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Historical Fiction July 2025 |
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The world's fair quilt : a novel
by Jennifer Chiaverini
"As fall paints the Pennsylvania countryside in flaming colors, Sylvia Bergstrom Compson is contemplating the future of her beloved Elm Creek Quilts. The Elm Creek Quilt Camp remains the most popular quilter's retreat in the country, but unexpected financial difficulties have beset them and the Bergstrom family's stately nineteenth-century manor. Now in her eighth decade, Sylvia is determined to maintain her family's legacy, but she needs new resources---a founding Elm Creek Quilter--arrives to discuss an antique quilt that she wants to display at the Waterford Historical Society's quilt exhibit. The Bergstrom sisters' quilt would be perfect for the Historical Society's exhibit, Summer explains. Sylvia is reluctant to lend out the quilt, which has been stored in the attic for decades, nearly forgotten. In keeping with the contest's 'Century of Progress' theme, the girls illustrated progress of values--scenes of the Emancipation Proclamation, woman's suffrage, and labor unions. But although it won ribbons, the quilt also drove a wedge between the sisters. As Sylvia reluctantly retraces her quilt's story for Summer, she makes an unexpected discovery--one that restores some of her faith in this unique work of art, and helps shine some light on a way forward for the Elm Creek Quilts community"
Format: Large Print
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The Stolen Queen
by Fiona Davis
In 1937, Charlotte Cross studies anthropology in the Valley of the Kings, but there are odd goings-on. In 1978 New York, she's a Met curator when a priceless artifact disappears during the Met Gala. Along with 18-year-old Annie Jenkins, Gala organizer Diana Vreeland's assistant, Charlotte goes to Egypt to face her past and retrieve the item. Read-alikes: Bryn Turnbull's The Paris Deception; Gill Paul's The Collector's Daughter.
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| The Girls of Good Fortune by Kristina McMorrisFacing anti-Chinese sentiment in 1880s Oregon, biracial Celia hides her heritage and works as a maid for Portland's mayor. His son, who knows Celia’s secret, loves her and proposes. But with him away at school, her father murdered, and her unexpectedly pregnant, Celia ends up housekeeping at a brothel, before other dangers surface. Recipes and an author's note add to this compelling tale. Read-alike: Jenny Tinghui Zhang's Four Treasures of the Sky. |
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| Where the Rivers Merge by Mary Alice MonroeIndependent Eliza Rivers, who was born in South Carolina's Lowcountry in 1900, lives through wars, family turmoil, sexism, business growth, and more. At 88, she draws two young women close, sharing her past and hoping they can keep her beloved land safe from her selfish son in this multigenerational novel, the 1st in the Mayfield duology. Read-alikes: Michael Christie's Greenwood; Dolen Perkins-Valdez's Happy Land. |
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| The Red House by Mary MorrisLeaving New Jersey and her troubled marriage, middle-aged Laura goes to Italy, hoping to learn more about her mother, Viola, who disappeared when Laura was a kid. Interspersed with Laura's efforts, readers see Viola as a child during World War II, when Italian Jewish people were imprisoned in detention centers. Exploring intergenerational trauma, this evocative read presents an "unusual and satisfying tale of family secrets". |
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Don't forget me, little Bessie : a novel
by James Lee Burke
At the dawn of the twentieth century, Bessie Holland finds strength in a suffragette mentor, battles forces threatening her Texas home and flees to New York, where she is drawn into a violent underworld that tests her unbreakable spirit.
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The Paper Birds
by Jeanette Lynes
Jemma Sullivan is pulled deeper in wartime intelligence work. She becomes an integral part of the codebreakers circle. The Cottage Codebreaking circle is small but determined, but in order to become successful they must learn to work together. But when Gemmma begins fraternnizing with a handsome POW, who later disappears, she risks losing everything.
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How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days
by Sophie Irwin
Rich handsome and titled Lord Ashford has every Lady in England longing for his hand. Everyone that is except of Miss Lydia Hanworth, the only one Lord Ashford wishes to marry. Lydia is pressured into marrying Lord Ashford by her family, but must keep the engagement a secret for 10 days. Can she do it?
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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