Kingmaker

Praise

“a thorough account of Harriman’s rise which also manages to be a brisk, twisty read … riveting and revelatory.”
—The New Yorker

“a must-read book of Fall 2024”
—People Magazine

“rigorous but rollicking”
—The New York Times

“Insightful… Pamela, in Purnell’s deft hands, blossoms into a fascinating subject.”
“Kingmaker is meticulously researched; highly readable…the tone and pace flawless; the scene-setting always vivid.” 
—The Financial Times

“This is a deliciously seductive read. Sonia Purnell escorts readers behind the scenes, beneath the covers, and between the lines in an enthralling and exhaustive portrait of Pamela Harriman, whose life and legacy have long deserved the kind of insightful treatment that someone with Purnell’s storytelling talents can provide. Harriman stands fully and uncompromisingly on her own, a testament to Purnell’s sumptuous prose and unrelenting investigative talents—Kingmaker is masterfully wrought.”
—Denise Kiernan, New York Times bestselling author of The Girls of Atomic City, The Last Castle, and We Gather Together

“A completely fascinating and revelatory biography, written with great aplomb, insight and shrewd analysis. A triumph.”
—William Boyd, Booker–nominated author of Any Human Heart

“With Kingmaker, Sonia Purnell emerges as one of the most accomplished biographers of our time. Once again, she gifts readers with a vivid, glittering, sexy, scintillating, beautifully written portrait of a woman who drove twentieth-century history even as history was driving her. Wife, courtesan, hostess, muse, mistress, social climber, fundraiser, ambassador: The English language has no single word to describe an ambitious female whose fate (across generations) depended on her skill at connecting, cajoling, wooing, and winning over. Today, of course, we’d call her a politician. Kingmaker is a rich and nuanced study of power—its allure, its perils, the gratifications and the great cost of its pursuit.”
—Liza Mundy, New York Times bestselling author of The Sisterhood: The Secret History of Women at the CIA

“a must-read book of Fall 2024”
—People Magazine

“A superb and fascinating account of Pamela Churchill Harriman’s life. It certainly puts the record straight and I can’t recommend it more.”
—Lady Anne Glenconner, bestselling author of Lady in Waiting

“A perfumed seductress with a big heart and even bigger hair, Pamela Harriman trailed jewels and luxury as she befriended everyone from Sinatra and Mandela to Kennedy and Nixon. In Kingmaker, Sonia Purnell triumphantly resurrects this British-born aristocrat (and daughter-in-law of Winston Churchill) whose life was intertwined with many of the greatest movers and shakers of the twentieth century. Addicted to men with riches and power, Pamela’s lack of formal education proved no handicap to her becoming President Clinton’s hand-picked ambassador to France. Meticulously researched and served up with great panache, this is the biography that Pamela Harriman so richly deserves.”
—Giles Milton, author of The Stalin Affair: The Impossible Alliance that Won the War

“a vibrant portrait of an influential political player … Meticulous research informs a captivating biography.”
—Kirkus, Starred Review

“A compulsively readable, multifaceted portrait of an oft-misunderstood woman whose role in twentieth-century geopolitics has, until now, been severely underappreciated.”
—Booklist, Starred Review

“An incredible story, beautifully told, of a remarkable woman whose political influence spanned Churchill to Clinton. Quite a woman, quite a read.”
—Alastair Campbell, former Director of Communication for the Prime Minister

“[T]his captivating new look from Sonia Purnell not only sees Harriman for who she truly was, but it avoids judgement and tired tropes. Instead, it digs deep into what made Harriman who she was—sharp, tactical, power-hungry, generous, infamous—and why she managed to find herself at the crux of almost every major event in her lifetime. It’s a crash course in history, to be sure, but also a finely observed story of becoming who you’re meant to be—whether the world approves or not.”
—Town & Country

“Wonderful … brilliantly readable and fair minded. Was there anyone else like Pamela Churchill Harriman?  And will there ever be again?”
—Anne Sebba, bestselling author of That Woman

“Kingmaker could have been merely about the undemocratic power of money and connections – or merely “high gutter” – but in Purnell’s hands, it becomes a study of the limited means of influence available to ambitious women of Harriman’s generation.”
—The Telegraph

“Casting Harriman as neither villain nor victim, Purnell proposes that for a jolly, pudgy, uneducated teenage daughter of a cash-poor English baron to ascend as Pamela did is nothing short of astounding—and evidence of a steel will, a keen intelligence, and unflagging ambition.”
—Commentary Magazine

“Ms. Purnell recasts her subject as a shrewd diplomat and political operator”
—The Wall Street Journal

“There have been very few dissections of how power is achieved and works that is as good as Purnell’s tremendous biography, who has given us a page turner that matches her subject in verve and ambition.”
—The Irish Examiner

“Purnell succeeds in conveying Harriman’s genuine political skills and her interest in using the insider knowledge she gathered, whether whispered in bed or brandished at one of her dinner parties….Purnell has brough her subject out from between the sheets and enabled her to stand in her elegant clothes, coiffed hair and jewels…”
—Airmail