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
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.0 / 5.0
LOVING FRANK:
BEING A HUGE FAN OF FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S WORK I COULDN'T WAIT TO READ THIS BOOK. I KNEW LITTLE OF THE MAN OR THE WOMEN IN HIS LIFE. THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST INTERESTING BOOKS I HAVE READ IN YEARS! PARTICULARLY, AS THE AUTHOR KNEW HIM AND THE WOMAN HE LOVED, AT THE TIME OF THIS SCANDAL. THE BOOK IS SPELL BINDING EVEN THO I KNEW HOW IT ENDED HAVING READ MUCH ABOUT HIS LIFE. HE WAS NOT A VERY NICE MAN BUT UNDOUBTABLY A GENIUS. YOU COULD FEEL THE EMOTIONS OF THE CHARACTERS AS YOU READ THIS WONDERFULLY... more info
NOT LOVING FRANK:
LOVING FRANK This book was the pick for book club; otherwise, I would have never finished it. I am glad I did finish it though and found out everything that happened in this tragic love affair. I have seen TV shows and heard about Frank Lloyd Wright and the beautiful homes he created with his gift for architecture. What I didn't know was about the man himself and how he affected so many lives - not necessarily in a good way. This is the story of his affair with Mamah Borthwick Cheney. He is... more info
Pleasantly surprised:
This book held a huge surprise for me at the end (don't worry I won't ruin it for you). I read this book hoping to gain a greater insight into the life of Frank Lloyd Wright what I didn't expect was the subsequent focus on the feminist movement in the early 1900's. I did enjoy the book and did enjoy the very humanist nature surrounding the characters. If you have an image in your head of what Frank Lloyd Wright was like you may want to set that aside, as this book does bring to light many of the flaws... more info
Loving Frank, Losing Mamah...:
[ASIN:1440149577 Bread of Shame, a literary novel by Marjorie Meyerle] ]Loving Frank, while an interesting interpretation of Frank Lloyd Wright's and Mamah Cheney's life together, is far from satisfying in its psychological exploration of them and the times. Perhaps it is too easy for today's historical writers to serve up subjects of historical interest to book clubs with some members members starving for the sensation that what they're reading contains more than the psychological insight of say, literary... more info
