February 2021 list by Katherine N.
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The Big Man's Daughter
by Owen Fitzstephen
18 year-old Rita Gaspereaux is suddenly "orphaned" when her con-artist father's illegal enterprise blows up around her. Alone and broke in San Francisco 1922, she must now navigate his criminal world. Rita has learned much from her father about the dark fringes of society. But has she learned enough? Fortunately, she is not without her own resources. What helps her most to cope with the greed, cruelty, and deceit around her is her almost obsessive reading of fiction, particularly the novel she possesses (and is possessed by) at the time of her father’s death. This book-within-the-book tells the story of another 18 year-old, a Dorothy G. from Kansas. As the story proceeds their lives become entwined in unexpected ways.
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Fifty Words for Rain
by Asha Lemmie
1948. Nori, the child of a married Japanese aristocrat and her African American GI lover, is an outsider. Her grandparents take her in, only to conceal her, fearful of a stain on the royal pedigree that they are desperate to uphold in a changing Japan. Obedient to a fault, Nori accepts her solitary life, despite her natural intellect and curiosity. But when chance brings her older half-brother, Akira, to the estate, Nori finds in him an unlikely ally with whom she forms a powerful bond. Once Nori has glimpsed the world beyond her small circle, she is ready to fight to be a part of it—a battle that just might cost her everything.
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A Frenzy of Sparks
by Kristin Fields
It’s 1965, and thirteen-year-old Gia, along with her older brother and cousins, are desperate to escape their sleepy, tree-lined neighborhood where nothing ever happens. The only thing Gia would miss is the surrounding marsh, where she feels at home among sea birds and salt water. But when one of Gia’s cousins brings drugs into their neighborhood, it sets off a chain of events that quickly turn dangerous. Everyone will be caught in the ripples, and some may be swept away entirely. Gia is determined to keep herself and her family afloat while the world is turned upside down around her.
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From These Broken Streets
by Roland Merullo
Italy, 1943. In Nazi occupied Naples, Giuseppe DiPietra, a curator in the National Archives, has a subversive plan to aid the Allies. If he’s discovered, forced labor or swift execution will surely follow. Lucia Pastone, secretary for the Italian Fascist government, is risking her own life in secret defiance of orders. And Lucia’s father, Aldo, is a black marketeer who draws Giuseppe and Lucia into the underworld—for their protection and to help plant the seeds of resistance. Their fates are soon intertwined with those of Aldo’s devoted lover and a boy of the streets who’ll do anything to live another day. And all of Naples is about to join forces to overcome impossible odds and repel the Nazi occupiers.
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Glimmer As You Can
by Danielle Martin
1962. In the middle of Brooklyn Heights sits the Starlite: boutique dress shop by day, underground women's club by night. The social club soon becomes a safe haven for women from all walks of life looking for a respite from their troubled relationships and professional frustrations. When an unspeakable tragedy befalls their sorority, one woman must decide whether to hide the truth from the group or jeopardize her own hopes and dreams. The novel captures the heartbeat of a generation of women living in a man's world--a world threatened by a wave of change.
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Irena's War
by James D. Shipman
Forced to run 1939 Warsaw’s soup kitchens to help the Gestapo maintain an illusion of order, a social worker learns small ways to defy her employers while helping smuggle essential supplies to criminalized Jewish families.
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The Lady Brewer of London
by Karen Brooks
1405: The daughter of a wealthy merchant, Anneke Sheldrake suddenly finds her family bankrupted when her father’s ship is swept away at sea. Forced to find a way to provide for herself and her siblings, Anneke rejects an offer of marriage from a despised cousin and instead turns to her late mother’s family business: brewing ale. Thanks to her fierce determination, Anneke’s brew wins a following and begins to turn a profit. But her rise threatens some in her community and those closest to her are left to pay the price. To reclaim her livelihood and family, Anneke strikes a bargain with a London brothel owner, vowing to make her own destiny.
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Night in Tehran
by Philip Kaplan
This novel is based on real events involving an idealistic American diplomat in a turbulent, US-hating Tehran in the days leading up to the Iranian Revolution. Backed by the CIA, and trailed by a beautiful and engaging French journalist he suspects is a spy, David Weiseman's mission is to ease the Shah of Iran out of power and find the best alternative between the military, religious extremists, and the political ruling class -- many of whom are simultaneously trying to kill him.
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Once We Were Here
by Christopher Cosmos
In 1940, Greece refuses to allow Mussolini and the Axis forces to occupy its land, forcing the country into the war. In a small village on the Aegean Sea, 18-year-old friends Alexei, the son of a local fisherman, and Costa, prepare to leave their homes to fight for their country. But before they go, Alexei asks Philia, the girl that he's loved his entire life, to marry him, which sets into motion the events which will change the lives of these three, and begins a story of courage, survival, sacrifice, the strength of the human spirit, and of a love and friendship that will echo across time and generations.
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The Paper Daughters of Chinatown
by Heather B. Moore
When Donaldina Cameron arrives at the Occidental Mission Home for Girls in 1895, she intends to teach sewing skills to young Chinese women immigrants, but, within days, she discovers that the job is much more complicated than sewing. San Francisco has a dark side, where powerful criminals bring Chinese young women to America to sell them as slaves. With the help of Chinese interpreters and the Chinatown police squad, Donaldina becomes a tireless social reformer to stop the abominable slave and prostitution trade.
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The Paris Children
by Gloria Goldreich
Paris, 1935. Threatened by Nazi occupation, Young Madeleine Levy—granddaughter of a Jewish World War I hero— joins the resistance and becomes the guardian of lost children. Madeleine offers children comfort and strength while working with other members of the resistance to smuggle them out of Paris and into safer territories. As Paris transforms into a theater of tension and hatred, many are tempted to abandon the cause. With a questionable future ahead of them, all Madeleine can do is continue fighting and hope that her spirit—and the nation's—won't be broken..
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The Paris Secret
by Natasha Lester
Discovering a priceless collection of Dior gowns in her grandmother’s vacant cottage, a fashion conservator delves into the mystery of their origins in the years following World War II while uncovering her beloved grandmother’s remarkable story.
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Tsarina
by Ellen Alpsten
St. Petersburg, 1725. Peter the Great lies dying in his magnificent Winter Palace. The weakness and treachery of his only son has driven his father to an appalling act of cruelty and left the empire without an heir. Russia risks falling into chaos. Into the void steps the woman who has been by his side for decades: his second wife, Catherine Alexeyevna, as ambitious, ruthless and passionate as Peter himself. Now Catherine faces the ultimate test: can she keep the Tsar’s death a secret as she plays a lethal game to destroy her enemies and take the Crown for herself?
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Under a Gilded Moon
by Joy Jordan-Lake
Called home to the Blue Ridge Mountains from college in New York, Kerry MacGregor is caught in a war between the rich and the poor when the powerful Vanderbilts try to acquire her family’s land to build Biltmore House. But something more powerful than an ambitious Vanderbilt heir could change Kerry’s fate as, one by one, more outsiders descend on the changing landscape—a fugitive from Sicily, a reporter chasing a groundbreaking story, a debutante tainted by scandal, and a conservationist prepared to put anyone at risk to stoke the resentment of the locals.
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V2: A Novel of World War II
by Robert Harris
A World War II German rocket engineer under orders to launch V2 rockets at London from Occupied Holland, and an actress-turned-English Intelligence officer who would neutralize the bombings, land on opposite sides in a desperate hunt for a saboteur.
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