Review: Love and Ruin

Love and Ruin by Paula McLain
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Martha Gellhorn was the third wife of Ernest Hemingway. They met while Martha and her family were vacationing in Florida and Martha was smitten from the beginning. At the time she was a struggling author who had just lost her stiffest critic, her dad. She longed to see the world and make a name for herself through her writing, and Hemingway provided an avenue to achieve her dreams. The two struck up a friendship that turned into a relationship. The problem, though, was that he was married. Their love was strong and they felt they could endure anything together. However, they were both headstrong and they both had demons to deal with. Their life together was a tale of love and ruin.

I knew little about Hemingway's life and even less about Gellhorn. This is a fictional tale of their life but their soul is felt throughout this story. This is my first read of McLain's and I wish I had read The Paris Wife first to get some background on wife #1. Obviously, Hemingway had issues and was a love 'em and leave 'em kind of guy who was tormented by personal struggles that he ultimately could not handle. Gellhorn is shown as a strong, independent woman always searching for validation. The book is also filled with historical events and exotic locales from Spain to Cuba to Paris.

I received this book gratis through Goodreads Giveaways.

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