| A perfect explanation by Eleanor AnstrutherThe premise: The aristocratic Campbell family needs an heir, and after her brother is killed in World War I, independent-minded Enid caves to parental pressure and marries a man she doesn't love.
The problem: Besides losing her sense of self, each of Enid's pregnancies worsens her mental health and drives her deeper into her religion, and desperation soon drives her to leave her family for a Christian Scientist retreat -- a decision that will have dramatic consequences for the next several decades. |
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| Light changes everything by Nancy E. TurnerWhat it's about: Mary Pearl Prine is a spirited young woman who, in order to evade a wealthy but boring suitor, trades her life in the rugged Arizona territory for the refined Wheaton College, where she experiences a major culture shock but also her first taste of independence.
Familiar faces: Although Light Changes Everything isn't technically part of Nancy Turner's series of novels starring Sarah Agnes Prine, readers of that series will recognize Mary as Sarah's niece.
You might also like: Caroline by Sarah Miller, The Outcasts by Kathleen Kent, and other stories of frontier women trying to make their way in the world. |
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Where the light enters
by Sara Donati
Dr. Sophie Savard, daughter of free people of colour returns home to the achingly familiar rhythms of Manhattan in the early spring of 1884 to rebuild her life after the death of her husband. With the help of Dr. Anna Savard, her dearest friend, cousin, and fellow physician she plans to continue her work aiding the disadvantaged women society would rather forget. As Sophie sets out to construct a new life for herself, Anna's husband, Detective-Sergeant Jack Mezzanotte calls on them both to consult on two new cases: the wife of a prominent banker has disappeared into thin air, and the corpse of a young woman is found with baffling wounds that suggest a killer is on the loose. In New York it seems that the advancement of women has brought out the worst in some men. Unable to ignore the plight of New York's less fortunate, these intrepid cousins draw on all resources to protect their patients.
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The winemaker's wife
by Kristin Harmel
Champagne, 1940: Inès has just married Michel, the owner of storied champagne house Maison Chauveau, when the Germans invade. As the danger mounts, Michel turns his back on his marriage to begin hiding munitions for the Résistance. Inès fears they'll be exposed, but for Céline, half-Jewish wife of Chauveau's chef de cave, the risk is even greater-rumors abound of Jews being shipped east to an unspeakable fate. When Céline recklessly follows her heart in one desperate bid for happiness, and Inès makes a dangerous mistake with a Nazi collaborator, they risk the lives of those they love-and the champagne house that ties them together. New York, 2019: Liv Kent has just lost everything when her eccentric French grandmother shows up unannounced, insisting on a trip to France. But the older woman has an ulterior motive-and a tragic, decades-old story to share. When past and present finally collide, Liv finds herself on a road to salvation that leads right to the caves of the Maison Chauveau.
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The eighth life (for Brilka)
by Nino Haratischvili
At the start of the twentieth century, on the edge of the Russian Empire, a family prospers. It owes its success to a delicious chocolate recipe, passed down the generations with great solemnity and caution. A caution which is justified: this is a recipe for ecstasy that carries a very bitter aftertaste. Stasia learns it from her Georgian father and takes it north, following her new husband, Simon, to his posting at the centre of the Russian Revolution in St Petersburg. Stasia's is only the first in a symphony of grand but all too often doomed romances that swirl from sweet to sour in this epic tale of the red century. Tumbling down the years, and across vast expanses of longing and loss, generation after generation of this compelling family hears echoes and sees reflections. Great characters and greater relationships come and go and come again; the world shakes, and shakes some more, and the reader rejoices to have found at last one of those glorious old books in which you can live and learn, be lost and found, and make indelible new friends.
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Costalegre
by Courtney Maum
What it is: 15-year-old Lara's recounting of her heiress mother's scheme to smuggle a group of Surrealist artists out of Nazi Germany and install them at Mexico's posh Costalegre resort.
Inspired by: the complicated mother-daughter relationship of American socialite Peggy and painter Pegeen Guggenheim.
Why you might like it: Structured as a series of diary entries, this novel juxtaposes keen observations of Costalegre's bohemian guests with a lonely girl's quest to become an artist in her own right.
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The secrets we kept
by Lara Prescott
What it's about: The CIA's plan to smuggle copies of Boris Pasternak’s banned novel Dr. Zhivago into Moscow as anti-Soviet propaganda.
Starring: Russian-born secretary-turned-spy Irina; her handler Sally, with whom she begins an affair; and Pasternak's mistress, Olga, who refuses to incriminate her lover and lands in the gulag.
Want a taste? "Some of us spoke Mandarin. Some could fly planes. Some of us could handle a Colt 1873 better than John Wayne. But all we were asked when interviewed was, 'Can you type?'"
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The Lily in the snow
by Jackie French
With her dangerous past behind her, Australian heiress Sophie Higgs lives in quiet comfort as the new Countess of Shillings, until Hannelore, Princess of Arneburg, charms the Prince of Wales. He orders Sophie, Nigel - and Miss Lily - to investigate the mysterious politician Hannelore insists is the only man who can save Europe from another devastating war. His name is Adolf Hitler. As unimaginable peril threatens to destroy countries and tear families apart, Sophie must face Goering's Brownshirt Nazi thugs, blackmail, and the many possible faces of love. And then the man she once adored and thought was lost reappears, and Sophie must also confront a vengeful girl, intent on killing the woman she believes is her mother: Miss Lily.
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| Run me to earth by Paul YoonWhat it's about: As the war in Vietnam spills over the border into Laos, three orphaned teenagers bond with each other and with the French-educated doctor they help scavenge for supplies. After the doctor finds a way for them to escape the country, a freak accident will radically alter the fate of this makeshift family forever.
Read it for: the spare, elegant writing and the haunting settings, such as the beautiful yet decrepit colonial mansion-turned-hospital that brings the characters together.
Did you know? During the Vietnam War, the U.S. dropped more bombs on Laos than were used in World War II against Japan and Germany combined. |
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| The fallen architect by Charles BelfoureLondon, 1900: Architect Douglas Layton has worked his way up the social ladder from his working-class background, with a successful career and an aristocratic wife to show for it. But when a balcony collapse at a theatre he designed kills a dozen people, he loses his career, his family, and his freedom.
Five years later: Released from prison, Douglas takes on a new identity and paints theatre sets for booze money, desperate to see his son again. Through his new connections in the theatre world, he begins to suspect that the tragedy that derailed his career wasn't just an accident -- and that someone might still be out to get him. |
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| Button man by Andrew GrossStarring: the three Rabishevsky brothers: Morris, who left school at age 12 to become the breadwinner after their parents' deaths; Sol, who works with Morris in the garment business; and the youngest, Harry, who wouldn't mind at all if the mafia figures he admires finally convinced his brothers to tie their family business with the family business.
Read it for: the richly detailed and authentic portrayal of life for three Jewish orphans in 1930s New York; the emotional turmoil of the fraying relationships between the brothers; cameos by important figures of the day, such as Dutch Schultz and Thomas Dewey. |
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Magnus and the Crossroads Brotherhood
by Robert Fabbri
Marcus Salvius Magnus, leader of the Southern Quirinal Crossroads Brotherhood, has long dominated his part of Rome's criminal underworld. From rival gangs and unpaid debts to rigged chariot races and blood feuds if you have a problem, Magnus is the man to solve it. He'll do everything in his power to preserve his grip on the less-travelled back alleys of Rome, and of course, make a profit. But while Magnus inhabits the underbelly of the city, his patron, Gaius Vespasius Pollo, moves in a different circle. As a senator, he needs men like Magnus to do his dirty work as he manoeuvres his way deeper into the imperial court.
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