Week 2: Assignment 2

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan

First and foremost this is a love story of Mamah Borthwick Cheney and Frank Lloyd, the famous architect.  Mamah is a headstrong married woman who leaves her very comfortable life and two loving children to travel and live with the man who challenges her and makes her feel that following her intellectual pursuits is the right thing to do.  While it is easy to admire Mamah’s feminist ideas, as she seems to be ahead of her time, it is also very easy to condemn the abandonment of her family, particularly her children and her sister.  People from all walks of life questioned her character.

The Secret Lives of Codebreakers:  The Men and Women Who Cracked the Engima Code at Bletchley Park by Sinclair McKay

This is an incredibly fascinating nonfiction book about some of the true heroes of World War II.  Bletchley Park, a sprawling estate purchased by the head of the intelligence agency at the beginning of the war, became the headquarters for over 1,000 Brits who worked on breaking the German Engima Code.  Loyal workers who included the brightest scholars from Oxford and Cambridge, as well as custodians and groundskeepers, never revealed what went on during the war at this remote location.  Many details weren’t ever mentioned to family members after the war, but now the truth is starting to come out.  This book does not bore you with mathematical computations, but does reveal the more interesting sides of life during the war such as parties, romances and difficult living conditions.