Closest companion

the long version

Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt's marriage was famously difficult, and it is widely known that FDR enjoyed the company of women. But this remarkable book reveals a secret that has been carefully guarded for more than half a century: Roosevelt's closest companion during the last years of his life was his sixth cousin Margaret "Daisy" Suckley. Astonishingly, the secret of this intimate relationship remained hidden until after Daisy's death in 1991, when her friends found a battered black suitcase under her bed. Stuffed inside were years of diaries and letters, including thirty-eight letters in FDR's own hand that no one had ever seen. As affecting as it is eye-opening, Closest Companion provides dramatic new insight into the character and private life of the century's greatest president.