BOOK REVIEW: The Girl in White Gloves by Kerri Maher @BerkleyPub @kerrimaherbooks #thegirlinwhitegloves #bookreview

I am definitely one of those girls who was guilty of growing up absolutely adoring Grace Kelly. Not that she didn’t deserve that adoration, but I feel guilty that I only based that off of the part I could see—her beauty, her composure, her talent, her glamorous life. As we get older, it can be hard to learn about the sad parts that we didn’t see in so many of these people. Judy Garland is another woman who I grew to truly understand only later, after learning about her life.

Weaving back and forth in time between the 1950s when Grace was at the height of her acting career, and the 1970s when she was established in Monaco married to Prince Rainier, The Girl in White Gloves takes some creative liberties but tells the story of Grace Kelly’s life and her transition from Hollywood golden girl to wife, mother, and princess in Monaco.

Grace’s story is one of a woman trying so hard to meet expectations set by others. I found the dichotomy between the life people thought Grace Kelly had, and the stress and ambition it took to try and maintain that life in some way to be not only enlightening, but relevant. It made me think a lot about the way we present ourselves on social media versus the minutiae of our real lives. Grace Kelly’s life was incredible. What she accomplished is incredible. But the work, worries, and low moments aren’t as visible.

What I loved about the way Kerri Maher wrote this, is that she gave life to the icon that is Grace Kelly in a way that is hard to capture through pure history. She filled in the narrative of her life, and made me feel as a reader like I was getting behind the scenes gossip. It felt salacious and raw. It made me think about Grace Kelly in a way I hadn’t otherwise. I loved the blend of non-fiction with creative license.It isn’t a biography, but it does lend a sense of heart to the lore of a woman who went through many more ups and downs than her life in statistics might show.

This book is lovely, sad, fun, and compulsively readable. A truly great blend of fiction and non-fiction that you’ll find yourself lost in!

Thank you to Berkley Publishing for my copy. Opinions are my own.

About the Book

A life in snapshots…

Grace knows what people see. She’s the Cinderella story. An icon of glamor and elegance frozen in dazzling Technicolor. The picture of perfection. The girl in white gloves.

A woman in living color…

But behind the lens, beyond the panoramic views of glistening Mediterranean azure, she knows the truth. The sacrifices it takes for an unappreciated girl from Philadelphia to defy her family and become the reigning queen of the screen. The heartbreaking reasons she trades Hollywood for a crown. The loneliness of being a princess in a fairy tale kingdom that is all too real.

Hardest of all for her adoring fans and loyal subjects to comprehend, is the harsh reality that to be the most envied woman in the world does not mean she is the happiest. Starved for affection and purpose, facing a labyrinth of romantic and social expectations with more twists and turns than Monaco’s infamous winding roads, Grace must find her own way to fulfillment. But what she risks–her art, her family, her marriage—she may never get back.

About the Author

Kerri Maher’s first novel, The Kennedy Debutante, came out in 2018, and her second novel came out on February 25, 2020: The Girl In White Gloves: A Novel of Grace Kelly.

Kerri has lived on both coasts, and currently calls Massachusetts home.  She lives near Boston, and loves all the museums and long, leafy walks that part of the world provides, but if you ask her where she’s from, she will always say California.

Visit Kerri’s website here!