Eunice

December 1, 2017

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist McNamara doesn't just tell the story of Eunice Kennedy, who used father Joe's money, the political power of brothers John and Robert, and her own Stanford-refined smarts and audacity to advance the well-being of children and adults with intellectual disabilities. McNamara argues that this was the Kennedy who left the most important legacy of all.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 19, 2018
Does Eunice Kennedy Shriver (1921–2009), the fifth of Joseph and Rose Kennedy’s nine children, deserve a full-fledged biography? McNamara, a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist at the Boston Globe, answers with a resounding yes. Spurred by the virtual loss of her intellectually disabled sister Rosemary, whom Joseph had lobotomized in 1941, and who then “disappeared” from the family, Shriver became a relentless campaigner for those similarly disabled. She helped expand the Special Olympics into an international organization, persuaded her brother John to establish a National Institute on Child Health and Human Development, and funded programs through the Kennedy Foundation. McNamara also portrays a deeply devout Catholic dedicated to “being an instrument of God’s will on earth”; a woman happily married to Sargent Shriver, the founding director of the Peace Corps; and an often engaged (though sometimes absent) mother. While the author clearly admires her subject, this is no hagiography; Shriver can come across as arrogant and entitled, among other flaws. McNamara’s book is an exemplary biography: thoroughly researched, beautifully written, and just the right length. It deserves a wide readership. Agent: Colleen Mohyde, the Doe Coover Agency.

Starred review from February 1, 2018
A convincing argument that Eunice Kennedy Shriver (1921-2009), the fifth of nine Kennedy children, changed the world in ways at least as significant as her more-famous relatives.Pulitzer Prize-winning former Boston Globe journalist McNamara (Director, Journalism/Brandeis Univ.; Breakdown: Sex, Suicide, and the Harvard Psychiatrist, 1994, etc.) makes a compelling case that Eunice Kennedy's primary crusade, on behalf of millions of citizens with cognitive disabilities, succeeded greatly as a civil rights movement, altering lives for the better not only for the disabled, but also for their families. Eunice received inspiration for the crusade from her parents' treatment of daughter Rosemary, a cognitively disabled girl--and later, woman--hidden away in asylums, forced to undergo a lobotomy, and lied about to the public to protect the burnished Kennedy family image. The powerful and ruthless Kennedy patriarch, Joseph P., made the major decisions regarding Rosemary, and Joseph's wife, Rose, gave in to her husband. McNamara demonstrates, however, that Eunice, John F., Robert, and all the other Kennedy siblings were complicit in the heartless treatment and public charade. Riddled by guilt and driven to accomplish her reform goals, Eunice influenced JFK to push Congress for legislation to improve the treatment of the cognitively disabled and fund research into causes and cures. That legislation won approval in 1963, shortly before the president's assassination. In 1962, Eunice created Camp Shriver, which eventually became the Special Olympics in 1968. In each chapter, the author amply spotlights the formidable nature of Eunice, who refused to accept no for an answer when she spearheaded a crusade. In fact, McNamara learned, the word most often used to describe Eunice was "formidable."A clearly written biography crammed full of memorable anecdotes about each of the Kennedys through four generations, about Eunice's influential husband, Sargent Shriver, and about dozens more characters from domestic politics, international diplomacy, and high society.

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