, GA, where FDR battled polio in his 30s and eventually died at age 63.In a bittersweet denouement, now widowed Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd returns to FDR's life to provide emotional support as his body fails. Growing up in the 1930s, my father knew of only one US President and First Lady until he was 16-years-old--Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt. Somewhat estranged emotionally since Franklin's affair with Lucy Mercer years earlier, the couple still worked together brilliantly in what Goodwin aptly refers to as "No Ordinary Time."She also paints a superb picture of life in the White House, where friends of both Franklin and Eleanor lived for extended periods as if in a small hotel, and provides detailed portraits of the various characters there - FDR confidant Harry Hooper, his secretary Missy LeHand, Princess Martha of Norway, Eleanor's great friend Lorene "Hick" Hickok, young soldier Joe Lash, and daughter Anna Roosevelt, who served as FDR's personal secretary during the last year of his life. Five stars to all readers, and especially to older Baby Boomers like me who can learn what FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt meant to their country and to each other during the lives of our parents. With remarkable skill and feeling, noted historian Goodwin in "No Ordinary Time" tells the story of likely the most remarkable couple of the 20th century. She focuses on the American home front and Roosevelt home front during the period surrounding and including World War II, when FDR prepared the country for war and served as a visionary world leader in the battle to defeat Germany, Japan, Italy and other Axis powers.
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