By Sarah Miller
Random House Studio / Random House, 2025
374 pages
978-0-593-64909-1
Age 12 and older
In the 1920s, 30s, and 40s, Lorena Hickok was a skilled and popular journalist, chronicler of the Depression for the U.S government, and intimate friend of Eleanor Roosevelt. This fascinating biography begins with Hickok’s childhood. Her abusive father couldn’t hold a job; the family moved often throughout the upper Midwest, including Wisconsin, where she was born. By the time she was an older teen she’d been supporting herself for several years. After a brief stint at college, she began working in newspapers. At a time when women journalists were relegated to features and society pages, Hick, as she liked to be known, earned a reputation as a reporter of both news and features. She was sharp and perceptive, and could skillfully convey facts, pain, poignancy, and humor in her stories. Hick met Eleanor Roosevelt in the early 1930s and was immediately captivated; so, too, was Eleanor. Their relationship’s level of physical intimacy during the time they were closest, which lasted into the 1940s (they remained friends until Eleanor’s death), has been debated. Here, author Miller never belabors the point; details reveal that the two women were in love, regardless of how they may or may not have expressed it. Author Miller uses the term “queer” to describe Hick and her relationship with Eleanor, a decision she discusses in the introduction and one that presents this aspect of Hick’s identity matter-of-factly, offering resonance for readers today. ©2025 Cooperative Children’s Book Center