Only the Beautiful
A Best Historical Fiction of Spring Pick by Amazon, PopSugar, AARP, and BookBub!
A heartrending story about a young mother’s fight to keep her daughter, and the terrible injustice that tears them apart, by the USA Today bestselling author of The Nature of Fragile Things and The Last Year of the War.
California, 1938—When she loses her parents in an accident, sixteen-year-old Rosanne is taken in by the owners of the vineyard where she has lived her whole life as the vinedresser’s daughter. She moves into Celine and Truman Calvert’s spacious house with a secret, however—Rosie sees colors when she hears sound. She promised her mother she’d never reveal her little-understood ability to anyone, but the weight of her isolation and grief prove too much for her. Driven by her loneliness she not only breaks the vow to her mother, but in a desperate moment lets down her guard and ends up pregnant. Banished by the Calverts, Rosanne believes she is bound for a home for unwed mothers. But she soon finds out she is not going to a home of any kind, but to a place that seeks to forcibly take her baby – and the chance for any future babies – from her.
Austria, 1947—After witnessing firsthand Adolf Hitler’s brutal pursuit of hereditary purity—especially with regard to “different children”—Helen Calvert, Truman’s sister, is ready to return to America for good. But when she arrives at her brother’s peaceful vineyard after decades working abroad, she is shocked to learn what really happened nine years earlier to the vinedresser’s daughter, a girl whom Helen had long ago befriended. In her determination to find Rosanne, Helen discovers a shocking American eugenics program—and learns that that while the war had been won in Europe, there are still terrifying battles to be fought at home.
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Readers say that Susan Meissner's Only the Beautiful is a powerful, emotionally resonant historical novel that explores the dark history of eugenics i...
This the second book on eugenics that I've read this year. I almost didn't select it, as the other book I read, "The Lies They Told" by Ellen Marie Wiseman, was very heavy. The period of the story, "Only The Beautiful", is similar - encompassing the 1930's and 1940's - told by two main characters. We are introduced first to Rosie, who lives with her parents at a Sonoma County winery run by the Calvert's. Rosie's father is the winery's vine-dresser. But early on in the story, her family is killed at a train-crossing near Santa Rosa. Rosie, nearing 16, is taken in by the Calvert's as their ward, but put to work as their domestic help. Through an act (yet again) of female victimization by the head of the household, Truman Calvert, Rosie becomes (gasp!) pregnant. Side-bar, but why is it that every time a young woman is seduced or raped by a man in her first-ever encounter, she is suddenly dealing with pregnancy? Rosie is cast-out, and sent to an institution where she learns they'll take her baby and sterilize her, because of a condition she has that the state doesn't want to infiltrate the population, nor pass-along (Rosie's) inferior genetics. The trait is that she hears sounds and immediately sees colors. Back then this condition was considered undesirable. Today, it's called synethesia - rare, but certainly not worth sterilizing women over. The other character is Helen Calvert, the sister of the head of the household's Truman Calvert, who has been living abroad in Europe as a nanny for well-heeled families. And while there, Helen comes to see how the Nazi regime is likewise practicing eugenics - not only with the Final Solution of exterminating Jews, but also exterminating others, such as handicapped children, who aren't quite up-to-snuff as Arian nationals. How the two characters and timelines come together, is very satisfying. Susan Meissner did a terrific job in telling the story of a real-life practice that our country shamefully sanctioned. It seems that we were no better than the Nazi's themselves.
Wonderful story very insightful and deeply moving. The story is told by 2 characters and it moves back and forth in time. It really moved me reading this story and it seems by the number of books I read from this author that i really like her writing style. Well done and hooray for author.
Highly recommended !!!!
Highly recommended !!!!
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