A fine novel of an American marriage.October 2, 2008 0 out of 2 found this review helpful
This novel is supposedly about the President and First Lady. It can be read that way but doesn't seem like them from what I have heard about them. Alice, the main character in the book starts out being too naive to believe. Her relationship with her friends and family seems more like the 40's than the 60's. It is very interesting and readable anyway. Her grandmother is the most interesting character in the book. I would like to read a book about her! The fact that she fall's for Charlie is very believable because he is so much fun and full of charm. How she could marry him after meeting his family strains credulity. A nastier bunch would be hard to find. I did not find the ending believable if she is supposed to be Laura, but for Alice it seems just right. I think the real first Lady is a tough cookie and a total follower and total believer in her husband.Alice just doesn't come through as the perfect Stepford wife. She seems to have an inner life at odds with the outer life. I liked the book as a work of fiction with a little faction thrown in.I think most people will like this story because it is well written and will keep you reading.
3.5 out of 5: A curious amalgamation of fact and fictionOctober 1, 2008 0 out of 2 found this review helpful
American Wife is the story of Alice Blackwell, a small-town girl who eventually becomes the President's wife. Although Laura Bush's life is the inspiration behind American Wife, in an interview for the Washington Post Book World podcast, Sittenfeld emphasized that 85% of the book is fiction. The result is a curious amalgamation of fact and fiction.
Sittenfeld's prose is enormously chatty and stuffed full of everyday details, including such trivialities as an exhaustive description of the layout of the Blackwell's country club and Alice's conversation with her realtor about her counteroffer to the seller (Should Alice counter with $37K or 32K? Should Alice give the seller 24 hours to respond to the counteroffer or 48?). Alice's talkative first-person voice is initially annoying but eventually quite appealing. Over the course of 500+ pages, all the inconsequential details coalesce into a wonderfully sensitive and convincing portrayal of Alice and her husband, both as individuals and in relation to each other. American Wife is tedious at times but ultimately satisfying.
Sadly, Some People Will See this Book for What it's NotSeptember 30, 2008 3 out of 7 found this review helpful
I'm not familiar with Laura Bush's history, never felt I had to be. I'm not a big fan of GWB, but I'm a huge fan of Laura's, but how she got to be the way she is, what molded her, her dreams, ambitions, the sort of stuff you find in those magazines by the supermarket checkout stand, those sort of things I tend to ignore. I pretty much accept people, the famous and the not famous, the way they are, their private lives should remain private. That's what I believe anyway.
That said, I did know Laura Bush was in an auto accident when she was in high school and that somebody had perished. The facts I didn't know. I also knew she'd married a guy who became president. And other than her style and grace, that's about all I knew about Laura.
I didn't know Ms. Sittenfeld had loosely based this book on Laura's life when I started it. Duh! How could I have been so dense, it's been on the news that a book based in the first lady's life was out there, but I didn't made the connection. I did connect pretty quickly once I started the book and met First Lady Alice Blackwell, who is wondering about the choices she's made as she's thinking about the Iraq War and her war-like president husband.
This was the book! Had I known, I probably would have passed, but I'd been drawn in, so I kept on reading about Alice as she goes over her life, from that accident when she'd killed the man (boy really) who would be a part of her forever. How she slept with his brutish brother as a sort of penance, how she got pregnant, had an abortion, loved her lesbian grandmother, met and married a dimwitted, conservative Republican from a clannish family. How she compromised her ideals, molded her life to fit his.
Does Laura think her husband is the dimwitted, war-mongering, born again kind of clown Alice sees in her husband? I doubt it. Ms. Sittenfeld may have some of the facts right, even if she has moved Texas to Wisconsin, but one look at Laura Bush's style and grace and you can tell Curtis Sittenfeld's got the character all wrong, Laura's character, that's the character she's missed the ball with. Alice's character, that's a horse of a different color. Ms. Sittenfeld has nailed Alice. She's built her from the ground up, made her real, made her someone you care about, but just Alice Blackwell is not Laura Bush.
This is fiction. It's good fiction, but sadly, I think too many people are going to see this book for what it's not.
Thoroughly engrossing, I could not put it down.September 30, 2008 0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I loved Sittenfeld's prior work, and when I read a review of American Wife, I knew I had to have it. Between work, kid, and home, I still managed to finish it in a few days. It was worth missing sleep for.
I am no Bush fan, and I find Laura Bush's placid smile and Stepford wife-like persona unnerving. I had heard, here and there over the years, that she was actually quite liberal, and I thought, how on earth can she be married to this, then? I knew this book was fiction, but figured it might give me some sort of explanation that made sense.
I loved the book. If anything could have made me feel sympathetic for the First Lady, it's this book. The fictionalized account of her high school car accident took blog fodder and gave it a poignant, human face. The narrative thread of how that accident informed every move made by the fictionalized first lady really drew me in. I also found the description of her family life, and her interaction with her inlaws, and their friends, to be extremely engaging. The story was really just incredible.
It did not make me swoon over her, however. I simply cannot feel sympathic to someone who goes into a marriage and pretty much stifles her own views for the rest of her life. I appreciated her actions at the end, but again, even reading the fictionalized account of why she stays with her husband, I still could not fully wrap my head around these choices. But it made for a great read!
Like others, I felt the final third was weak, but only in comparison to the first 2/3s of the book. The final third just seemed a little disjointed, but fascinating nonetheless.
If you're a Bush critic, this book may temper any revulsion you may feel for his wife (it will certainly not improve your feelings for Bush). If you're a Bush fan, you will probably find it horribly critical. I found it a pretty even handed and engrossing account, but then again, you can probably tell I'm not exactly bowled over with love for the current occupant.
some sillinessSeptember 30, 2008 4 out of 6 found this review helpful
It was hard to read this book without picturing the real first lady and her husband and that was a problem. I liked the beginning of the novel better than the rest, but some of the writing (especially the dialogue) was forced and silly. It wasn't a great read at all.
