The Story of Chicago May

Like some of the previous reviewers, I was annoyed and bewildered after the initial reading of this book. Not because it wasn't well-written. It is. But the intermingling of the author's experiences and what she perceives May Duignan-Churchill to have felt/experienced was disorienting because I thought I was buying a biography of Chicago May. Most historical biographies are devoid of personal observations unless the author... Read Full Review

The biography was much as described in other reviews, where an interesting person was described both through the historical facts found and personal experiences of the author. I enjoyed O'Faolain's strategy and the story of May's life.

I was struck with the skill and insight that the author demonstrates to draw us to this character. May becomes an examp-le of a human soul trapped by her environment and able to discard the yoke of fear that holds us in a dead-end life. She emerges as a soaring butterfly but is conscious of the difficulty of returning to "comfortable" life after living on the edge of society and flaunting it. The author carefully guides us... Read Full Review

I thought that this was a terrificly engaging book - read in two sittings. I very much liked Ms O'Faolain's two volumes of memoirs and this is a discernable and organic development of those investigations into life and love. This is a feminist, though unacademic, rewriting of history using impressively detailed research to recreate a picture of a largely unknown and 'unimportant' woman who was notorious as a streetwalker and... Read Full Review

I heartily disagree with the previous review. Nuala O'Faolain is not seeking to merely recreate a biography in this book, but to urge readers to consider and ruminate upon the lives of women on the fringes of society, those millions who have led hard-scrabble, often brutal, lives throughout history. Her commentary seems, to me, not to be intrusive, but rather chronicles the connections made between the lives of the author... Read Full Review