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Mother-daughter tension sets the stage for this closely researched portrait of Ada Lovelace, the only legitimate daughter of poet Lord Byron. Chiaverini's latest historical novel details Ada's struggles to please her mother, Lady Byron, nee Annabella Milbanke, who so feared that Ada would succumb to the influence of Byron's bad blood that she forbade the child from reading poetry or indulging in any flight of fancy. Annabelle's own turbulent marriage to Byron lasted less than a year. Ada nevertheless became a profoundly talented and imaginative mathematician. Cast as Ada's memoir, Chiaverini's novel uses lines from Byron's poetry as chapter titles, charting Ada's discovery of her talents and acceptance of her father's influence. Eventually, Ada found her closest friends in Mary Somerville and Charles Babbage, both of whom encouraged her intellectual creativity, as did her husband, William, Lord King. Even so, her mother's, her husband's, and her society's ideas about appropriate behavior for women suppressed her genius. A compelling yet heartbreaking homage to the mother of computer science"
-From Kirkus
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