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Loving Frank

Author: Nancy Horan
Publisher: Random House Large Print Publishing
Category: Book

This item is no longer available

Avg. Customer Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars

192 reviews
Sales Rank: 1366820

Format: Large Print
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1

ISBN: 0739327526
EAN: 9780739327524
ASIN: 0739327526

Publication Date: August 2007

Also Available In:

•	Paperback - Loving Frank: A Novel
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank
•	Audio Cassette - Loving Frank with Other (Playaway Adult Fiction)
•	Audio Download - Loving Frank (Unabridged)
•	Hardcover - Loving Frank: A Novel
•	Audio Cassette - Loving Frank
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank
•	MP3 CD - Loving Frank
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank
•	Kindle Edition - Loving Frank: A Novel
•	Audio CD - Loving Frank

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Editorial Reviews:

Amazon.com Review
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

Product Description
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

Customer Reviews: Read 187 more reviews...

1 out of 5 stars

Not Loving "Loving Frank" November 22, 2008
How is it possible to bore a reader to death with a story of celebrity, artistic acheivement ,passionate love, adultery, and murder? Just ask Nancy Horan, the author of "Loving Frank", the story of the scandalous, and ultimately tragic, love affair between Frank Lloyd Wright and Mameh Cheney.
Let's give Horan her due.....she is consistent. She never misses an opportunity to gloss over a conflict or miss a dramatic moment. In one sentence she decides to leave her husband and small children; in half a page we have the account of murder and mayhem that left seven innocents slaughtered.
The book reads more like a student research paper than a book of fiction.

4 out of 5 stars

well don November 16, 2008
I have enjoyed the book but felt it was somewhat of a slow read. Thoughful and reflective.

4 out of 5 stars

Interesting, especially if you don't know much about Wright November 15, 2008
I didn't know much about Wright and enjoyed this book - learning about his work and getting a glimpse into his personality. Although the work was mainly about Mamah, and got a little dull at times, overall it was a quick read and well written.

5 out of 5 stars

An Amazing Book November 13, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful

I read this book based on a recommendation from a friend. Even though I am not usually a fan of historical fiction, I was interested, as I have been to Falling Water and knew a few things- or so I thought- about Frank Lloyd Wright.
I was truly captivated by this book. Loving Frank tells of the clandestine love affair between the Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick Cheney. This book was so amazing from a feminist stand point...Mamah was a very well-educated, strong woman who was trying to fight her way in a man's world. She did not get a fair shake in the world, but was very courageous.
The end was quite a shock and inspired me to find out more about the lives of Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick Cheney. (Ahhhh, now I understand the draw to historical fiction!) I spent a few hours on the internet researching after I finished reading this wonderful book. It is a story that will stay with you, and leave you wanting more.

3 out of 5 stars

Trials and tribulations November 11, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful

A rather disappointing book after all the hype. Too much dwelling on Maymah's emotional torture and not enough on the relationship that drove her to leave a conventional life for that of an outcast. Too little about Frank and I still am not sure why she loved him since she portrayed him as a completely arrogant and self absorbed creature. The pain of leaving her children was well documented and finally tedious but the joy of being with Frank was stated but not explored. Too much minutia on financial matters and then all brushed away as she travels and studies and does as she pleases. Felt there should have been more at the end about Frank to tie up her influence on his life.

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