Paula McLain was already deep into research for a novel about Marie Curie when her brother-in-law handed her a copy of Beryl Markham's own 1942 memoir, West with the Night. She told her agent she was dropping the Curie project the same week. The result, Circling the Sun, reimagines the real life of Markham — the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic east to west, and one of colonial Kenya's most unconventional women — and it became a New York Times bestseller with strong praise from NPR and the Boston Globe, plus a solid 3.94 out of 5 on Goodreads from more than 82,000 ratings. This review covers what critics actually said, McLain's own account of why she wrote it, and where reader opinion genuinely splits on the novel's central love triangle.
What Circling the Sun Actually Is
The novel follows Beryl Markham from a difficult, near-feral childhood on a Kenyan farm — where her mother abandoned her and her father raised her alongside the local Nandi tribe's children, letting her run wild and hunt barefoot — through her development into East Africa's first licensed female horse trainer, and eventually into her famous career as a bush pilot. At its emotional center is a real historical love triangle: Markham's relationship with big-game hunter and pilot Denys Finch Hatton, who was also involved with Karen Blixen, the Danish writer better known by her pen name Isak Dinesen and the author of Out of Africa. McLain tells the whole story in Markham's first-person voice, building backward from a framing device set the night before Markham's own historic 1936 transatlantic flight.
It's historical fiction built on a documented life, but McLain has been explicit that the interior psychology — how Markham actually felt about the abandonment, the marriages, the affair — is necessarily invented. Markham's own memoir, McLain has noted, is strikingly guarded about anything personal; the novel exists specifically to imagine the private self that West with the Night deliberately leaves out.
About Paula McLain and Why She Wrote This
McLain was born in Fresno, California, in 1965, and after both her parents left the family, she and her two sisters spent fourteen years moving through foster homes under California's court system. She earned an MFA in poetry from the University of Michigan, published two poetry collections and a memoir about her foster-care childhood, Like Family, before her fiction breakthrough with The Paris Wife in 2011, which reimagined Ernest Hemingway's first marriage to Hadley Richardson from Hadley's point of view.
McLain has said she discovered Beryl Markham almost by accident: her brother-in-law, a doctor and pilot, gave her West with the Night while she was stuck on an entirely different historical novel about Marie Curie. She's described Markham as “a totally wonderful accident as a subject,” and has said what actually drew her in wasn't the flying but the mystery of Markham's inner life — the fact that Markham's own memoir is, in McLain's words, very selective about what it reveals, leaving open the question of how a person like Beryl actually gets made. McLain has also spoken about a direct personal connection to the material: like Markham, she and her sisters were effectively abandoned by their mother early in life, and she's said that shared experience gave her real access to writing Markham's childhood with emotional specificity rather than distance.
How It Compares to The Paris Wife
Both novels share McLain's core method: take a real historical woman who existed in the orbit of a more famous man or a more famous story, and reimagine her from the inside. But the two books diverge in tone and structure. The Paris Wife is told from a place of quiet endurance — Hadley watching a marriage slowly dissolve. Circling the Sun is told from a place of active defiance; Beryl spends the entire novel refusing the domestic, conventional life colonial Kenya expected of her, choosing horses, flying, and her own desires over any of her three marriages. Several reviewers noted that Circling the Sun doesn't quite match The Paris Wife's emotional cohesion, in part because Beryl's story sprawls across more relationships and more overlapping ambitions than Hadley's single, contained marriage. If you loved The Paris Wife for its intimacy, know that this book trades some of that focus for a wider, more restless canvas.
What Critics Actually Said
Rather than inventing a verdict, here's what was actually published about it:
“Richly textured . . . a voice that is lush and intricate to evoke a character who is enviably brave and independent.”— NPR
“Bold, absorbing fiction.”— New York Daily News
Circling the Sun will “keep you from eating, sleeping, or checking your e-mail.”— The Boston Globe
That critical reception was accompanied by real recognition: the novel was a New York Times bestseller and was named a best book of the year by NPR, BookPage, and Shelf Awareness.
And the aggregate reader picture, for what it's worth:
Where Real Reviews Pushed Back
The most specific, recurring reader criticism targets the novel's central love triangle directly. Multiple reader reviews describe the relationship between Beryl, Denys Finch Hatton, and Karen Blixen as lacking real dramatic tension — one reviewer went as far as calling it “the most boring love triangle in the history of romance,” and another found Beryl's extended longing for Finch Hatton “tiresome at times,” describing some of those passages as reading more rhetorical than genuinely felt. There's also a real, recurring comparison problem: several reviewers who'd read The Paris Wife first noted that Circling the Sun, while beautifully written, doesn't quite reach the same emotional intensity. It's worth adding that not every reader agrees — other reviews specifically praised McLain for taking the triangle seriously as a real, documented part of Markham's life rather than skipping past it — so this is a genuine point of division among engaged readers, not a universal complaint.
On Beryl's Childhood and the Making of an Unconventional Woman
The novel's opening third, covering Beryl's unsupervised childhood on her father's Kenyan farm after her mother's departure, is where McLain's personal connection to the material shows most clearly. Beryl is raised loosely alongside the children of the local Nandi people, hunting barefoot and largely outside the conventions expected of a colonial-era white girl, and the novel treats that specific, documented upbringing as the direct root of the fierce independence that later defines her horse training and flying careers. McLain has said she felt she could write this section with real emotional access because of her own experience of maternal abandonment, and that personal throughline gives the childhood chapters a specificity the later, more plot-heavy sections sometimes lack.
On Beryl Markham's Real Historical Achievements
It's worth separating the documented facts from the novel's invention: Beryl Markham really was East Africa's first licensed female horse trainer, and she really did become, in 1936, the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic from east to west — a genuinely dangerous, headline-making feat at the time, flying into the wind Charles Lindbergh had flown with nine years earlier. Her own 1942 memoir, West with the Night, later drew notable admiration from Ernest Hemingway, who praised her prose directly in a letter that's since become a well-known piece of literary trivia. McLain's novel uses that real flight as its framing device, but the historical achievement itself — not just the romantic drama around it — is what ultimately anchors the book's portrait of Markham as more than a supporting player in someone else's story.
Key Takeaways
- McLain abandoned an entirely different novel, about Marie Curie, the same week she encountered Beryl Markham's own memoir, West with the Night
- Beryl Markham was a real, documented aviation pioneer -- the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic east to west, in 1936
- McLain has cited her own experience of childhood maternal abandonment as a direct, personal connection to writing Markham's early chapters
- The most consistent reader criticism targets the central love triangle as dramatically underwhelming, a real and recurring complaint, though not a universal one
- The novel and The Paris Wife share no characters or plot and can be read in either order, connected only by McLain's approach to reimagining real historical women
Who This Book Is Actually For
Readers drawn to richly researched historical fiction about real, unconventional women, especially anyone interested in colonial East Africa, early aviation history, or McLain's approach to reimagining overlooked figures from the inside. It particularly suits fans of Out of Africa curious about the real Beryl Markham behind Karen Blixen's version of events.
Who Should Read Something Else Instead
If a slow-building, occasionally underwhelming romantic triangle is a dealbreaker for you, the documented criticism above is worth taking seriously. Readers who want McLain's tighter, more emotionally contained storytelling should start with The Paris Wife instead.
Pros and Cons
Pros:
- Strong critical praise from NPR, the Boston Globe, and New York Daily News, plus a New York Times bestseller run
- Grounded in a genuinely remarkable, well-documented real life -- East Africa's first licensed female horse trainer and a transatlantic flying pioneer
- A vividly rendered, personally connected childhood section that critics and McLain herself point to as the book's emotional core
- Named a best book of the year by NPR, BookPage, and Shelf Awareness
- Solid 3.94 out of 5 rating across more than 82,000 Goodreads ratings
Cons:
- Multiple reader reviews describe the central love triangle as lacking real dramatic tension
- Some readers find it emotionally less cohesive than McLain's The Paris Wife
- Beryl's extended romantic longing reads as repetitive to some reviewers
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Circling the Sun based on a real person?
Yes. Beryl Markham was a real aviator, horse trainer, and memoirist who became the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic east to west, and who wrote her own acclaimed 1942 memoir, West with the Night, which directly inspired McLain to write this novel.
What's the real Goodreads rating?
Around 3.94 out of 5 across editions, from roughly 82,000-plus ratings as of this writing. Check the live number yourself since it will keep moving.
Do I need to read The Paris Wife first?
No -- the two novels share no characters or plot and can be read in any order or independently. They're connected only by McLain's approach: real historical women, often overshadowed by famous men, reimagined from the inside.
Is the love triangle with Karen Blixen and Denys Finch Hatton historically real?
Yes, the broad outline is documented -- Beryl Markham, Karen Blixen (author of Out of Africa), and big-game hunter Denys Finch Hatton were real people whose lives intersected in colonial Kenya. Some readers found the love triangle itself underwhelming on the page, a real and recurring criticism worth knowing before you start.
Sources & Further Reading
- Goodreads — Circling the Sun (aggregate rating, reader reviews)
- NPR — review
- The Boston Globe — review
- New York Daily News — review
- BookPage — Paula McLain interview
- NPR — Paula McLain interview transcript
- PositiveLifes.com — free inspirational and life-changing PDF books
Final Verdict
Circling the Sun backs up its bestseller status with real critical praise and a genuinely remarkable true story at its center, even if it doesn't fully match the emotional cohesion of McLain's The Paris Wife. The reader criticism of its central love triangle is specific and recurring enough to take seriously, but it sits alongside a vividly rendered, personally connected portrait of how an abandoned, half-wild girl became one of the twentieth century's most fearless women. For readers drawn to real historical women doing genuinely extraordinary things, this delivers exactly that.
Buy Day rating: 8.1/10