Country Canada Pages 378 pp. ISBN 9780670866748 Subject Biography | Publication date 1997 Originally published 1997 Genre Non-fiction Publisher Penguin Books | |
 | ||
Media type Print (Hardcover & Paperback) Similar Charlotte Gray books, Non-fiction books | ||
Mrs. King: The Life and Times of Isabel Mackenzie King is a non-fiction book, written by Canadian writer Charlotte Gray, first published in 1997 by Penguin Books. In the book, the author chronicles the life of William Lyon Mackenzie's daughter; the mother of Canada's longest serving prime minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King. Her son portrayed her as the "ideal woman, the epitome of motherhood and an angel of goodness and light." His biographers have her portrayed as "an ambitious, grasping manipulator who pushed her eldest son into politics and then contrived to keep him a bachelor so that he could support the rest of his family." Wilfrid Laurier University's Faculty of Arts panel called Mrs. King an "outstanding example of creative non-fiction", further stating, "Charlotte Gray has written a biography with the narrative power of a fine novel."
Awards and honours
Mrs. King won the "Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction", and the Canadian Authors Association's "Birks Foundation Award for Non-fiction". The book was also nominated for the "Viacom Award" and a "Governor-General's Award".