NetGalley Description
A “sweeping” (Entertainment Weekly) novel of America’s forgotten leading lady, the central figure of a movement that defined a nation—from the New York Times bestselling author of The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post
“Whether exploring Margaret’s remarkable friendships or delving into her crucial legacy as a journalist, writer, and feminist, Finding Margaret Fuller promises to transform every reader it touches.”—Marie Benedict, co-author of The Personal Librarian
Young, brazen, beautiful, and unapologetically brilliant, Margaret Fuller accepts an invitation from Ralph Waldo Emerson, the celebrated Sage of Concord, to meet his coterie of enlightened friends. There she becomes “the radiant genius and fiery heart” of the Transcendentalists, a role model to a young Louisa May Alcott, an inspiration for Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Hester Prynne and the scandalous Scarlet Letter, a friend to Henry David Thoreau as he ventures out to Walden Pond . . . and a muse to Emerson. But Margaret craves more than poetry and interpersonal drama, and her restless soul needs new challenges and adventures.
And so she charts a singular course against a backdrop of dizzying historical drama: From Boston, where she hosts a salon for students like Elizabeth Cady Stanton; to the editorial meetings of The Dial magazine, where she hones her pen as its co-founder; to Harvard’s library, where she is the first woman permitted entry; to the gritty New York streets where she spars with Edgar Allan Poe and reports on Frederick Douglass. Margaret defies conventions time and again as an activist for women and an advocate for humanity, earning admirers and critics alike.
When the legendary editor Horace Greeley offers her an assignment in Europe, Margaret again makes history as the first female foreign news correspondent, mingling with luminaries like Frédéric Chopin, William Wordsworth, George Sand and more. But it is in Rome that she finds a world of passion, romance, and revolution, taking a Roman count as a lover—and sparking an international scandal. Evolving yet again into the roles of mother and countess, Margaret enters the fight for Italy’s unification.
With a star-studded cast and sweeping, epic historical events, this is a story of an inspiring trailblazer, a woman who loved big and lived even bigger—a fierce adventurer who transcended the rigid roles ascribed to women and changed history, all on her own terms.
Review by Coffee & Ink
This well-researched, well-written historical novel is highly recommended for lovers of overlooked women in history. The only thing I knew about Margaret Fuller is vague—she was part of the early abolitionist and suffragist movement. What a loss, though! A woman of great character and intellectual spirit, educated by her father who knew she’d never get any kind of education in the outside world. (Harvard did not admit women until 1920 and was the first college/university to do so. A separate school for women, the Annex, became known as Radcliffe, established by a woman named Elizabeth Agassiz, in 1879. It gave out certificates to women, not degrees.)
The novel follows her as she searches for a way to support her widowed mother and younger siblings. She journeys to Concord, Massachusetts where she encounters the Transcendentalists: Emerson and Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorn, Bronson Alcott, and a young Lousia May.
Throughout, she returns often to Concord, to Waldo and his wife, to recover and ground herself in a home away from home. The story is told in the first person with a sensitive, reflective tone. I really feel the author captured the spirit of Margaret Fuller, and her novel has made me even more curious to read further about the woman and her era.
Highly recommend historical fiction, worth repeating.
Thank you NetGalley for a copy of this book to read and review
Coffee And Ink 
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