I’ve been reading semi-biographies of real people. You could call them biographical fiction or novelized life stories.
“Maria” by Michelle Moran is “a fictional interpretation of true events” in the life of Maria von Trapp — that is, it’s the real story behind the lead character in the play and movie entitled “The Sound of Music.”
It’s 1959 in New York City. Maria has written to lyricist Oscar Hammerstein about the upcoming musical he’s writing because she’s been made aware of “egregious errors in the script” and wants him to correct them before the play opens. We get flashbacks to 1926 Austria, as 21-year-old postulant Maria teaches first-graders at the abbey. There, she’s told about a widowed captain who needs a teacher for his seven children. She doesn’t want to leave the abbey, but will go where the abbess sends her.
We learn that much of the musical is true — for example, Maria takes her guitar with her when she goes to the captain’s big house so she can teach the children music. The captain does whistle to call the kids, who wear matching sailor suits. Maria does sew play clothes out of drapes. But the oldest is a boy, the names aren’t the same, and, Maria insists, the captain was never as cold as the play makes him out to be. Their actual flight to escape the Nazis is different, but just as harrowing.
It’s fun for us fans of the movie to see the similarities and differences in the movie and real life. And there’s a nice “whatever happened to” section at the end that reveals the fate of the family members.

“Ella” by Diane Richards introduces us to the teenage Ella Fitzgerald. If you’re young and not familiar with her, Ella Fitzgerald was perhaps the definitive jazz singer of the 20th century. But in this book we learn that she started out as a dancer.
It’s 1932 in Yonkers, New York. Ella, 15, and younger sister Frannie live with their hard-working mother and stepfather. Ella is a talented dancer, and she and her partner dance for tips and bring home a few pennies, badly needed during the Depression. She finds refuge in music. “She couldn’t get enough of music; she wanted to devour it. She loved … how she could lose herself, physically inside it. … The bebop bounce of jazz, the lushness of the orchestras, the elegance and upbeat charm of ragtime, the broken-hearted despair of the blues: all of it gave her joy.”
Her life is upended when her mother suddenly dies. Her stepfather takes to drink and no longer brings home money but still expects Ella to provide meals. He becomes abusive. She stays only to protect her younger sister, but eventually is forced to move out.
Desperate for money, she turns to the local mob for work. She’s arrested and sent to a reform school/prison, where the conditions are horrifying. At one point, while she’s in solitary confinement, she sings aloud to keep herself sane and makes a discovery: “It was … her very own voice. Her own way of singing. … She was a singer now, as well as a dancer.”
In 1934, she enters a talent contest at the Apollo Theater. She would dance. But at the last moment she decides to sing instead. Her life would change instantly.
Adult situations and violence.

“By Any Other Name” comes from the prolific Jodi Picoult. The book has dual timelines, but I’m not sure they work well together.
In Elizabethan England, we meet Emilia Bassano, who in real life was the first female poet published under her own name. She also wrote plays, but at that time “women were not allowed to write for the stage … it could land her in jail.”
It’s 1581. Young Emilia’s cousins from Italy are court musicians. (And secret Jews. Revealing that could get them killed.) Emilia is forced to become the courtesan of a man 43 years her senior. He’s the Lord Chamberlain, in charge of all the plays performed, so she learns a great deal about the business of the theater. She gets to read all the plays submitted to him, and she’s fascinated by writers. Emilia thinks, “There was such magic in language. It could bring you to tears, pull you to the edge of your seat, make you sigh with relief. It could draw you out of the world when you needed to escape, and at other times hold up a looking glass to the world as it was.”
She becomes a good friend of playwright Christopher Marlowe, who introduces her to “a small group of writers who all wish to remain anonymous for various reasons. … They cannot sell the work under their own names, so they have someone else front the plays for them.” Who are they using? William Shakespeare. When she meets him, she tells him, “I believe we can help each other. … You wish for everyone to know your name; I wish for no one to know mine.”
In the modern-day timeline, Melina learns she is a relative of Emilia’s and does some investigating to find out if, as some people conjecture, Emilia may have written some of the plays and poems attributed to Shakespeare. Melina writes her own play about Emilia, in which she suggests the relationship with the bard. “I think a hoax can look like history … if you mistake mythology for truth,” she says. She offers plenty of evidence that Emilia was a more logical writer of some of the plays than Shakespeare: She was more educated, better traveled, more familiar with other languages and cultures, etc.
Melina’s play will be presented at an upcoming festival, but there’s some confusion. The director is known for producing only plays written by men, so, unknown to her, her roommate has submitted the play under the name “Mel,” knowing the director will think it’s a man. The ensuing disorder is not at all comic.
In a note at the back of the book, Picoult presents even more evidence for why she thinks Emilia wrote some of the plays.
Here’s my take: The Elizabethan story is simply wonderful — absolutely captivating, can’t-put-it-down reading. The premise is intriguing and the characters almost come to life. I was so involved, I had tears in my eyes when it ended. The modern one, although it’s a satisfactory story, didn’t touch me at all. The two timelines don’t intertwine well. I suggest reading both at first to understand why Melina believes her ancestor wrote some of the Shakespeare plays, but then, if the modern one makes you long for the other, go ahead and read the Emilia timeline straight through, skipping over Melina’s. When you’re done, go back and finish the modern plotline.
Adult situations and domestic violence.
And what do I think of the Shakespeare connection? I have to say, it seems entirely plausible.
Happy reading!
Mary Louise Ruehr is a books columnist for The Portager. Her One for the Books column previously appeared in the Record-Courier, where she was an editor.