MY THOUGHTS
I learned a lot while reading this book. I didn't know a lot about the Lindberghs and nothing about the nanny/nurse Betty Gow. This is her story. Told from her about the events of her employment, the kidnapping of the baby Charlie and her life after this tragedy. It's a heartbreaking story so be prepared.
Betty Gow comes to America from Scotland following her first love. She thought they had something special. She found out that it was not to be. She becomes the Nanny/Nurse to little Charlie Lindbergh and he becomes her life. She would do anything for that baby. I really did like Betty. I think she was a genuine, caring, loving, lovable woman. I think she was good for Charlie. When he calls her Beddy I admit I had to laugh a bit. I could picture he doing that. Also I could picture him on the lawn. In that closet too. Betty tells this story and it's filled with heart and soul. A lot of tears will be shed reading it. They were for me anyway.
I didn't like the Lindbergh parents very much at all. Charles Lindbergh comes across as very cold to me. Very controlling and he also thought Hitler was doing the right thing. I believe Charles Lindbergh may have been a Nazi sympathizer. He had strange ways. He didn't interact much with little Charlie and he had big expectations of his wife. I didn't like her very much either. She didn't seem to have a mind of her own at all. She wanted whatever Charles wanted and followed him for months at a time, leaving little Charlie alone with the nanny and two other employees. How can a mother leave her baby for months at a time? They change so much from day to day. I know most good moms could not do that. Charlie's parents were not really hands on parents. They just had strange ways of thinking when it came to raising a child. He was just a baby. He needed lots of love and cuddles. All babies do.
This book is very well researched. Do not miss reading the end THE REAL BETTY GOW and THE LINDBERGH NANNY: FACT VS. FICTION. Both tell a lot and show how much heart went into this story. It's a fiction book based on lots of facts. Much of it is actual and did really happen. It's a part of history that I didn't know a lot about so I learned quite a bit reading this one.
Thank you #NetGalley, #MariaFredericks, #StMartinsPressMinotaur for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.
4.5 stars and I highly recommend it. It's very good. Very emotional.
SYNOPSIS
Mariah Fredericks's The Lindbergh Nanny is powerful, propulsive novel about America’s most notorious kidnapping through the eyes of the woman who found herself at the heart of this deadly crime.
"A masterful blending of fact and fiction that is as compelling as it is entertaining."—Nelson DeMille
When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles, Sr., is the country’s golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there’s someone else in their household—Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny.
A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child, and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears.
Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night, in order to clear her own name—and to find justice for the child she loves.
"Gripping and elegant, The Lindbergh Nanny brings readers into the interior of the twentieth century’s most infamous crime."—Nina de Gramont, New York Times bestselling author of The Christie Affair
"A masterful blending of fact and fiction that is as compelling as it is entertaining."—Nelson DeMille
When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles, Sr., is the country’s golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there’s someone else in their household—Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny.
A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child, and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears.
Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night, in order to clear her own name—and to find justice for the child she loves.
"Gripping and elegant, The Lindbergh Nanny brings readers into the interior of the twentieth century’s most infamous crime."—Nina de Gramont, New York Times bestselling author of The Christie Affair
