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Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady

Susan Quinn

3.77 · Rating details · 3,370 ratings · 446 reviews

A warm, intimate account of the love between Eleanor Roosevelt and reporter Lorena Hickok—a relationship that, over more than three decades, transformed both women's lives and empowered them to play significant roles in one of the most tumultuous periods in American history

In 1932, as her husband assumed the presidency, Eleanor Roosevelt entered the claustrophobic, duty-bo A warm, intimate account of the love between Eleanor Roosevelt and reporter Lorena Hickok—a relationship that, over more than three decades, transformed both women's lives and empowered them to play significant roles in one of the most tumultuous periods in American history

In 1932, as her husband assumed the presidency, Eleanor Roosevelt entered the claustrophobic, duty-bound existence of the First Lady with dread. By that time, she had put her deep disappointment in her marriage behind her and developed an independent life—now threatened by the public role she would be forced to play. A lifeline came to her in the form of a feisty campaign reporter for the Associated Press: Lorena Hickok. Over the next thirty years, until Eleanor’s death, the two women carried on an extraordinary relationship: They were, at different points, lovers, confidantes, professional advisors, and caring friends.

They couldn't have been more different. Eleanor had been raised in one of the nation’s most powerful political families and was introduced to society as a debutante before marrying her distant cousin, Franklin. Hick, as she was known, had grown up poor in rural South Dakota and worked as a servant girl after she escaped an abusive home, eventually becoming one of the most respected reporters at the AP. Her admiration drew the buttoned-up Eleanor out of her shell, and the two quickly fell in love. For the next thirteen years, Hick had her own room at the White House, next door to the First Lady.

These fiercely compassionate women inspired each other to right the wrongs of the turbulent era in which they lived. During the Depression, Hick reported from the nation’s poorest areas for the WPA, and Eleanor used these reports to lobby her husband for New Deal programs. Hick encouraged Eleanor to turn their frequent letters into her popular and long-lasting syndicated column "My Day," and to befriend the female journalists who became her champions. When Eleanor’s tenure as First Lady ended with FDR's death, Hick pushed her to continue to use her popularity for good—advice Eleanor took by leading the UN’s postwar Human Rights Commission. At every turn, the bond these women shared was grounded in their determination to better their troubled world.

Deeply researched and told with great warmth, Eleanor and Hick is a vivid portrait of love and a revealing look at how an unlikely romance influenced some of the most consequential years in American history. ...more

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Hardcover, 416 pages

Published September 27th 2016 by Penguin Press

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Sep 03, 2017 Montzalee Wittmann rated it really liked it

Eleanor and Hick by Susan Quinn is a book I picked up from the library. I enjoyed this book and learned a lot of history from it too. When it talked about the history of Hick's life, it is so sad and yet if she lived today, this would not have happened. Sure, she might have had a drunk father that beat her but she couldn't live own her own as a young teen.She also wouldn't have to work at different places to feed herself. Hick had a hard life, a total opposite of Eleanor. I also learned more abo ...more

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Mar 18, 2017 DeB MaRtEnS rated it really liked it

Shelves: american-core-identity, biography-memoir, history, nonfiction, historically-american-nonf-f, 2017-notable

I'm of two minds about this book: I appreciated learning about Lorena Hickok's considerable positive contribution to FDR's years as President and as a tremendously affirmative support for Eleanor Roosevelt. However, I did get bogged down with the breadth and detail of FDR's political career, within which I had to sometimes search for the nuggets of the story of "Hick" and Eleanor, to the point that I found myself avoiding "that damn book", and making myself groaningly finish it.

The first half f ...more

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Aug 02, 2016 Nancy rated it it was amazing

Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair that Shaped a First Lady by Susan Quinn shows us the personal life and independent career of Eleanor Roosevelt, and explores her friendships with women and men who enriched her life and whom she deeply loved. Lorena Hickcok (Hick) was an AP journalist covering the White House when Eleanor met her. Sharing a train car while campaigning started a relationship that helped Eleanor become a capable leader and broke Lorena's heart.

Discovering her husband's love affair Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair that Shaped a First Lady by Susan Quinn shows us the personal life and independent career of Eleanor Roosevelt, and explores her friendships with women and men who enriched her life and whom she deeply loved. Lorena Hickcok (Hick) was an AP journalist covering the White House when Eleanor met her. Sharing a train car while campaigning started a relationship that helped Eleanor become a capable leader and broke Lorena's heart.

Discovering her husband's love affair with her personal secretary moved Eleanor to offer a divorce; Franklin's mother said it would ruin his political career. Eleanor never forgave Franklin and their marriage was never again emotionally or physically intimate.

Eleanor became involved with a series of friendships that offered her the love and companionship she needed. The deep love expressed in her letters to Lorena Hickcock, as well as to male friends Joe Lash and her doctor David Gurewitsch, show her deep capacity to love. If any of these relationships included sexual intimacy is uncertain and unknowable but Eleanor's letters to Hick express longing for physical contact and expressions of love.

Eleanor had a history of close relationships to women from her time away at school when she idolized a teacher, to her close friendships with lesbian couples. Eleanor also may have had problems with intimacy and closeness. Her involvement in causes and political work and role as First Lady meant Hick hardly ever had Eleanor all to herself. They took trips together, vacationed together, and spent special holidays together. But it was never enough for Hick.

Eleanor had a great heart and felt deeply, and fought courageously, for the underdog, the powerless, the marginal; she championed equality for all. This book also shows how Hick's reporting and WPA work brought to attention the grinding poverty and dangerous workplaces, the starvation and health crisis across the country during the Depression. Hick was also a competent leader for Democratic Women.

This book shows how these strong women, so disimilar in background and class, impacted FDR's policies and improved the lives of Americans.

I recieved a free ebook through First to Read in exchange for a fair and unbiased review. ...more

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Jul 21, 2016 Denise rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: lgbt-nonfiction, reviewed

This is going to be one of the blockbuster popular histories of the fall, certainly to be featured on NPR and other big book promoters like that, so I was super excited to get an advanced copy. But unfortunately I was quite let down, because the book was actually kinda flat, and I was disappointed in it, though I’ve thought about it for several days and I still can’t totally put my finger on why it seemed so meh. I am slightly crazy about Eleanor Roosevelt, who is America’s greatest politician w This is going to be one of the blockbuster popular histories of the fall, certainly to be featured on NPR and other big book promoters like that, so I was super excited to get an advanced copy. But unfortunately I was quite let down, because the book was actually kinda flat, and I was disappointed in it, though I’ve thought about it for several days and I still can’t totally put my finger on why it seemed so meh. I am slightly crazy about Eleanor Roosevelt, who is America’s greatest politician who never was, and I’ve always just accepted, in my post-everything-child privilege, that she was A Lesbian with some dumb cheating man who wouldn’t give her a divorce and that her partner was named Lorena Hickok, and that’s that. But the book, despite its stated thesis of documenting this great love affair, kinda made me question what I’d grown up “knowing” about Eleanor Roosevelt instead. Technically, the book was completely fine: The historical methodology, totally fine for pop history, the writing, unexciting but fine, the balance of the twin-biographies, fine. There's nothing structurally wrong with the book.

I think some of the problem is actually the subject matter and the historic materials at hand. While the author lavishes you with quotes from both sides of their 30 years of correspondence, it is just plain hard to squeeze too much spice and sex from the Eleanor-Hick letters, they are decidedly not like James Joyce to his mistress here. The evidence presented supports a romantic affair, with a lot of XOXO letters, U-Haul daydreaming about getting a sweet cottage together, a “special friendship” ring, and some cozy sleepovers in Eleanor’s sweet gayborhood apartment where we can infer human beings did natural human being things, but it’s striking how quickly it faded out to just correspondence about their political work and their health, far from the devoted lifetime romance the blurb promises you.

It’s also pretty plain this was an unbalanced love, Hick loved Eleanor more than she was loved in return. Hick quit her hard-won AP reporting job and devoted most of her life to her, pushed away other nice women she could have built a more emotionally satisfying life with, Eleanor… actively courted other emotional intimacies and didn’t give up anything that I could notice. I have been forced by this book, in short, to come to terms with the knowledge that Eleanor Roosevelt was a Bad Lesbian, and I’m not very happy about it. Which is fine, that’s history for you, always crushing your history-crushes, but the blurb promised me “a vivid portrait of love” and I got something more like a depressing series of blurry paparazzi photos of Eleanor taking a good woman for granted.

I do think the author, however, has put together the most complete set of stories about Hick yet published, including fresh interviews with people who knew her in her final years, which is probably the main value of the book. I didn’t know anything but the bare facts about Hick before reading this, and I now am kinda crazy about her, this grumpy looking woman with a fat cigarette hanging out of her mouth just doing her thing, working hard for 30 years and never being sure if she’d gotten a single position after being with Eleanor on her talent and without nepotism. There’s also some decent research on the other lesbian couples Eleanor and Hick hung out with, though I’d have liked more work on them, if only because it’s comforting to know Eleanor and Hick knew other lesbians in (what we’d consider today) more healthy relationships, and fights the general historical misconception of ye olden days being nonstop lonely closeted homosexual tragedy. So get the book if you want to read more about the beginning of women's involvement in Democratic party politics and a particular badass lesbian journalist, but temper your expectations of a great inspirational romance, because it’s just not here.

My copy of this book was free from the publisher for the purposes of review. ...more

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Oct 14, 2016 BAM Endlessly Booked rated it liked it

Shelves: notorious-women, american-nonfiction, audiobooks, traded

3 stars or 4 stars? I honestly don't know. As evidence of a love story through a changing time in our country's history, strong four stars. Otherwise, it is rather dull. Audiobook I found my mind wandering it was easy to lose track of the narrative because little action takes place. I'm glad I read it, just not happy I own it and can't sell it ...more

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Aug 19, 2016 Alisha Marie rated it liked it

Shelves: arc-s, non-fiction, read-in-2016

I found Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady to be somewhat underwhelming. I guess with a subtitle like that I expected there to be tons more focus on the actual relationship/love affair between Eleanor and Hick, but you don't really get that. I mean, you get some, but a lot of this book is focused on what these two ladies did separately as opposed to together.

I also would have liked it if this book included more of the letters that Hick and Eleanor wrote each other. I know ...more

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Apr 26, 2017 Katie rated it really liked it

Shelves: books-read-in-2017-new, how-library, books-read-in-2017, format-ebook

The first half of this was really good! Very readable and engaging. I'd heard of Hick before, but had no idea she and Eleanor had such a close (probably romantic, possible sexual) relationship.

Then my library loan expired and I had to wait to read the second half, so some of my waning interest is probably due to that, but also the second half of the book was more about Eleanor and Hick as individuals. Which was still interesting, but wasn't what the book promised.

Eleanor had other close, special ...more

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Jul 28, 2016 Tammy rated it liked it

Thank you First Reads for the opportunity to read Eleanor and Hick. This book chronicles the love between two women and the influence that the First Lady had during the depression, the war and the years following the war. I doubt that Mrs. Roosevelt would have been as effective without the stimulus of Ms. Hickock. And, the focus of the book really is on Hick's influence rather than on the relationship between the two women. So, the subtitle is a bit misleading. No matter. This is a tale that nee ...more

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Dec 18, 2016 Erin rated it it was ok

Lorena Hickok was Eleanor Roosevelt's very close and personal "friend". I cannot even begin to imagine what it must have been like to gay in 1930's and 40's it must be hard enough in our somewhat more enlightened times. Add to that imagine being a lesbian and being the First Lady. Before reading this I had heard the rumors that Eleanor Roosevelt may have been a lesbian and I wanted to learn more about that part of her life.

This book was fascinating but also slow moving and boring at times. I ge ...more

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Feb 25, 2020 Camryn added it

Shelves: couldn-t-finish

DNF at 112 pages. This was interesting and well written and I commend the author for talking about the racism and anti-semitism both women engaged in. That being said, it was really frustrating me and making me, quite frankly, not care about either of them, so I had to stop.

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Jul 28, 2017 Cindy rated it it was ok

Shelves: history, non-fiction, lgbtq, biography-autobiography-memoir, female-author-read-2017

Gosh, I'm so disappointed. As a card carrying lesbian from birth, I'm unclear how I had never heard of Eleanor and Hick. So, you can only imagine my reaction when I saw this title. I was beyond pumped. Although full of information, I found this book boring and a struggle to get through. It was neither warm nor intimate. I actually feel bad that I disliked it so much. (((le sigh))))) ...more

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Jul 20, 2020 Rosemarie Donzanti rated it liked it

An interesting read for sure. Eleanor and Franklin had an interesting relationship that was peppered and spicy with a dollop of infidelity. I really enjoyed the historical aspect of the book. The personal relationships, however were pretty darn dysfunctional. Not a lot of truth in this marriage but a fair share of jealousy. I probably would have enjoyed the book so much more if it was my first read of Eleanor and Hicks relationship. I read White Houses by Amy Bloom two years ago and I was shocke ...more

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Mar 24, 2020 Angela rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: already-owned

One of my passions these days is learning about the history of the world. I can’t remember how I discovered this book, it was possibly a recommendation on goodreads. I do remember reading in a historical book about Eleanor Roosevelt's Tour of the South Pacific in 1943, when she visited our soldiers in Australia during World War II. There was no hesitation with the full 5 star rating I gave it. It was so interesting and enlightening.

Eleanor Roosevelt, was First Lady of the U.S.A from March 4, 193 ...more

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Dec 14, 2017 Melody rated it really liked it

Shelves: aloud

Interesting and involving, this book totally captivated me from the beginning. Some of the aspects of the relationship are so heartbreakingly sad they were hard to read about. I enjoyed the clearer picture of Eleanor and Hick.

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Apr 22, 2018 Jess rated it liked it

A lot of information about the political climate/events/background of the time and individuals involved, and some good info on some lez relationships, but I wanted more of the latter

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Jul 21, 2019 Leah Struhsaker rated it really liked it

4.5.

Eleanor Roosevelt has always been someone I admire and this book affirms this. I’ll note, this is more of a general biography of her life with a focus on her relationship with Hick which is more heavy in the beginning of the book than the second half on. I expected it to focus on their relationship more closely throughout. A great read nonetheless.

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Oct 17, 2020 Debbie Pearson cox added it

This book provided a very personal look at the life of Eleanor Roosevelt and her special relationship with Lorena Hicks. CNN is airing a series on First Ladies. It will be interesting to see if that relationship is touched upon in the series. The historical background to her life in the White House was quite interesting.

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May 28, 2018 Tanya rated it it was ok

Shelves: library-book, audiobook, non-fiction, read-in-2018

Overall a most interesting, thorough background of Eleanor and Hick’s relationship. The writing and research was well done but I couldn’t understand why Hicks lived in the White House and was allowed to carry on with Eleanor. If Hicks had been a man, I would be of the same opinion. The bits about each woman’s early life was telling and insightful; Eleanor’s hands on approach to helping in and out of the White House was really wonderful and certainly showed her desire to help all people. Her rela ...more

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Jan 07, 2021 Melody rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook, non-fiction, historical-event, susan-quinn

There were some parts that I thought did not need to be in there, but overall, I enjoyed it.

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Dec 15, 2020 Moira rated it really liked it

While slow at times, I very much enjoyed this perspective on Eleanor Roosevelt, Lorena Hickok, their friendship and love, and the history of the 30s and 40s.

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Jul 17, 2020 Nikki rated it really liked it

This was a lovely, non-fluff escape into history. Richly personal details, empathetic nuance, and lots of fun. Like riding shotgun on a romance rollercoaster and then watching it level into steady motion. Great history, great biography, great pleasure.

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Aug 10, 2016 Heather rated it really liked it

Shelves: lgbtq, nonfiction, biography, adult

As a big fan of Eleanor Roosevelt, it's sometimes hard to find biographies that stay true to her while also providing a fresh perspective. This book has managed to do that by taking her widely-acknowledged and yet still slightly secret relationship with Lorena Hickock and putting it center stage. By writing the book as a dual biography of the two women, the author was able to highlight the ways in which their lives intersected and diverged without convoluted effort.

I enjoyed reading more about t ...more

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Dec 04, 2016 Judy G rated it really liked it

This title is a misnomer. It is not about a love affair between Eleanor Roosevelt and the journalist Hick. It isnt even certain from the passages of their letters that they had a love affair. They did tho love each other and whether there was a sexual relationship is uncertain.
What this book is about is the political life of Eleanor and about the life of her friend Hick or Lorena Hickok. It is also about the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the issues of those times especially about ...more

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Aug 04, 2016 Quirkyreader rated it liked it

I received this as an ARC from Penguin. It was an OK book. At times I did get board with the narrative, but I did finish it.

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Aug 02, 2018 Houston Reader rated it it was ok · review of another edition

How on earth did this writer make a fascinating subject boring?

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Oct 09, 2019 Deborah Carr rated it it was ok

Shelves: peeps-book-club, just-couldn-t-finish

I just could't finish this book. It just couldn't keep my interest. ...more

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Oct 28, 2020 Mark rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, biography, politics

When you're in a book club, you'll sometimes get a book you never would have chosen on your own, and you'll think, I'm glad I read that.

This is not one of those occasions.

This is also, I admit, a cheat review, because I was generally so disinterested in this topic that I skipped the whole middle of the book.

Quinn is a decent writer and has done her research, as far as I can tell, but the story she has told is really not so much a love story, as far as I can tell, as a loyalty story.

The clear im ...more

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Apr 05, 2020 Robyn rated it really liked it

Shelves: good-book, 2020-april-challenge

I checked this book out at the library and was quite surprised to learn so much about Eleanor Roosevelt and her relationship with Lorena Hickok (Hick) an AP journalist covering the White House. I think that the world is aware now that FDR was involved in another relationship and that he and Eleanor were married in name only in an attempt to save his political career.

Being a board minded person, I assume that what is good for the drake is good for the flock, so to speak. So I was ok to learn tha ...more

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Aug 27, 2017 Giedra rated it really liked it

Greatly enjoyed reading this book. I didn't know much about Eleanor Roosevelt beyond being FDR's wife (and distant cousin), and had never even heard of Lorena Hickok ("Hick"). Hick was a journalist who, in the course of following FDR's career, became one of Eleanor's closest lifelong friends and for a time, perhaps something more. It's clear that after discovering FDR's affair with Lucy Mercer during his time as a (Senator/Representative? forget which) in DC, Eleanor resolved to stay married but ...more

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Jun 16, 2017 Angie rated it liked it

Shelves: historical, history, friendship, book-club, lgbt, families, adult-nonfiction, adult, nonfiction

"I'm afraid, you and I are always going to have times when we ache for each other and yet we are not always going to be happy when we are together." pg. 129

This was our book club pick for June. Must say, I was pleasantly surprise to find out about the romantic and possibly homosexual relationship of first lady Eleanor Roosevelt with journalist Lorena Hick.

The book was well-balanced with historical anecdotes and documented interactions between Mrs. Roosevelt and Miss Hick. Friends or lovers? As ...more

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About Susan Quinn

Susan Quinn

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Susan Quinn grew up in Chillicothe, Ohio, and graduated from Oberlin College. She began her writing career as a newspaper reporter on a suburban daily outside of Cleveland, following two years as an apprentice actor at the Cleveland Playhouse. In 1967, she published her first book under the name Susan Jacobs: a nonfiction account of the making of a Broadway play called On Stage (Alfred A. Knopf). Susan Quinn grew up in Chillicothe, Ohio, and graduated from Oberlin College. She began her writing career as a newspaper reporter on a suburban daily outside of Cleveland, following two years as an apprentice actor at the Cleveland Playhouse. In 1967, she published her first book under the name Susan Jacobs: a nonfiction account of the making of a Broadway play called On Stage (Alfred A. Knopf). In 1972, after moving to Boston, she became a regular contributor to an alternative Cambridge weekly, The Real Paper, then a contributor and staff writer on Boston Magazine. In 1979, she won the Penney-Missouri magazine award for an investigative article for Boston Magazine on dangerous cargo transported through the city, and the Golden Hammer Award from the National Association of Home Builders for an investigative article on home inspections. She has written articles for many publications, including the New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly and Ms. Magazine.
In 1987, she published her first biography, A Mind of Her Own; The Life of Karen Horney (Simon and Schuster, Addison-Wesley and Perseus) for which she received the Boston Globe's Laurence L. Winship Award.

For her next book, Marie Curie: A Life, she was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Rockefeller Foundation writing residency at Bellagio in Italy. A reviewer in Science magazine predicted that her book "is certain to be this generation's biography of Marie Curie.” Marie Curie was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award and was on the short list for the Fawcett Book Prize in England. It has been translated into eight languages, and was awarded the Elle Grand prix des lectrices in 1997.

In 2001, Quinn published Human Trials: Scientists, Investors and Patients in the Quest for a Cure. It was described as a “real-life thriller” by the New York Daily News. Human Trials was chosen by Library Journal as one of the best sci-tech books of 2001.

Susan Quinn has lectured all over the United States, and has spoken in France and Poland about her biography of Marie Curie. In 2000, the University of Wisconsin at Stout awarded her a Doctorate of Humane Letters.

Quinn has served as the Chair of PEN New England, a branch of the writers’ organization PEN International. She is an accomplished flutist, and continues to participate in chamber groups on a regular basis. Susan is married to a psychoanalyst, Daniel Jacobs and has two children and four grandchildren. She lives in Brookline, Massachusetts just outside of Boston. ...more