Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry (2025) 416 pages
Alice grew up loving music that Cosmo Sinclair, an early icon of the rock and roll scene, created. Some of Cosmo's music was written about his wife, Margaret Ives, the great-granddaughter of a publishing magnate based in California. Margaret was big on the social scene until she disappeared, not too long after Cosmo's untimely death in a car accident.
Alice is a writer for a pop culture magazine, but would love to write something more substantial, like Margaret Ives's biography. She tracks her down to an island off of Savannah, Georgia and is eventually given an invitation to visit. However, Margaret has asked a Pulitzer-prize-winning biographer, Hayden Anderson to try out for the job as well, and gives each of the writers one month to interview her and to make proposals for how they plan to present her life. At that time, she will choose one of them to write her bio. They're required to sign non-disclosure contracts, keeping them from discussing their time with Margaret with anyone, including each other.
Alice and Hayden each have three days per week for meeting with Margaret. They run into each other often on the small island. Alice is cheerful and optimistic; Hayden tends to be much more serious. As they get to know each other, their own relationship grows. As for Margaret's life, it's like a story within a story. Starting with her grand-grandfather, who left Pennsylvania where his large family was quite poor, and found his way out west to mine ore. He started to gain wealth, and later learned that buying up newspapers was even more lucrative. The various siblings, spouses, and lovers in Margaret's family tree makes for drama.
Margaret's story, starting back in the 1800s, was fascinating, but eventually, I found myself more invested in the relationship of Alice and Hayden, and in their own backstories.
