A WELL BEHAVED WOMAN by Therese Anne Fowler

Such a dreary cover for a woman extraordinary in her time. In this densely packed, but never overwhelming book of biographical fiction, the author has been voracious in her research to tell the story of Alva Vanderbilt Belmont. A Google search of Alva will label her as either an American socialite or an American suffragette, but she was much more than this - an architect, a campaigner for equal rights for women, and a social activist to both empower and educate women in hygiene, family health, reproduction and contraception. History of the time being generally written by men, it is hardly surprising that she received a lot of bad press, labelled a social climber, shrewish, aggressive, domineering - you get the picture. And she probably was all those things because she had to be to be heard, but she was also a most interesting woman who determined from a young age that she was going to be in charge of her own life.

Born into a highly respectable but impoverished family, by the time she was in her early 20s in late 1870s, she knew she had to marry well to have any hope of saving herself and her family from a life of poverty. She used her good name and breeding to land herself the prize of a young man from the very wealthy but socially inferior Vanderbilt family. The higher echelons of New York society never being an easy nut to crack, this marriage gave the Vanderbilt family its much needed entry into the right crowd, with Alva being the director of proceedings.  From that point on Alva was unstoppable. Known for having a manner well suited to her social standing that upset many people, she was also well known for her energy, her intelligence, strong opinions and willingness to challenge the tightly defined conventions of the day.  She had three children, successfully divorced her unfaithful husband in a time when divorce was a social suicide, remarried for love, and never stopped championing the rights of women and children. 

This is a great read, never boring, and gives a fascinating insight into a time and city when enormous wealth was being made by those willing to take risks in the very new country of America. And how appropriate to read about such a woman in this year of celebrating 125 years of  the first country in the world to give women the vote, and it wasn't the US, it was New Zealand - not a fake news in sight.