ame_why's review against another edition
2.0
I thought this was going to be a really interesting biography based on the book's description. It sounded like a rags to riches success story, where a young country girl eventually becomes a real life princess. However, I was disappointed right from the start. Not only is the book more about everyone except Allene Tew, but it's essentially a story about how many different times this woman got married and divorced and inherited her fortune. She became wealthy because people around her died, not because she did anything of value. She was a social climber, nothing more. As far as the title suggesting that she was a princess, that marriage only lasted a short while and took up no more than a couple minutes in the book. It was over before it was worth mentioning. And then she went on to marry two other people and live out her life being rich, but otherwise unremarkable.
teriboop's review
3.0
The title of this book would be more appropriate as "The Many Loves of Allene Tew." This book is more about the people that surrounded Allene than it is about herself. Through most of the book, Allene is a secondary character. Allene Tew was a young woman from the late 19th century who came from a pioneering family and married into a higher social status. Although her first husband was from a wealthy family, he was not highly regarded and less so once he married the young woman from the country. Her husband Tod Hostetter was the first in a long line of husbands. Each marriage seemed to edit her social status, not always for the better and she eventually wed a Dutch prince and a German count. She suffered some tragedies in life but also found sources of great love and strength.
I wanted to like this book but I felt that Tew was a very one-dimensional character. I never felt that we truly got to know her. Most of the book was dedicated to the men in her life, giving the reader great details of their rise and fall in society. The book also seemed to be more of a history lesson on life during the periods that Tew lived. This information was at times very elementary and even repetitive. The reader learned more than once that John Jacob Astor died on the Titanic.
Although this was a non-fiction book, I think it would have been more enjoyable as a historical fiction story and the author could have envisioned Tew's character and thoughts. The way the book came across was more of "here's the facts." Tew did this and then did this based on newspaper articles and genealogical records. I do wonder how much of the flatness of the story and the elementary discourse was due to the translation from Dutch to English.
All in all, the information was interesting but the overall story just seemed to drag on with the minutia of detail on everyone and everything except Allene Tew. Perhaps the story is more interesting in its native language, but I suspect it comes across the same. This would be a good book for someone not familiar with the Gilded Age through World War I.
I received this book gratis through Goodreads Giveaways.
I wanted to like this book but I felt that Tew was a very one-dimensional character. I never felt that we truly got to know her. Most of the book was dedicated to the men in her life, giving the reader great details of their rise and fall in society. The book also seemed to be more of a history lesson on life during the periods that Tew lived. This information was at times very elementary and even repetitive. The reader learned more than once that John Jacob Astor died on the Titanic.
Although this was a non-fiction book, I think it would have been more enjoyable as a historical fiction story and the author could have envisioned Tew's character and thoughts. The way the book came across was more of "here's the facts." Tew did this and then did this based on newspaper articles and genealogical records. I do wonder how much of the flatness of the story and the elementary discourse was due to the translation from Dutch to English.
All in all, the information was interesting but the overall story just seemed to drag on with the minutia of detail on everyone and everything except Allene Tew. Perhaps the story is more interesting in its native language, but I suspect it comes across the same. This would be a good book for someone not familiar with the Gilded Age through World War I.
I received this book gratis through Goodreads Giveaways.
thebooktrail88's review against another edition
4.0
Visit the locations in the novel
A book about Allene Tew – the very epitome of “American royalty” even though you might think that title still belongs with the Kennedy family. That famous family of course had their own problems which are well documented, but I admit to never having heard of Allene Tew.
The book and story intrigued me however as real figures from history often do, and when their stories are fictionalised, even more so. There’s a good mix of fact and fiction here. I think most of it is actually true (judging by the author notes and extensive research documents at the end.)
She went through quite a few marriages and had a few stories to tell on her way to becoming this American Princess though! The stories get so amazing and fanciful in parts that you have to remind yourself that this is a true story and real person! She moves around the country from Jamestown and then eventually to the big city of New York . Aah New York, that glitzy place with golden promises….
It was all a question of who you married and when, in those days it would seem. Well, at least for the monnied classes. She was no fool however, blindly following her husbands around. She guarded her wealth carefully and plotted her next move with the calmness of a chess player quite frankly.
This is one story however that could have the tagline – Money does not buy happiness. Her story also includes momentous events such as the sinking of the Titanic, the stock market crash of 1929, the world wars and even the Russian revolution.
It’s a story which includes a lot packed into a short life and relatively short book at less than 200 pages! Some of that was interestingly taken up with photos and personal letters. I did think the story suffered in that sense as some sections could have been explained more and the various characters more fleshed out, but the story is good however long in the end.
Fascinating mix of fact and fiction
acperkins67's review
4.0
Allene Tew is the epitome of someone who when life gets you down, picks themself up by the bootstraps and keeps going. She was a fascinating woman and her story gives us a glimpse into some of the most important events in the 1st half of the 20th Century.
elenajohansen's review
2.0
I sometimes have this problem with fiction, but never before with nonfiction: this work has a name in the title, but it's not about that person. Allene Tew is our nominal protagonist, so to speak, but very little in this tale is actually about her, instead following the lives of her husbands, children, ex-husbands, "adopted" children, and in some cases, her husbands' or ex-husbands' friends.
Obviously she interacted with many people in her life, but apparently she did so little herself of note that the bulk of her "story" is actually about other people and what they did before/after becoming a part of her life. How many times did we cut away from a narrative about a man to return to Allene, who was "shopping in London" or "buying and furnishing a new house" or "writing letters"? Listen, I understand that the lives of high-society women were circumscribed quite greatly at the time, and this woman in particular did manage to flout the system in many ways (like having five husbands and marrying into royalty) but a history built on social climbing isn't inherently interesting if the person doing the climbing is basically a non-entity in the narrative who exists to marry the next husband.
The few personal details we get are thin and repetitive: she loved surrounding herself with active young people. She stopped caring about being fashionable when she gained weight in her later years. Look at how high this woman has flown when she was born in a backwoods town with basically nothing.
Even the big selling point of the concept--a Dutch writer takes on the tale of an American "princess" because of her connection to the Dutch royal family--isn't much of a payoff, because the baptism ceremony where Allene becomes a royal godmother was apparently incredibly boring to her, and then we breeze right past it to tell the rest of the story, which again, is mostly about men.
I realize this is coming across as harshly critical in ways I don't necessarily mean it to be--this book is obviously well-researched, and sources from the era would naturally be more inclined to discuss men than women in their pages (rampant sexism we're still fighting today, of course.) So it's not surprising that there's so much information available on all five of Allene's husbands and her son and her stepson. But this circles back to my point about putting her name in the title and making me (and other readers too, judging from other reviews) expect that the book is actually going to be about her and not an endless set of vignettes about every man in her life? Why frame the narrative this way when she's basically a shadow we follow along through the history while watching other people actually do things? The only chapter that is truly about her in any substantive way is the final one about her death, and even that's sharing space with the fight of her heirs over her will.
I didn't find this particularly interesting or satisfying and basically only bothered to finish it because it was short.
Obviously she interacted with many people in her life, but apparently she did so little herself of note that the bulk of her "story" is actually about other people and what they did before/after becoming a part of her life. How many times did we cut away from a narrative about a man to return to Allene, who was "shopping in London" or "buying and furnishing a new house" or "writing letters"? Listen, I understand that the lives of high-society women were circumscribed quite greatly at the time, and this woman in particular did manage to flout the system in many ways (like having five husbands and marrying into royalty) but a history built on social climbing isn't inherently interesting if the person doing the climbing is basically a non-entity in the narrative who exists to marry the next husband.
The few personal details we get are thin and repetitive: she loved surrounding herself with active young people. She stopped caring about being fashionable when she gained weight in her later years. Look at how high this woman has flown when she was born in a backwoods town with basically nothing.
Even the big selling point of the concept--a Dutch writer takes on the tale of an American "princess" because of her connection to the Dutch royal family--isn't much of a payoff, because the baptism ceremony where Allene becomes a royal godmother was apparently incredibly boring to her, and then we breeze right past it to tell the rest of the story, which again, is mostly about men.
I realize this is coming across as harshly critical in ways I don't necessarily mean it to be--this book is obviously well-researched, and sources from the era would naturally be more inclined to discuss men than women in their pages (rampant sexism we're still fighting today, of course.) So it's not surprising that there's so much information available on all five of Allene's husbands and her son and her stepson. But this circles back to my point about putting her name in the title and making me (and other readers too, judging from other reviews) expect that the book is actually going to be about her and not an endless set of vignettes about every man in her life? Why frame the narrative this way when she's basically a shadow we follow along through the history while watching other people actually do things? The only chapter that is truly about her in any substantive way is the final one about her death, and even that's sharing space with the fight of her heirs over her will.
I didn't find this particularly interesting or satisfying and basically only bothered to finish it because it was short.
lorialdenholuta's review
4.0
The writing is a bit dry, but Allene Tew's life is interesting and carried me through. I recommend this book if you are the sort that's interested in history, and people from the recent past.
thecaledonianrose's review
5.0
I picked this up off an e-book recommendation, not expecting much. I was pleasantly surprised by the well-researched, detailed story told of this 'American Princess,' so like and yet unlike the well known names of the New York 400 and those famous for their influences over the Gilded Age - the Astors, the Vanderbilts, and so on.
Allene Tew was living proof of the power of determination and the testament to success that is American optimism. She survived heartrending tragedy and overcame numerous humiliations, proved herself capable, creative, and a creature of ingenuity, but more established herself as a living, vibrant woman with a generous, loving heart.
Well worth the read, I highly recommend it.
Allene Tew was living proof of the power of determination and the testament to success that is American optimism. She survived heartrending tragedy and overcame numerous humiliations, proved herself capable, creative, and a creature of ingenuity, but more established herself as a living, vibrant woman with a generous, loving heart.
Well worth the read, I highly recommend it.