Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne Stevenson was a remarkable woman who seemed to live several different lives in one lifespan. She traveled back and forth between the civilized world and the barbarous regions at the edge of society, not with aplomb, but with gritty determination. (view spoiler)[ Her adventures included traveling across the isthmus of panama before the canal was built, crossing the desert in a stagecoach, setting up housekeeping in a mining camp, studying painting in France, being romanced by a young Robert Louis Stevenson, sailing the Pacific Ocean, and forging a plantation from the jungle in Samoa. Add to this her success at being what is now referred to as a “cougar.” Fanny, however, was not a carefree bon vivant who sought out adventure, it just seemed that these unusual circumstances placed themselves in her path, and she forthrightly rolled up her sleeves and tackled each task as it came before her. There was much turmoil and strife in her life that took its toll on her – a philandering husband, the unseemliness of divorce in Victorian times, her nervous breakdown and mental illness, and the never-ending fight for the lives of beloved invalids, her son and her frail young husband. (hide spoiler)] One of her acquaintances said that you either loved her or hated her. I loved to read about her and definitely admire her pluck, but am not quite sure what I would have thought of Fanny Stevenson had our paths crossed in real life.

As to how the book was written, I have my problems with Ms. LaPierre. Is this a biography or a novelization? Parts of the book are dramatized and if this were a novel, and scenes are acted out, and told from various viewpoints of the characters involved. These are not “characters,” however, but real people. I would rather have read a straight biography of this fascinating woman than have scenes enacted. We get an almost moment-by-moment description of what went on in Fanny’s mind and life while she decided whether to stay with her husband or leave him for RLS, but other phases or her life are skimmed over. She meets RLS while he is baring earning a living as a writer, and once she marries him he is a famous author. When exactly did this happen? We see her mental illness from her daughter’s prospective, who thinks to herself, “Oh, I should have mentioned to the doctor that mother thought she was pregnant with ten babies, and made the house she was building especially large to accommodate them all.” What?!?!?! Not enough facts for a biography; not enough insight for a novel.

I have given it four stars mainly because I found Fanny so interesting.