Y’all know I love my Brontës and I get so annoyed when either adaptations of their work or stories based on their lives get EVERYTHING WRONG, DAMMIT. My Brother’s Keeper is an eerie story involving the Brontë family, werewolves, and warring cults, and, darn it, it gets everything just absolutely perfect. I was so impressed with this book even though the whole warring cults thing was the least interesting thing about it. I’m copying the … Continue reading My Brother’s Keeper by Tim Powers →
The Mad Girls of New York is a fictionalized retelling of the real-life reporter Nellie Bly’s breakthrough investigation into The Women’s Insane Asylum on Blackwell’s Island. The novel is at its best when it sticks to the facts and when it keeps its focus on Nellie and women that she meets. It suffers when the attention shifts to a rival reporter, the fictional Sam Colton. In both this book and in real life, Nellie Bly … Continue reading The Mad Girls of New York by Maya Rodale →
Redwood and Wildfire is a slow book, and one steeped in trauma. The book depicts a lot of violence, including abuse of animals, a lynching, and a graphic rape scene, and although there is a love story in it, this is historical fiction/historical fantasy. If the reader approaches the book knowing what to expect, they will be rewarded by lush prose and a detailed view of America during the Great Migration in both the rural … Continue reading Redwood and Wildfire by Andrea Hairston →
Dangerous Women is a dangerous book in the sense that once you pick it up you won’t want to put it down. This historical mystery novel explores a murder on board a ship full of convict women being transported from England to Van Dieman’s Land (Australia). By switching between several first-person narrators, the book is able to explore the lives of underclass women in urban Victorian England and the choices they made to survive, while … Continue reading Dangerous Women by Hope Adams →
Prospects of a Woman is a historical novel, very much not a romance, about a woman who finds her independence in California during the Gold Rush. It’s written by a local author and the sense of place is solid all throughout the book, anchoring the story of an angry woman who feels incomplete for much of the story. While I did not like the main character initially, I did enjoy her character development, and I … Continue reading Prospects of a Woman by Wendy Voorsanger →
Content warning: References to child abduction, the sexual abuse of children, and sexual exploitation generally. It is all referred to in fairly vague terms and is not depicted on the page, but there is a lot of upsetting back story. There is also a subplot that hinges on infidelity. The Road to Ironbark is two stories in one. At the tail end of the Gold Rush, Aurora Scott, a respectable widow with a less than … Continue reading The Road to Ironbark by Kaye Dobbie →
Cranky Ladies of History is an anthology of short fiction about real historical women who were angry and did things with that anger. Some of these things were spectacular, and some were just spectacularly appalling (looking at you, Erszebet Báthory) (but not looking too closely, because I really don’t want to provoke you), but it makes for a fascinating anthology theme, tailor-made for fans of Carrie’s ‘Kickass Women in History’ series. In the introduction, Tansy … Continue reading Cranky Ladies of History edited by Tansy Rayner Roberts and Tehani Croft Wessely →
TW/CW: sexual assault. I enjoyed The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding by Jennifer Robson, mostly because it tackles a subject that is dear to my heart: why is traditionally-female created art (think quilting, embroidering, knitting) labeled “a craft” and of less than value than male-produced art? As a historical novel, a full third of the narrative I found to be unnecessary, which meant there were parts of the book I had to slog through … Continue reading The Gown by Jennifer Robson →
The sinking of the RMS Lusitania might not sound like a great setting for a sweeping historical adventure and romance, but I cut my young romance-loving teeth on the Titanic movie, and I am here to challenge your shipwreck tragedy notions. As historical fiction The Glass Ocean works beautifully. It had espionage, intrigue, a love-triangle and a truly horrifying talent show. That said, my romance-reader heart wasn’t entirely satisfied with how the romance played out, and craved a … Continue reading The Glass Ocean by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig and Karen White →
CW/TW for rape, coercion, child abuse, child murder, and general horribleness of Nazis and WWII. The Paris Seamstress is told in parallel storylines between two women, Estella and her granddaughter Fabienne. Estella escapes Paris prior to the Nazi invasion, bringing with her a sewing machine and not much else. She arrives in New York having newly learned that she is a dual citizen of France and the US because her father was American – but … Continue reading The Paris Seamstress by Natasha Lester →
This book moves very quickly, and while a lot happens, the plot doesn’t venture too deeply in any one direction: not into the history, not into the setting, not into the characters’ motivations. I dove into this book because it was about a Dutch widow in 1654 who travels from her very small hometown to Delft and becomes a pottery painter. Obviously, that’s exactly like Regency England and every other historical I’ve read. (Ha. Not.) … Continue reading Midnight Blue by Simone van der Vlugt →
