All posts tagged: Great Depression

Laird Hunt talks about how ZORRIE was inspired by his grandmother, her ties to Indiana, plus memory, being a literary citizen, the transformative, multifaceted aspects of the color green, more

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By Leslie Lindsay  Gorgeously and sparsely told tale of one woman’s life from her hardscrabble days on an Indiana farm and everything in-between. ~Writers Interiewing Writers|Always with a Book~ March Spotlight: Historical Fiction O Magazine’s Most Anticipated Historical Fiction Novels of 2021   This stunning and luminously told story is so affecting, and transformative, too. Set against the harsh, quintessential Midwestern landscape, ZORRIE (Bloomsbury, Feb 9, 2021) is at once a historical fiction of a one woman’s life, but also a study in Americana, grit, and the transformative events of the 20th century. Zorrie is an orphaned child who goes to live with her aunt on a farm in Indiana. She’s twenty-one when she decides to set off on her own, and it just so happens to be in the midst of the Great Depression. She ends up in Illinois working odd jobs and then at the radium plant, sleeping in abandoned barns and under the stars. At the end of the day, the girls from the factory glowed from the radioactive material. Here she meets several young women who become friends–those …

Is the past really prologue? I think so, and so does Kristin Hannah–join us as we talk about THE FOUR WINDS, prejudices in our everyday life, women in history, how she was influenced by memoirs of the dust bowl

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By Leslie Lindsay  A powerful and poignant examination of a very bleak and gritty time, THE FOUR WINDS is about the Great Depression, the American Dust Bowl, perseverance, and more. ~WRITERS INTERVIEWING WRITERS|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ Weekend Reading MARCH SERIES: HISTORICAL FICTION One of “2021’s Most Highly Anticipated New Books”—Newsweek Read with Jenna/Today Show Selection for FebruaryOne of “27 of 2021’s Most Anticipated Historical Fiction Novels That Will Sweep You Away”—Oprah MagazineOne of “The Most Anticipated Books of Winter 2021″—ParadeOne of the “Books Everyone Will Talk About in 2021”—PopSugarOne of “The 57 Most Anticipated Books Of 2021″—ElleOne of “32 Great Books To Start Off Your New Year”—Refinery29One of “25 of the Best Books Arriving in 2021”—BookBubOne of “The 21 Best Books of 2021 for Working Moms”—Working MotherOne of “The Most Anticipated Winter Books That Will Keep You Cozy All Season Long”—Stylecaster One of the “Most Anticipated Books of 2021”—Frolic It’s 1921 when we meet Elsa Wolcott, an unremarkable twenty-five-year-old woman. She’s tall and gangly, a bookworm spinster living at home with her parents. Her family does well …

Famous French-Canadian Quintuplets becomes roadside attraction in the Great Depression. Debut author Shelley Wood talks about THE QUINTLAND SISTERS

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By Leslie Lindsay  Historical debut about the famous French-Canadian quintuplets born during the Great Depression, THE QUINTLAND SISTERS (William Morrow, March 5 2019) is about love, heartache, and resilience. I am stunned and amazed that I never knew so much as a peep about the first surviving identical quintuplets. Journalist and debut author, Shelley Wood, tackles the vast amount of research in bringing these tiny miracles to life. Born in 1934 to French farmers in a hardscrabble area of Northern Ontario, readers will experience firsthand the harrowing birth, the precarious first days, and then the scandals-–how the babies are removed from the parents’ custody, put on display (for profit), and more. The writing is largely first person, told from the POV of young Emma Trimpany, who is 17 in 1934, and a reluctant midwife to the babies. She has no training but is there the evening Mrs. Dionne goes into to labor. This beginning was absolutely gripping and had the ring of the BBC show, “Call the Midwife.”  Emma stays with the Dionne family and helps raise these …