I’ve been studying Anne Morrow Lindbergh for more than ten years and I found the excerpt in Good Housekeeping from “The Aviator’s Wife” by Melanie Benjamin to be not only a misrepresentation of her early life, but if this continues throughout the book, a travesty to the accomplished woman Mrs. Lindbergh was.

I give classes and presentations on Mrs. Lindbergh, and have written a one-woman play on her (Shells -- a Cameo of Anne Morrow Lindbergh), so I was distressed to see her life turned into a Harlequin novel.

Mrs. Lindbergh had a fascinating and accomplished life: she came from great wealth, she married the world’s most famous hero of her time, she was a pioneering aviator, and she was a significant writer of the 20th century. Her early letters and diaries as well as her public appearances later in life clearly show she was a shy young person. In fact, she described herself as the shiest, most self-conscious adolescent who ever lived. When she met Charles Lindbergh in 1927, she was just months away from graduating from Smith College with the two most prestigious writing awards given by the school. But she absolutely and clearly was not a helpless dunce, at that time or anytime afterward.

Mrs. Lindbergh also said that early on in her marriage, she considered herself a devoted page serving her knight, a role she could play until she grew up. Well, she did grow up. And anyone who has read the latest book of her letters and diaries edited by her daughter Reeve Lindbergh, Against Wind and Tide, would clearly see that Mrs. Lindbergh grew to understand not only her own intelligence and self worth, but also her contributions to Charles’ successes.

So to have a book that defined her life in terms of her husband by the title (The Aviator’s Wife) is an erroneous beginning to even attempt to tell the story of this remarkable woman.

I have read and studied everything I can get my hands on related to Mrs. Lindbergh, so I will read this book. But if it continues to present inaccuracies on every page as well as a frivolous and disparaging attitude toward someone for whom I have so much admiration and respect, I only hope I can finish it.