Review: Beautiful Exiles

Beautiful Exiles by Meg Waite Clayton
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I’m going to be honest and say Ernest Hemingway is a historical figure I know very little about. In fact, I’m someone who has never read an Ernest Hemingway novel. I keep telling myself I will, but I always find something else to read instead. I will have to change that, at some point, if only to end my curiosity, but for now I was more than willing to give Meg Waite Clayton’s Beautiful Exiles a read. Although this is not a book about Ernest Hemingway in the usual sense of books about the figure, it was a different perspective that did enlighten me about the man.

As I’ve stated, my knowledge about Ernest Hemingway is extremely limited. This means my knowledge about those connected to him is also limited – even more so, actually. Due to this, I cannot say how much of this book is fact and how much is poetic licence. However, I can say this was an interesting read.

Well written, this book had me curious to see what snippet of information we would receive next. I had some notions of where certain things would go – due to the small snippets of knowledge I had – but for the most part, this book was eye opening for me. It certainly left me even more curious about the historical figures within – and I’m not simply speaking about Ernest Hemingway.

There is no doubt in my mind that Meg Waite Clayton has a way of bringing history to life, and Beautiful Exiles has certainly left me interested in digging deeper into the history of the characters in this novel.

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