![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/lady-tans-circle-of-women.jpg?resize=200%2C304&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Lady Tan’s Circle of Women<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Lisa See<\/p>\nAccording to Confucius, \u201can educated woman is a worthless woman,\u201d but Tan Yunxian\u2014born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness\u2014is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations\u2014looking, listening, touching, and asking\u2014something a man can never do with a female patient.<\/em><\/p>\n From a young age, Yunxian learns about women\u2019s illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose\u2014despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it\u2014and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other\u2019s joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus, they tell themselves: from adversity beauty can bloom.<\/em><\/p>\n But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife\u2014embroider bound-foot slippers, pluck instruments, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Paris, 1939: Young mothers Elise and Juliette become fast friends the day they meet in the beautiful Bois de Boulogne. Though there is a shadow of war creeping across Europe, neither woman suspects that their lives are about to irrevocably change.<\/em><\/p>\n When Elise becomes a target of the German occupation, she entrusts Juliette with the most precious thing in her life\u2014her young daughter, playmate to Juliette\u2019s own little girl. But nowhere is safe in war, not even a quiet little bookshop like Juliette\u2019s Librairie des R\u00eaves, and, when a bomb falls on their neighborhood, Juliette\u2019s world is destroyed along with it.<\/em><\/p>\n More than a year later, with the war finally ending, Elise returns to reunite with her daughter, only to find her friend\u2019s bookstore reduced to rubble\u2014and Juliette nowhere to be found. What happened to her daughter in those last, terrible moments? Juliette has seemingly vanished without a trace, taking all the answers with her. Elise\u2019s desperate search leads her to New York\u2014and to Juliette\u2014one final, fateful time.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Venice, 1717. Fifteen-year-old Luisa has only wanted one thing: to be the best at violin. As a student at the Ospedale della Piet\u00e0, she hopes to join the highest ranks of its illustrious girls\u2019 orchestra and become a prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of the great Antonio Vivaldi. Luisa is good at violin, but she is not the best. She has peers, but she does not have friends. Until Maddalena.<\/em><\/p>\n After a scandal threatens her noble family\u2019s reputation, Maddalena is sent to the Piet\u00e0 to preserve her marriage prospects. When she meets Luisa, Maddalena feels the stirrings of a friendship unlike anything she has known. But Maddalena has a secret: she has hatched a dangerous plot to rescue her future her own way. When she invites Luisa into her plans, promising to make her dreams come true, Luisa doesn\u2019t hesitate. But every wager has its price, and as the girls are drawn into the decadent world outside the Piet\u00e0\u2019s walls, they must decide what it is they truly want\u2014and what they will do to pay for it.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n In 1898, Pirbhai, a teenage boy looking for work, is taken from his village in India to labor for the British on the East African Railway. Far from home, Pirbhai commits a brutal act in the name of survival that will haunt him and his family for years to come.<\/em><\/p>\n So begins Janika Oza\u2019s masterful, richly told epic, where the embers of this desperate act are fanned into flame over four generations, four continents, throughout the twentieth century. Pirbhai\u2019s children are born in Uganda during the waning days of British colonial rule, and as the country moves toward independence, his granddaughters, three sisters, come of age in a divided nation. Latika is an aspiring journalist, who will put everything on the line for what she believes in; Mayuri\u2019s ambitions will take her farther away from home than she ever imagined; and fearless Kiya will have to carry the weight of her family\u2019s silence and secrets.<\/em><\/p>\n In 1972, the entire family is forced to flee under Idi Amin\u2019s military dictatorship. Pirbhai\u2019s grandchildren are now scattered across the world, struggling to find their way back to each other. One day a letter arrives with news that makes each generation question how far they are willing to go, and who they are willing to defy, to secure their own place in the world.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n In 1943, Irene Woodward abandons an abusive fianc\u00e9 in New York to enlist with the Red Cross and head to Europe. She makes fast friends in training with Dorothy Dunford, a towering Midwesterner with a ferocious wit. Together they are part of an elite group of women, nicknamed Donut Dollies, who command military vehicles called Clubmobiles at the front line, providing camaraderie and a taste of home that may be the only solace before troops head into battle.<\/em><\/p>\n After D-Day, these two intrepid friends join the Allied soldiers streaming into France. Their time in Europe will see them embroiled in danger, from the Battle of the Bulge to the liberation of Buchenwald. Through her friendship with Dorothy, and a love affair with a courageous American fighter pilot named Hans, Irene learns to trust again. Her most fervent hope, which becomes more precarious by the day, is for all three of them to survive the war intact.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Richmond, Virginia 1811. It\u2019s the height of the winter social season, the General Assembly is in session, and many of Virginia\u2019s gentleman planters, along with their wives and children, have made the long and arduous journey to the capital in hopes of whiling away the darkest days of the year. At the city\u2019s only theater, the Charleston-based Placide & Green Company puts on two plays a night to meet the demand of a populace that\u2019s done looking for enlightenment at the front of a church.<\/em><\/p>\n On the night after Christmas, the theater is packed with more than six hundred holiday revelers. In the third-floor boxes sits newly widowed Sally Henry Campbell, who is glad for any opportunity to relive the happy times she shared with her husband. One floor away, in the colored gallery, Cecily Patterson doesn\u2019t give a whit about the play but is grateful for a four-hour reprieve from a life that has recently gone from bad to worse. Backstage, young stagehand Jack Gibson hopes that, if he can impress the theater\u2019s managers, he\u2019ll be offered a permanent job with the company. And on the other side of town, blacksmith Gilbert Hunt dreams of one day being able to bring his wife to the theater, but he\u2019ll have to buy her freedom first.<\/em><\/p>\n When the theater goes up in flames in the middle of the performance, Sally, Cecily, Jack, and Gilbert make a series of split-second decisions that will not only affect their own lives but those of countless others. And in the days following the fire, as news of the disaster spreads across the United States, the paths of these four people will become forever intertwined.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n California, 1938\u2014When she loses her parents in an accident, sixteen-year-old Rosanne is taken in by the owners of the vineyard where she has lived her whole life as the vinedresser\u2019s daughter. She moves into Celine and Truman Calvert\u2019s spacious house with a secret, however\u2014Rosie sees colors when she hears sound. She promised her mother she\u2019d never reveal her little-understood ability to anyone, but the weight of her isolation and grief prove too much for her. Driven by her loneliness she not only breaks the vow to her mother, but in a desperate moment lets down her guard and ends up pregnant. Banished by the Calverts, Rosanne believes she is bound for a home for unwed mothers. But she soon finds out she is not going to a home of any kind, but to a place that seeks to forcibly take her baby \u2013 and the chance for any future babies \u2013 from her.<\/em><\/p>\n Austria, 1947\u2014After witnessing firsthand Adolf Hitler\u2019s brutal pursuit of hereditary purity\u2014especially with regard to \u201cdifferent children\u201d\u2014Helen Calvert, Truman\u2019s sister, is ready to return to America for good. But when she arrives at her brother\u2019s peaceful vineyard after decades working abroad, she is shocked to learn what really happened nine years earlier to the vinedresser\u2019s daughter, a girl whom Helen had long ago befriended. In her determination to find Rosanne, Helen discovers a shocking American eugenics program\u2014and learns that that while the war had been won in Europe, there are still terrifying battles to be fought at home.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n 2019: Under cover of darkness, Kate flees London for ramshackle Weyward Cottage, inherited from a great aunt she barely remembers. With its tumbling ivy and overgrown garden, the cottage is worlds away from the abusive partner who tormented Kate. But she begins to suspect that her great aunt had a secret. One that lurks in the bones of the cottage, hidden ever since the witch-hunts of the 17th century.<\/em><\/p>\n 1619: Altha is awaiting trial for the murder of a local farmer who was stampeded to death by his herd. As a girl, Altha\u2019s mother taught her their magic, a kind not rooted in spell casting but in a deep knowledge of the natural world. But unusual women have always been deemed dangerous, and as the evidence for witchcraft is set out against Altha, she knows it will take all of her powers to maintain her freedom.<\/em><\/p>\n 1942: As World War II rages, Violet is trapped in her family’s grand, crumbling estate. Straitjacketed by societal convention, she longs for the robust education her brother receives\u2013\u2013and for her mother, long deceased, who was rumored to have gone mad before her death. The only traces Violet has of her are a locket bearing the initial W and the word weyward scratched into the baseboard of her bedroom.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n 2017: When Angela Creighton discovers a mysterious letter containing a life-shattering confession, she is determined to find the intended recipient. Her search takes her back to the 1970s when a group of daring women operated an illegal underground abortion network in Toronto known only by its whispered code name: Jane.<\/em><\/p>\n 1971: As a teenager, Dr. Evelyn Taylor was sent to a home for \u201cfallen\u201d women where she was forced to give up her baby for adoption\u2014a trauma she has never recovered from. Despite the constant threat of arrest, she joins the Jane Network as an abortion provider, determined to give other women the choice she never had.<\/em><\/p>\n 1980: After discovering a shocking secret about her family, twenty-year-old Nancy Mitchell begins to question everything she has ever known. When she unexpectedly becomes pregnant, she feels like she has no one to turn to for help. Grappling with her decision, she locates \u201cJane\u201d and finds a place of her own alongside Dr. Taylor within the network\u2019s ranks, but she can never escape the lies that haunt her.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n The master of the Providence plantation in Barbados gathers his slaves and announces the king has decreed an end to slavery. As of the following day, the Emancipation Act of 1834 will come into effect. The cries of joy fall silent when he announces that they are no longer his slaves; they are now his apprentices. No one can leave. They must work for him for another six years. Freedom is just another name for the life they have always lived. So Rachel runs.<\/em><\/p>\n Away from Providence, she begins a desperate search to find her children\u2014the five who survived birth and were sold. Are any of them still alive? Rachel has to know. The grueling, dangerous journey takes her from Barbados then, by river, deep into the forest of British Guiana and finally across the sea to Trinidad. She is driven on by the certainty that a mother cannot be truly free without knowing what has become of her children, even if the answer is more than she can bear. These are the stories of Mary Grace, Micah, Thomas Augustus, Cherry Jane and Mercy. But above all this is the story of Rachel and the extraordinary lengths to which a mother will go to find her children\u2026and her freedom.<\/em><\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Do you have a favorite historical fiction novel? Share with us in the comments below!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/the-paris-daughter.jpg?resize=200%2C304&ssl=1\")
<\/a>The Paris Daughter<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Kristin Harmel<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/maddalena-and-the-dark.jpg?resize=200%2C304&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Maddalena and the Dark<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Julia Fine<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/history-of-burning.jpg?resize=200%2C303&ssl=1\")
<\/a>A History of Burning<\/a><\/strong> <\/em>by Janika Oza<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/good-night-irene.jpg?resize=200%2C310&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Good Night, Irene<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Luis Alberto Urrea<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/the-house-is-on-fire.jpg?resize=200%2C304&ssl=1\")
<\/a>The House is on Fire<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Rachel Beanland<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/only-the-beautiful.jpg?resize=200%2C303&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Only the Beautiful<\/a><\/strong> <\/em>by Susan Meissner<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/weyward.jpg?resize=200%2C304&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Weyward<\/a><\/strong> <\/em>by Emilia Hart<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/looking-for-jane.jpg?resize=200%2C300&ssl=1\")
<\/a>Looking for Jane<\/a><\/strong> <\/em>by Heather Marshall<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/river-sing-me-home.jpg?resize=200%2C303&ssl=1\")
<\/a>River Sing Me Home<\/a><\/strong><\/em> by Eleanor Shearer<\/p>\n