Under the Wide and Starry Sky by
Nancy Horan
Are you a fan of Treasure Island
or Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? Meet
the man behind the fiction and the woman who stood behind him. Robert Louis Stevenson is a humorous and
delightful man, full of life and ready for a laugh. At least until his chronic illnesses bring
him down yet again. Fanny meets Louis in
France with her two children, an older daughter and young boy in tow. She is recuperating from the devastating loss
of her youngest son to tuberculosis. She
is also in France to get away from her philandering husband. Despite everything Louis and Fanny fall in
love and struggle to create a life with each other. So begins their married life and the trials and
tribulations of illness, artistic temperaments and ocean voyages eventually
leading to a life in the South Pacific.
I was doubtful about Loving Frank
when it first came out and only reluctantly picked it up when my book club
chose it one month. I was thoroughly
surprised by how much I enjoyed that read.
While this book is a good read, it is not as gripping as Horan’s first
outing. The two main characters, Fanny
and Stevenson are both interesting in their own right; it is the relationship
between the two that makes the story.
I listened to this story and it is a
good one to listen to while doing other things.
If your mind wanders, or you wander out of the room, and miss a couple
of minutes it isn’t a problem. Like any life
there are ups and downs; at times life moves at a whirlwind and at others a
crawl and Horan captures the everyday as well as the pivotal events in the
lives of this couple.
