“A gorgeous, Technicolor take on America in the middle of the twentieth century.”—Colson Whitehead, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Nickel Boys
From the award-winning, bestselling author of Chang & Eng and Half a Life, a new novel about Lucille Ball, a thrilling love story starring Hollywood’s first true media mogul.
This indelible romance begins with a daring conceit—that the author’s grandfather may have had an affair with Lucille Ball. Strauss offers a fresh view of a celebrity America loved more than any other.
Lucille Ball—the most powerful woman in the history of Hollywood—was part of America’s first high-profile interracial marriage. She owned more movie sets than did any movie studio. She more or less single-handedly created the modern TV business. And yet Lucille’s off-camera life was in disarray. While acting out a happy marriage for millions, she suffered in private. Her partner couldn’t stay faithful. She struggled to balance her fame with the demands of being a mother, a creative genius, an entrepreneur, and, most of all, a symbol.
The Queen of Tuesday—Strauss’s follow-up to Half a Life, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award—mixes fact and fiction, memoir and novel, to imagine the provocative story of a woman we thought we knew.
Genre: Historical
From the award-winning, bestselling author of Chang & Eng and Half a Life, a new novel about Lucille Ball, a thrilling love story starring Hollywood’s first true media mogul.
This indelible romance begins with a daring conceit—that the author’s grandfather may have had an affair with Lucille Ball. Strauss offers a fresh view of a celebrity America loved more than any other.
Lucille Ball—the most powerful woman in the history of Hollywood—was part of America’s first high-profile interracial marriage. She owned more movie sets than did any movie studio. She more or less single-handedly created the modern TV business. And yet Lucille’s off-camera life was in disarray. While acting out a happy marriage for millions, she suffered in private. Her partner couldn’t stay faithful. She struggled to balance her fame with the demands of being a mother, a creative genius, an entrepreneur, and, most of all, a symbol.
The Queen of Tuesday—Strauss’s follow-up to Half a Life, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award—mixes fact and fiction, memoir and novel, to imagine the provocative story of a woman we thought we knew.
Genre: Historical
Praise for this book
"Read it!" - Jennifer Egan
"Anything Darin Strauss writes is magic. I have been his fan since the beginning of time, and I will be his fan until the sun explodes." - Elizabeth Gilbert
"The Queen of Tuesday is a beautiful cinematic story about three people: the beloved actor Lucille Ball; a real estate builder, Isidore Strauss; and his grandson, the author, Darin Strauss. In a gorgeous imagined history of a not-long-ago world, the novelist Strauss allows us to remember our deeply held wishes to invent our lives and memories for our privately held loves. Like The Great Gatsby, Strauss's novel reminds us that ghosts unseen who remain deeply felt renew our hearts' most passionate yearnings and ambitions." - Min Jin Lee
"A great read." - Jenny Offill
"Darin Strauss has resurrected a lost world--the grand movie that never aired, the truncated epic of what might have been between Lucille Ball and his grandfather. Part elegy, part mystery, part speculative memoir, here is a love story unlike any you've read before--spiked with Hollywood scandal and the secrets families keep across generations. Strauss is a beautiful and funny and piercing writer, and this book is a gift." - Karen Russell
"Wonderful!" - Andrew Sean Greer
"A home run!" - Gary Shteyngart
"With The Queen of Tuesday, Darin Strauss rescues history's outtakes and lost footage to edit his own gorgeous, Technicolor take on America in the middle of the twentieth century, concocting an unlikely romance that is bold, brassy, and bighearted." - Colson Whitehead
"Anything Darin Strauss writes is magic. I have been his fan since the beginning of time, and I will be his fan until the sun explodes." - Elizabeth Gilbert
"The Queen of Tuesday is a beautiful cinematic story about three people: the beloved actor Lucille Ball; a real estate builder, Isidore Strauss; and his grandson, the author, Darin Strauss. In a gorgeous imagined history of a not-long-ago world, the novelist Strauss allows us to remember our deeply held wishes to invent our lives and memories for our privately held loves. Like The Great Gatsby, Strauss's novel reminds us that ghosts unseen who remain deeply felt renew our hearts' most passionate yearnings and ambitions." - Min Jin Lee
"A great read." - Jenny Offill
"Darin Strauss has resurrected a lost world--the grand movie that never aired, the truncated epic of what might have been between Lucille Ball and his grandfather. Part elegy, part mystery, part speculative memoir, here is a love story unlike any you've read before--spiked with Hollywood scandal and the secrets families keep across generations. Strauss is a beautiful and funny and piercing writer, and this book is a gift." - Karen Russell
"Wonderful!" - Andrew Sean Greer
"A home run!" - Gary Shteyngart
"With The Queen of Tuesday, Darin Strauss rescues history's outtakes and lost footage to edit his own gorgeous, Technicolor take on America in the middle of the twentieth century, concocting an unlikely romance that is bold, brassy, and bighearted." - Colson Whitehead
Visitors also looked at these books
Ribbons of Scarlet
Stephanie Dray, Laura Kamoie, E Knight, Sophie Perinot, Kate Quinn and Heather Webb
Used availability for Darin Strauss's The Queen of Tuesday