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Historical Fiction August 2020
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Conjure Women
by Afia Atakora
What it's about: The pre-and-post-slavery life of Rue, a midwife and healer who learned everything she knows from her late mother May Belle, a "conjure woman" whose skill set also included laying curses on their cruel master.
After the war...the recently emancipated people stay on the grounds of the old plantation, building a new community in the shadow of their former master's burned-out house. When the birth of strange-looking baby precedes an epidemic that Rue can't stop, a traveling preacher condemns her as a witch.
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Stateway's garden : stories
by Jasmon Drain
A shy, intelligent boy coming of age in 1980s Chicago navigates dreams, poverty and violence through the interlinked short stories of his neighbors as they anticipate the imminent destruction of their housing project. A first collection.
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Saving Ruby King by Catherine Adel West What it's about: the bond of friendship between two teenage girls living in the South Side of Chicago, which is tested by domestic violence, murder, and decades-old secrets coming to light.
Read it for: the exploration of issues such as inter-generational family trauma and social marginalization; the strong sense of place; the shifting perspectives, including chapters narrated by inanimate objects that witness some of the story's most dramatic events. | |
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The book of longings : A Novel
by Sue Monk Kidd
A first-century intellectual fights the limitations imposed on women before an encounter with an 18-year-old Jesus leads to their marriage, his dangerous public ministry and her flight to safety in Alexandria. By the author of The Invention of Wings. Maps.
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Cilka's journey
by Heather Morris
A novel based on a true story follows a Russian woman who is forced by a concentration-camp commandant to become his lover and is subsquently sent to Siberia after being found guilty of collaborating with the enemy. By the #1 best-selling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz.
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Across the way
by Mary Monroe
Tensions between the bootlegging Hamiltons and the respectable Watson families in Depression-era Alabama reach a boiling point that leads to lies, deceit and violence, in the finale of the Neighbors series. By a New York Times best-selling author.
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The year of the witching
by Alexis Henderson
A young woman living in a rigid, repressive society discovers dark powers within herself, with terrifying and far-reaching consequences, in this stunning, feminist fantasy debut.
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Summer of '69
by Elin Hilderbrand
During the tumultuous summer of 1969, the children of the Levin family, looking forward to spending the summer at their grandmother's historic Nantucket home, find their lives upended by troubling family secrets
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Last stop in Brooklyn : a Mary Handley mystery
by Lawrence H Levy
Hired by a prisoner's brother to reopen a Jack-the-Ripper copycat murder case and help identify the real killer, 19th-century Brooklyn private investigator Mary Handley uncovers corruption deep within New York's justice system that implicates the city's untouchable head of detectives.
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Summer secrets
by Jane Green
Years after hard partying and the discovery of the father she never knew ends her only friendships, Cat Coombs achieves sobriety and resolves to make amends to those she has hurt during a revelatory Nantucket summer. By the New York Times best-selling author of Saving Grace.
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The Summer Country
by Lauren Willig
What it is: a compelling family saga by the bestselling author of The English Wife, set in colonial Barbados and full of mystery and romance.
1812: Charles Davenant arrives in Barbados to run Peverills, his family's sugar plantation, which proves challenging to say the least.
1854: Englishwoman Emily Dawson inherits the now-derelict Peverills and, with the help of brusque but attractive local doctor Nathaniel Braithwaite, learns about its tragic past.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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