Too Close To The Sun

Product Description

This vivid honest memoir of growing up in the Roosevelt White House during the Great Depression is a delicious read for anyone interested in American history or the presidency. Curtis Roosevelt was born five & half months after Black Tuesday when the New York Stock Exchange crash in October 1929 paved the way not only for the Great Depression but also for his grandfathers presidency. History had his family in its grip & he had no choice but to go along for the ride. Just three years old Curtis arrived at his grandparents household at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue only a very short time after they themselves had begun to unpack. He & his sister Eleanor were the countrys First Grandchildren a pint-sized double act known to the media as Sistie & Buzzie" (pronounced as one word). " Too Close to the Sun" is his intimate account of growing up in the Roosevelt White House. With nostalgia & candour Roosevelt describes his role as a tiny planet circling the dual suns of his grandfather & grandmother known to him as Papa & Grandmere. Blending self-abasement humour resentment & affection Roosevelt describes the emotional impact of living his formative years with two larger-than-life figures of having little identity beyond being one-half of the " Sistie & Buzzie" show & of being kept on a short leash by everyone from his grandmother to his bodyguard." Too Close to the Sun" offers a rich chronicle of daily life in the Depression era White House & a moving tale of coming to terms with an untraditional childhood. It is also a fascinating portrait of arguably the most influential & inspirational figure in modern American history. Curtis Roosevelt was there. & he will take readers along with him into the long-ago world that formed him-for better or for worse."