Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I picked up this book because I'm a fan of Downton Abbey, although I knew before I bought the book that it had little to do with the fictional world of those characters. If you are looking for information on the Downton Abbey television show, there is a marvelous book by Jessica Fellowes which will probably better suit your needs. This is the story of Lady Almina Carnarvon who lived at Highclere Castle which is the real world setting for the fictional television program. If you want to know more about the lives of the real people who inhabited that world during that same era, keep reading. Any biography is a story being told, and each story has a unique voice. In this case, the voice is a member of the Carnarvon family. She seems to draw from source documents such as journals, letters, and other historical references to create a picture of Almina Wombwell who became the wife of the Fifth Earl of Carnarvon. (Yes, this was the same Lord Carnarvon who worked with Howard Carter and discovered King Tut's tomb in Egypt.) This book is told primarily as Lady Almina's story after her marriage, although it can't help but touch on the story lines of many of the other principle players. While the book is historical in nature, that doesn't make it dry reading. There is scandal (Almina was most likely the illegitimate daughter of the wealthy Alfred de Rothschild), wildly fabulous wealth (Almina lived a lavish and luxurious lifestyle prior to WWI), Egyptian adventures, and ultimately heartbreak as WWI touched almost every family in Britain. There is also the inspiring story of how Lady Almina used her connections and wealth during the war to create a hospital first at her home and then in London to help wounded British soldiers receive much needed treatment if they were lucky enough to make it back to England. The book also does one more thing which I appreciate as a US reader of this period of history. This book helps set many of the individual events which are taking place into their larger historical context. I think that's important for reading this particular narrative While it is very much the story of one woman, it also a description of a lifestyle which has slipped into the pages of history in less than a hundred years. Since the book is written by a member of the Carnarvon family, I had expected that the portrait which the book painted to be flattering to the family. I felt that the author did a good job of balancing the good and the bad. The book depicts the wealth, privilege and connections of the family, but it also describes many of their individual faults. It's not the ultimate resource to that time period, but I don't feel that it's intended to teach that kind of history. It's one woman's powerful story in an era when women held little power. Fans of Downton Abbey will come away with a new respect for the real life inspirations of the characters and the period which the program depicts.