What do you think?
Rate this book
Willie : A Romance: Volume 1 of the King Years
Heather Robinson has made Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King's bizarre and paradoxical psyche the mainspring of a historical novel of consummate invention, audacity and wit.
Set against the turbulent background of World War I and Canada's struggle to achieve political maturity, "Willie: A Romance" hurls Mackenzie King into not only a love affair but a love triangle. A unique and absorbing panorama of wartime Canada and wartime Ottawa, official and unofficial, the novel is richly peopled with historical characters: King, Talbot Papineau, Sir Wilifrid and Lady Laurier, Lord Beaverbrook, John D. Rockefller Jr., among others.
Sympathetic and fascinating, "Willie: A Romance" delves deeply into the secret life of Mackenzie King, exposing an extraordinary mixture of buffoonery and cunning, paranoia and ambition, puritanism and prurience.
Set against the turbulent background of World War I and Canada's struggle to achieve political maturity, "Willie: A Romance" hurls Mackenzie King into not only a love affair but a love triangle. A unique and absorbing panorama of wartime Canada and wartime Ottawa, official and unofficial, the novel is richly peopled with historical characters: King, Talbot Papineau, Sir Wilifrid and Lady Laurier, Lord Beaverbrook, John D. Rockefller Jr., among others.
Sympathetic and fascinating, "Willie: A Romance" delves deeply into the secret life of Mackenzie King, exposing an extraordinary mixture of buffoonery and cunning, paranoia and ambition, puritanism and prurience.
360 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1983
1 person is currently reading
6 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
October 7, 2015
I live in Canada now so I thought it is important to learn about my new country. I still think that and now I do know more about it and one of the things where I increased my knowledge is about this Prime Minister that used to live right around the corner. But he was a creep! I felt like I needed a shower every time he was described in more than one fleeting glimpse.
The book is well written though! The style might not be to everyones liking since it is entirely in letters and diary entrances. I loved the perky main character Lily Coolican and I learned some more about WWI from a different (meaning the North American) perspective of it. I have not checked if there are more volumes since this one is called the Volume 1 of the King years but I don't think I could read more about this very, very weird and very, very, very creepy person unless they come out with a waterproof version I can read in the shower...
The book is well written though! The style might not be to everyones liking since it is entirely in letters and diary entrances. I loved the perky main character Lily Coolican and I learned some more about WWI from a different (meaning the North American) perspective of it. I have not checked if there are more volumes since this one is called the Volume 1 of the King years but I don't think I could read more about this very, very weird and very, very, very creepy person unless they come out with a waterproof version I can read in the shower...
Displaying 1 of 1 review