"It's about time that a book such as Why They Stay should appear to comment on the wives of politicians and why they remain in place despite reports of infidelity and bad behaviors. Not only does this apply to the highest political offices past and present, but its message and analysis will reach many a marriage where friends may wonder about the reasons why a wife stays in the home after misconduct is uncovered. It's a gripping production especially recommended for any interested in women's issues and political scandals and their aftermath." -- D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
"Marriage is a mysterious thing and political unions are even more so. In the engrossing and important Why They Stay Anne Michaud peers into the heart of some of the most famously troubled political marriages of the past 100 years in an attempt to understand why accomplished women ranging from Hillary Clinton to Silda Spitzer put up with men many others would have quickly kicked to the curb. Her answers will no doubt influence how we think about these scandals going forward - not to mention the ones still to come." -- Helaine Olen, author of Pound Foolish
"Anne Michaud breathes life into headlines that I thought I knew so well with fresh details about well-known political spouses like Hillary Clinton, Silda Wall Spitzer and Huma Abedin. Her thorough reporting helped cast them into an entirely new light to show how their personal struggles reflect the internal struggles women have faced for centuries." -- Christine Haughney, former New York Times staff reporter
"It's a story we've heard often: Prominent politicians suddenly find themselves ensnared in humiliatingly public sex scandals, but their wives decide to stay with them. With a prodigious amount of research and deft storytelling skill, Anne Michaud goes beyond the headlines and explores the stories of both spouses, on both sides of the Atlantic, revealing the pain, the loyalty, and the calculations behind the wives' decisions. Every political couple should read it." -- Bob Keeler, author and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
"I found it really interesting, meticulously researched, and well-documented. Why They Stay doesn't revert to sensationalism but really goes to the question of why they stay in the marriage." -- Stephen F. Medici, author of The Girls in Pleated Skirts
A journalist explores the motivations and emotional constructs of nine political wives who chose to stay in their marriages—in some cases, only for a while—after being confronted with their husbands’ infidelities.
Why do wives of prominent politicians stand by their men after they have been betrayed, especially when that disloyalty has been publicly revealed? This is the question Michaud, a former columnist for Newsday, sets out to answer in her gossipy debut book. She establishes a rather esoteric scale by which to evaluate these women’s decisions—something she calls the White Queen Quotient. For those unfamiliar with 15th-century British history (or the eponymous TV series), the original White Queen was Elizabeth Woodville, who “apparently knew that her husband Edward IV had mistresses—and even one special mistress, Elizabeth Shore. But the rewards of being queen kept her bound to her royal husband.” Michaud then creates five attributes by which she establishes her subjects’ White Queen rating: Submitting to Tradition; Longing for Security; A Personal Sense of Patriotism; Responsibility for Family’s Emotional Health; and Ambition to Build and Bequeath a Legacy. From Eleanor Roosevelt (whose heartache was kept relatively private) to Huma Abedin (assistant to Hillary Clinton and former wife of Anthony Weiner), Michaud, using numerous secondary research sources, details the family histories and accomplishments of each of the women and their erring spouses. There’s not much new here about the six American couples studied, but U.S. readers will likely be less familiar with the one Israeli and two British couples dissected. Skillful prose makes the dishy profiles an engaging read. Unfortunately, Michaud sometimes veers into judgmental speculation and indulges in unsubstantiated assumptions. For example, after discussing the humiliation of wives facing the press during their husbands’ standard confessionals, she writes: “The publicity allows the women who stay to inflate their sense of themselves as loyal, and to bask in other ego-pleasing fantasies.” Of Abedin, the author offers: “Huma had to choose: Anthony Weiner or Hillary Clinton. In the end, it wasn’t Huma’s injured wifely feelings that ended her marriage so much as her professional pride and ambition.”
A lively political book that focuses more on pop psychology than objective analysis.
