American Wife: A Novel

Curtis Sittenfeld

Sept 2008 · Sold by Random House

About this eBook

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A gorgeously written novel that weaves class, wealth, race, and fate into a brilliant portrait of a first lady—from the author of Rodham and Eligible

“Terrific . . . an intelligent, bighearted novel about a controversial political dynasty.”—Entertainment Weekly
 
NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Time • People • Entertainment Weekly
 
A kind, bookish only child born in the 1940s, Alice Lindgren has no idea that she will one day end up in the White House, married to the president. In her small Wisconsin hometown she learns the virtues of politeness, but a tragic accident when she is seventeen shatters her identity and changes the trajectory of her life. More than a decade later, when the charismatic son of a powerful Republican family sweeps her off her feet, she is surprised to find herself admitted into a world of privilege. 
 
And when her husband unexpectedly becomes governor and then president, she discovers that she is married to a man she both loves and fundamentally disagrees with—and that her private beliefs increasingly run against her public persona. As her husband’s presidency enters its second term, Alice must confront contradictions years in the making and face questions nearly impossible to answer.
 
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review • Chicago Tribune • NPR • Rocky Mountain News • St. Louis Post-Dispatch • The Washington Post Book World

Ratings and reviews

This book was by no means a page turner. It took a while to get into it.The long drawn out bio of the wife didn't help, her beginings were so very detailed & had no bearing on events later on.  It seemed to pick up when they met, and began dating. But toward the end the book it makes a swift change it literally happens at the beginning of one chapter & is terribly abrupt. It really should have been the start of a whole new series or book in itself!  You can write something better. Worst I ever book read!!!

An interesting read that after a day of reflection, I still find myself not absolutely enjoying this book. A piece of fiction loosely based on Laura Bush's life, but at times felt not so loose and not so fiction. A story of a woman from a small town who ends up married to the President of the United States. In her younger years, she causes an accident killing a classmate and has an abortion at a very young age. While her future mate is working for the family company and drinking away his days. They meet, fall in love and marriage follows soon after. Unlike the Bush family, they have a child quickly. Although like the Bushs, he purchases a baseball team, leaves the family business and then gets into politics. For my thoughts - this is the first time I have read a book that is loosely based on a real person and I have read her biography. If I pitted the two books against each other, I would hand her biography off to anyone I passed. I guess I am just not a fan of books where I am unsure as to whether it truly happened to the person. I either want true fiction or true story.

Below my level

About the author

Curtis Sittenfeld is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels Prep, The Man of My Dreams, American Wife, Sisterland, and Eligible, and the story collection You Think It, I’ll Say It, which have been translated into thirty languages. Her short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Washington Post Magazine, Esquire, and The Best American Short Stories, of which she was the 2020 guest editor. Her nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Time, and Vanity Fair, and on public radio’s This American Life.