Love's Legacy

"Historic nonfiction with a romantic twista bewitching journey of love, pain, and discoveryunfailingly clear and engagingpresented with academic rigor and a storytellers élana lively dive into French history, family legend, and storied lover and writer." - Booklife Review, Publishers Weekly
"a true-life mystery tourincredibly readable and excitingan air of discovery and excitement in every pagekept me totally enthralledI can highly recommend this read." -Grant Leishman, Readers' Favorite Review
"drew me in from the first pageengagingI recommend Love's Legacy also for the sheer pleasure of its delicious wordsmithingthis story of five generations is a feat in itself." -Irene Valentine, Readers' Favorite Review
"What a delightful, informative, and moving read this is! Part biography, part literary history, part family chronicle, and part journey of discovery and self-discovery, Love's Legacy tells the story of the great French romantic writer François-René de Chateaubriand, the extraordinary origins and history of the cosmopolitan and peripatetic Fallon family, the author's love for his father, and, ultimately, the mystery at the heart of a family's past-all recounted in a crisp,lively, and elegant prose. Most highly recommended." -Richard J. Golsan, University Distinguished Professor and Distinguished Professor of French, Texas A&M University
"In this delightful genre-bender of a memoir, a distinguished scholar sets out to verify or disprove a family legend that links him-perhaps through a suppressed scandal-to the great French writer Chateaubriand. Daniel Fallon's enthralling true story of his quest and its outcome is at once a literary-historical romp, a suspense tale with a twist ending, a love letter to his colorful forebears, and a resonant meditation on the meaning of legacy and inheritance." -Amy E. Schwartz, Opinion and book editor, Moment Magazine, and award-winning former editorial writer and op-ed columnist, The Washington Post
"Daniel Fallon's extraordinary tale of Chateaubriand's early life in exile in England during the French Revolution captures the ambivalent feelings of a young French aristocrat in love but also draws on the author's personal fascination with Chateaubriand.This work of literature is both biography based on rigorous scholarship and a fanciful exploration of the 'what ifs' of life. Love's Legacy has all the ingredients of a good read: charm and wit in equal measure, intrigue, and even suspense. It will astound and thrill anyone, surely inspiring some to read or reread well-known works by the great French romantic writer." -Tom Conner, Professor of Modern Languages and Literatures, St. Norbert College, and author of Chateaubriand's Mémoires d'outre-tombe: Portrait of an Artist in Exile
"By presenting an absorbing arc of ancestry, Daniel Fallon reveals a side of Chateaubriand too little recognized, yet as instructive to students of the influential French romantic writer, politician, and diplomat as it is compelling to today's reader of biography." -Steven Mansbach, Distinguished University Professor and Professor of Art History and Archaeology, University of Maryland at College Park