Fast-moving, sure-footed ... Untold Power is a delightful read. Ms. Roberts, a historian of American women’s suffrage, has clearly enjoyed getting to know her subject, in part through unpublished chapters of Edith’s memoirs. Yet she doesn’t valorize Edith unduly. She treats with tactful historical perspective certain retrograde attitudes of both the president and Mrs. Wilson, but she doesn’t skip over them, either.
Rebecca [has a] flair for writing crisp and engaging narratives. Her book Untold Power: The Fascinating Rise and Complex Legacy of First Lady Edith Wilson is quite simply a compelling yarn ... Roberts’s description of Wilson’s wooing springs to life through her careful research of the love notes the couple exchanged almost daily. In addition, the author skillfully deconstructs the second Mrs. Wilson’s 1939 memoir ... Roberts’s storytelling soars as she leads the reader through Edith’s machinations to hide her husband’s disabilities while maintaining his White House’s functions.
Rebecca Boggs Roberts gives Edith her due, demonstrating that, as the first unelected woman to govern the country, Edith has no match ... Untold Power brims with details, from the colors of the signature orchids Edith wore to the troubled corners of Woodrow’s mind after his stroke.
Solid ... Enriched with incisive sketches of the era’s political figures, including socialite Alice Roosevelt Longworth, and concise history lessons on the Treaty of Versailles, the League of Nations, and more, this is a rich portrait of a singular first lady.
