A World More Bright: The Life of Mary Baker Eddy

Ferguson, Isabel and Heather Vogel Frederick. A World More Bright: The Life of Mary Baker Eddy. Boston: The Christian Science Publishing Society, 2013.

Although written for young readers, A World More Bright contains numerous details for anyone interested in the personal side of Mary Baker Eddy’s life story. The title is a quote from a poem penned by Eddy during the Civil War, shortly after hearing news of her son’s enlistment. She had already grieved over the deaths of her favorite sibling, mother, and (first) husband. Now the news that her son, from whom she had been separated for many years, was alive but in danger, was bittersweet. This specific type of information is accompanied by photographs of people, places, and artifacts throughout the book’s entire narrative. Sidebar cameos explain the cultural, geographical, and historical context for the events depicted in the book. Almost every page includes one or more of these photographs or cameos, so the story unfolds visually as well as literarily. For scholars or others more familiar with other biographies on Eddy, this book offers details that may be useful for filling in gaps of historical interest. Scholars will recognize that controversies such as the “Next Friends” suit are described but not critiqued by the authors. Readers can sense that this is the story Eddy would have wanted to be told.

ISBN-13: 9780875104942