“A beautiful portrait of being in Paris in the glittering 1920s—as a wife and as one’s own woman.”—Entertainment Weekly
A deeply evocative story of ambition and betrayal, The Paris Wife captures the love affair between two unforgettable people: Ernest Hemingway and his wife Hadley.
Chicago, 1920: Hadley Richardson is a quiet twenty-eight-year-old who has all but given up on love and … love and happiness—until she meets Ernest Hemingway. Following a whirlwind courtship and wedding, the pair set sail for Paris, where they become the golden couple in a lively and volatile group—the fabled “Lost Generation”—that includes Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Though deeply in love, the Hemingways are ill prepared for the hard-drinking, fast-living, and free-loving life of Jazz Age Paris. As Ernest struggles to find the voice that will earn him a place in history and pours himself into the novel that will become The Sun Also Rises, Hadley strives to hold on to her sense of self as her roles as wife, friend, and muse become more challenging. Eventually they find themselves facing the ultimate crisis of their marriage—a deception that will lead to the unraveling of everything they’ve fought so hard for.
A heartbreaking portrayal of love and torn loyalty, The Paris Wife is all the more poignant because we know that, in the end, Hemingway wrote that he would rather have died than fallen in love with anyone but Hadley.
more
What a cad!!
This was one of my favorite books ever!
Any book that’s set in Paris is my kind of book. Add to that the vivid characters and the page turning story, and I give this book two enthusiastic thumbs up!
My favorite book about Hemingway
A tough job being married to Hemingway… insight into expats in Paris between tHe wars
Wow, what a writer. I was pulled into Hadley’s world and mind from the beginning, and I feel her with me still even though I’m sadly finished. It’s one of those books you can’t put down but don’t want to end. Just as with “The Book of Salt” by Monique Truong, I enjoyed inhabiting the world of 1920s Paris and experiencing people like Gertrude …
The side of the story we didn’t get to hear about.
I absolutely loved this book. I knew very little about Hemingway’s early life, and nothing about his first wife Hadley Richardson. This book read like a memoir written by Hadley and I kept forgetting it was historical fiction. I was immersed in her life, her emotions, her experiences, and of course Paris. Read this book to step inside this …
Fictionalized story of Ernest Hemingway’s wife is a sad story of another woman falling under Hemingway’s spell before being cast aside for another.
I enjoyed the book. It was a quick and entertaining read.
Interesting read about the writers whose works captured the world in the early 1900’s from the viewpoint of Hemingway’s first wife.
Characters lived a disturbing lifestyle.
I liked it
The author chose the developmental period of Hemingway’s creative life describing his contacts and life during the Parisian years using the vehicle of his wife-at-the-time’s voice.
Great peek into history…fleshing out the complicated, competitive lives and romances of the Hemingway’s and their circle.
An amazing book that will play on your heart strings. Fictional, but based firmly on facts that it could almost be non-fiction.
Interesting era to read about.
Altho it’s fiction, it stayed close to the characters and the facts. I loved it.
I don’t know how accurate this is but it was well written and kept me reading.
PARIS WIFE by Paula McLain is a fictionalized account of Ernest Hemingway’s first marriage to Hadley Richardson, and the time they spent together in Paris during the 1920s. Hadley Richardson was not glamorous; indeed in the eyes of Hemingway’s increasingly sophisticated circle of friends she was probably seen as a liability. And she couldn’t …