Dark Lady: Winston Churchill's Mother and Her World [Hardcover]

Charles Higham (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 29, 2006

In this sensational new book, bestselling author Charles Higham draws from previously overlooked sources in America and Britain to tell the fascinating story of Jennie Jerome, mother of Winston Churchill — feminist, advocate of Irish independence, and notoriously promiscuous society belle. It charts her luxurious New York upbringing, eyebrow-raising entry into the British aristocracy through marriage to Lord Randolph Churchill, her endless line of liaisons with much younger men and a very different sort of affair in the highest of places — with the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII (one of many kings and princes to win her affection). Long before women had the vote, Jennie broke the rules by campaigning in elections for her husband, Lord Randolph Churchill. A staunch freethinker, she edited her own magazine, fought for Protestant interests in Ireland and sailed a hospital ship to South Africa, where she risked her life in the Boer War. Passionately in love with life, expressive of her sexuality when women were supposed to hide it, beautiful and independent minded, Jennie Churchill was decades ahead of her time.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Helpful prerequisites to interest in Jeanette Jerome (1854-1921) would be interest in her son, Winston Churchill, British parliamentary politics, or the adulteries of the late Victorian British upper class. Absent those connections, she is a historical footnote, one of the American Gilded Age heiresses flouncing through the country homes of England's cash-poor, title-rich nobility. But with them, Lady Randolph Churchill, as her name became, has everything a celebrity biographer can wish for: beauty and scandal amid a parade of the great and the good of the time. Higham, who has written up Howard Hughes, Wallis Simpson, and several stars of the silver screen, capitalizes on Lady Churchill's joie de vivre for this insouciantly entertaining profile. Yes, she made a few stabs at serving society, but Paris, Ascot, and assignations were greater priorities for Lady C. Three marriages, a half-dozen known swains, and string pulling for young Winston crowd Higham's chronicle, which captures the woman's indomitability. Higham's work is a fine update on decades-old existing biographies of Churchill's mother. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

Son of the advertising pioneer Sir Charles Frederick Higham, MP, Charles Higham is the author of Howard Hughes: The Secret Life, a basis of the film The Aviator, starring Leonardo DiCaprio. His Mrs Simpson: Secret Lives of the Duchess of Windsor, has been a Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller and he has written bestselling lives of Katherine Hepburn, Bette Davis and Orson Welles. A former New York Times feature writer and recipient of the Académie Française Prize of the Creators, he lives in Los Angeles.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press (December 29, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786718897
• ISBN-13: 978-0786718894
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,550,170 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Waste of time, and of a potentially good subject, March 20, 2007

By 

3Angela (California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dark Lady: Winston Churchill's Mother and Her World (Hardcover)

This book appears to have been written in haste and not edited. It contains so many glaring factual errors, such as identifying Queen Alexandra's sister as the Duchess of Tech (definitely not, her sister was the Empress of Russia) that I came to doubt the rest of the book. At one point he seems to indicate that Catholics do not eat during Lent (that would be an extraordinary accomplishment). There is, literally, an error on every page, many of which could have been avoided by very simple and basic editing. Very annoying. I couldn't finish it.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars hack work, December 4, 2008

By 

Gilbert Michaud (canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dark Lady: Winston Churchill's Mother and Her World (Hardcover)

a book of gossiping . written hastily. . if you want to know lady randolph go to ANITA LESLIE INSTEAD

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I hope this doesn't do lady churchill justice, May 12, 2008

By 

Kimberley Wilson (VA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dark Lady: Winston Churchill's Mother and Her World (Hardcover)

This biography reads like a quickie rush to the market insant book written about some pop singer or two bit actress. In it, Jenny Jerome comes off as a truly horrible creature. How such a monster managed to attract so many men seems impossible. Plus, the bit about Catholics apparently not eating during Lent (it's 40 days long) made me laugh and this is not a comedy.