958-963 (2020 #1-6). January 2020

Christmas Bells by Jennifer Chiaverini - ebook, historical fiction, realistic fiction, hybrid.  This book combines historical fiction about Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and his family with a number of present-day storylines, tying them together with the Christmas carol "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day."  I had no idea the lyrics from this song were from Longfellow's poem "Christmas Bells," which was written on Christmas Day in 1863 and inspired by personal tragedy.

The present-day storylines involve a Catholic church children's choir in Longfellow's town of Cambridge, Massachusetts, that's going to perform the song.  The choir director is also a public school music teacher, about to lose the latter job to budget cuts.  Her volunteer accompanist, a civil engineer, is secretly in love with her.  Other narrators include two children in the choir, their mom, and the parish priest who is a friend of their soldier dad who is missing in Afghanistan; the widow of a wealthy Senator who's been a benefactor of the parish; and an elderly nun at the parish.

I've found Jennifer Chiaverini's strictly historical fiction books about real people (as opposed than those about fictional characters in a particular era) to be rather dry.  She does much better with contemporary realistic fiction, and blending the two, as she's done in this book, works well.  I also liked the way Chiaverini incorporated O. Henry's classic "The Gift of the Magi" into this story.  It's a book written for the holiday season, so the ending is positive and hopeful, as it should be.

The Christmas Key by Lori Wilde - ebook, romance - Military vet Mark Shepherd and Naomi Luther, sister of Clayton, who died under Mark's command, both sleep with a Twilight Christmas kismet cookie under their pillows on Christmas Eve and dream of each other - the legend being that's your one true love.  Then they meet by accident in Twilight - when Mark visits to fulfill a mission to return a decorative white key to the Luther family, at Clayton's request.

There are not as many references to things I can identify in my town of Granbury, Texas (the inspiration for Twilight), although author Lori Wilde does mention the Fort Worth Stockyards and Billy Bob's (page 26) and Highway 377 (page 27).  She's right that "There was no Uber in Twilight, or even taxis for that matter" (page 33).  However, there's no downtown marina and no houseboats or sailboats (page 36) either.  There is a First Presbyterian Church here (page 36), and it's old and historic, but it's very near the historic courthouse square, not a ways down Ruby (Pearl) street on the west side of town.

The snow-covered scene of the front cover isn't appropriate for our holiday season, but it's a Christmas story, so there's gotta be snow, at least on the front cover.  There's some sex and the romance is predictable (although this one only has a few tropes I can identify, the mistaken-identity military orphan hero with scars seeking redemption).  Nevertheless, I'm always gonna read the Twilight Christmas books.  I enjoy seeing old characters from former books reappearing, and trying to figure out which establishment a place like The Teal Peacock is supposed to be.

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki - magical realism, 2013 Man Booker Prize finalist.  Gift from Laurie Sharp.  Bullying.  Set in Japan and in Whaletown, British Columbia.  A mysterious diary written by a troubled schoolgirl in Tokyo has washed ashore on the Pacific Northwest coast of Canada in the wake of the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami. The diary is discovered by a novelist named Ruth (the author), who becomes obsessed with discovering the girl's fate.

The Long Flight Home by Alan Hlad - local book club, historical fiction, e-book.  Alan Hlad's debut novel was inspired by a news story about the remains of a WWII carrier pigeon found in a chimney in England in 2012, and the mysterious coded message it carried (still not decoded).  That led Hlad to research Source (later Operation) Columba, an effort by the British to enable Resistance groups in Europe to use homing pigeons to get messages back to England.  This historical romance is wrapped around that premise.

War is Over by David Almond, illustrated by David Litchfield - children's, early reviewer, advance reader edition, historical fiction, picture book.  Audience: Children's - Grade 4-6, Age 9-11.  117 pages.  Originally published in 2018 in the United Kingdom for the centennial of World War I, War is Over will be published in the United States in May 2020.  Set in 1918 in Newcastle, England, John is a little boy whose father is at the front in France and whose mother works in the local munitions factory.  Most of his community is pro-war, at least on the surface.  John and some of his friends wonder how they, just children, can be at war too.

One day John picks up a sketch shown earlier by a local conscientious objector ("conchie" in local slang) of a little boy named Jan, from Dusseldorf, Germany. John writes and mails him a letter (page 63):  "Dear Jan, I am a boy like you.  I am not at war with you.  You are not at war with me.  Your friend, John."  The consequences - especially when viewed from today's world - are not surprising, but are heartbreaking nonetheless.  With the end of World War I, however, the book's conclusion is hopeful.

Although it's 117 pages long, I'd still classify this as a picture book, thanks to the numerous compelling black-and-white illustrations by David Litchfield.  The cover (which does have a little cover) shows birds interspersed with bombs, a motif that also appears (although with falling leaves becoming falling bombs) in an illustration at the bottom of pages 68-69, where children playing at war become soldiers fighting.  I do wish a few of the illustrations had the color of some on Litchfield's website, though, as I think the color there adds to their impact.

The intended audience is children in grades 4-6, ages 9-11.  I think this book could be used in teaching about World War II as well as World War I; I forgot as I read it which war it was.  And that's a point of the book.  Author David Almond has a link to some teaching resources on his website.  I heartily recommend this book.

The Library of Legends by Janie Chang - LTER, ARC, historical fiction - This story takes place in China in 1937 during the Second Sino-Japanese War.  Universities in areas being bombed were evacuated, and students (called liuwang), professors, and staff all walked to safer interior areas.  Hu Lian is a 19-year-old student at Minghua University in Nanking, and her school is also carrying the Library of Legends, a collection of Chinese folktales and mythology, to safer quarters.  There's much adventure (good and bad) along the way, and, in danger, Lian eventually escapes (along with wealthy student Shao and his maidservant Sparrow) to find her mother, a refugee in Shanghai.

There's an element of fantasy in the book, as one of the characters is actually a spirit from one of the legends in human form.  The book drags a bit, especially in the middle, but these fantasy elements are just enough to maintain interest but not overwhelm.  Author Janie Chang was inspired by her parents' experiences - her father was a liuwang from Nanking and her mother a war refugee in Shanghai.

© Amanda Pape - 2020

780 (2018 #3). Enchantress of Numbers

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This is a biographical novel about Ada Byron King, Countess of Lovelace, daughter of the poet Lord Byron and the woman many consider to be the first computer programmer.  Ada died at age 36, so much of the book focuses on her childhood.  That part of the story is set up by a prologue in third person, told from the viewpoint of Ada's mother, which helps explain why she (the mother) was such a control freak.  Ada never met her father, as her parents separated shortly after she was born, and he left the country not long after that, dying when she was only eight.  Ada's mother feared the "madness" of her father would manifest in her daughter, and thus forbade anything that smacked of poetry or other creativity.  She did encourage the study of math and science, however.

The rest of the book is first-person Ada, and is rather unbelievable when Ada recalls her early childhood in minute (and impossible) detail.  There are a few anachronisms as well, with references to Ada swimming in 1828 (page 118), when it was very uncommon for women in England, especially the upperclass, to swim, and to her use of an air mattress (page 128) in 1830, when it was not invented until 1889.

I think this book would have been much better if its 433 pages had run at least a hundred less.  Jennifer Chiaverini does not devote much attention to Ada's mathematical pursuits, and her chronicling of Ada's illnesses and studies and frustrations with her mother's restrictions gets rather tiresome. 

© Amanda Pape - 2018

[This print book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

748 (2017 #46). Fates and Traitors

by Jennifer Chiaverini

Although its subtitle is "A Novel of John Wilkes Booth," Fates and Traitors - like nearly all of Jennifer Chiaverini's books - is really about women.  In this case, four women whose lives were intricately tied to that of Lincoln's assassin:  his mother, Mary Ann Holmes Booth; his sister, Asia Booth Clarke; his supposed fiancee, Lucy Hale; and a co-conspirator, Mary Surratt.

The book opens with a prologue from Booth's viewpoint about his capture, in which he is shot and as he is slowly dying, he thinks of these four women.  Then his life's story is told through theirs in the next four chapters:  his early years (1838-1851) with his mother, who has an fascinating background; the years 1851-1864 from his older sister Asia's point of view (she later became a poet and writer); then 1864-1865 as seen by both fiancee Lucy (daughter and later wife of senators) and Mary Surratt (the first woman hung by the federal government for her part in the plot to kill Lincoln).

This is followed by a chapter in John's voice again, set in 1865, just after Lee's surrender at Appomattox.  The final chapters tell what happened to all four women in the rest of 1865, and end with Lucy in 1890.  I knew very little of any of these women, and found their stories to be the intriguing ones.  Telling the story this way, though, also adds to the mystique of Booth - because one can see how his words and actions sounded and appeared to others, yet still not be able to get fully inside his mind to fully understand his motivation to kill Lincoln.

The title comes from Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene III, the last line:

If thou read this, O Caesar, thou mayst live.
If not, the Fates with traitors do contrive.

A longer passage including this line is the epithet of the book, rather fitting for Booth, who apparently stated his favorite Shakespearean role was that of Brutus, Caesar's lead assassin.

Chiaverini provides a map at the beginning of the book marking relevant locations in Washington, D. C., and lists her sources in three pages of acknowledgements at the end of the book.  I liked this novel better than Chiaverini's other novels featuring Civil War era personages.


© Amanda Pape - 2017

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

518 (2015 #75). Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This is the fourth of Jennifer Chiaverini's historical fiction / biographical novels featuring lesser-known women of the Civil War era.  It is most similar to the first in that group, Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker, in that it's about a President's wife and a black woman.  Unlike that book, the black woman in this one is not a free woman.  I was surprised to learn that Julia Dent Grant, the wife of Union General and later President Hiram Ulysses S. Grant, came from a slave-holding family in Missouri.

Apparently, Mrs. Grant was often accompanied by a "favorite slave" when she joined her husband at various military outposts, according to the author in an interview, in reference to her research.  Little is known about this woman, except that her name was also Julia (and she was often referred to as "Black Julia,") and that another Dent family slave described her as a "tiny ginger-colored maid."  Chiaverini uses these two details to build an almost-entirely fictional character (and her related experiences).

I found the story of the novelized Mrs. Grant to be far more interesting.  I also learned a lot about Ulysses S. Grant and his career from this book.

© Amanda Pape - 2015

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

399 (2014 #27). The Spymistress

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This is the third in Jennifer Chiaverini's historical fiction / biographical novels featuring lesser-known women of the Civil War era.  This time it's Elizabeth Van Lew, who was apparently the leader of a ring of Union spies in the Confederate capitol of Richmond, Virginia, during the war.  The 43-year-old spinster Van Lew and her widowed mother were against slavery and secession.  Van Lew got her start as a spy by tending to Union soldiers held prisoner, bringing them bread and books - and smuggling out messages.  By 1864, she - and others in her network - was helping prisoners escape, and sending dispatches to Union generals written in code in an "invisible ink" that darkened with mild acid and heat.

Chiaverini chooses to call her "Lizzie" in the novel, perhaps to clearly distinguish her from her mother and niece, both called Eliza.  Unfortunately, despite her exciting adventures, I found Lizzie to be a rather flat character, at least the way Chiaverini portrays her.  More interesting to me was her former slave, Mary Elizabeth Bowser (Mary Jane in the book, perhaps to avoid even more confusion in names).  Bowser agreed to pretend to be a slave again and serve in the household of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, in order to spy on him.

I did learn about two historical figures I knew nothing about, and am inspired to read more about them. Chiaverini lists her sources in the acknowledgments at the end of the book, and they include Van Lew's published Civil War diaries.  I'll also be reading Chiaverini's next book set in this era, about Ulysses Grant's wife Julia.  I liked this book more than Chiaverini's Mrs. Lincoln's Rival, but not as much as her Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker.

A final comment: too many book covers for historical fiction with lead female characters look alike nowadays; the full-length image of a woman in period dress with only the lower half of her face (often in profile) visible.  It's getting boring.

© Amanda Pape - 2014

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

394 (2014 #22). Mrs. Lincoln's Rival

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This historical fiction / biographical novel is about Kate Chase Sprague, the "Belle of Washington" or "Belle of the North" during the Civil War.  She was the daughter of Salmon P. Chase, an Ohio governor and senator, who was Lincoln's first Secretary of the Treasury, and who was later appointed by Lincoln as chief justice of the Supreme Court.

Kate was very pretty and very bright, and served as her thrice-widowed father's official hostess and political advisor and confidante (Chase had aspirations to be President).  While the two women apparently did not have a high opinion of each other in real life, Kate's "rivalry" with First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln is not a major part of the book (and somewhat misleading as a title - although I have to wonder if the book was so named to dovetail with Chiaverini's other book with the same setting, Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker, which I liked better).

Much of the book focuses on the courtship and marriage of Kate and Rhode Island governor William Sprague, a wealthy businessman who later became a senator from that state.  Sadly, their marriage was an unhappy one.  I did not find Kate to be a particularly likable character, but I did feel sorry for her in this marriage.

The book covers the period from March 1858, when Kate is 18, through the period just after Lincoln's assassination.  The Civil War comes up often as news of the battles reaches Washington, D.C. (often by incorporating quotes from real newspaper articles of the era), and the social life there is described in detail (dresses, food, etc.). Maybe too much detail for both, as the book felt a bit long.  An author's note at the end tells what happened to Kate and her family afterwards, and the acknowledgments section lists an impressive number of sources.

© Amanda Pape - 2014

 [This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

322 (2013 #6). Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker

by Jennifer Chiaverini

Best known for her Elm Creek Quilts series (of which I've read nearly all), this is Jennifer Chiaverini's first foray into the genre of biographical novels.

I read this book shortly after seeing the movie Lincoln, in which mixed-race former slave Elizabeth Keckley is more than a minor character.  Keckley was more than Mary Todd Lincoln's dressmaker, she also became a friend and a confidante, due to her role preparing Mrs. Lincoln for official functions (dress, hair, etc.).

I could see why Mrs. Lincoln and Keckley became friends.  Each of them was caught between two worlds.  Mrs. Lincoln was married to the leader of the Union, but had family members fighting for the Confederacy. Keckley, due to her position in the White House and her status as a free black woman, was caught between the white world and the black.

This book starts in Washington, D.C., in November 1860, when Lincoln is elected to his first term.  Keckley at that time was the dressmaker for the wives of Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee, as well as other Washington elite.  At this point, Keckley was already 42, and Chiaverini weaves in some details from Keckley's past - her purchase of her freedom, her rape by a white man and subsequent son, George, and her separation from and death of her husband.

In many respects, the book is more about the Civil War and its effects on those living in Washington, D.C. at the time (well-researched by Chiaverini), and about Abraham and especially Mary Todd Lincoln, than it is about Keckley. Mrs. Lincoln dies on page 334, and the story ends 16 pages later, even though Keckley outlived Mrs. Lincoln by 25 years.  I think I will need to read Keckley's memoir, Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House (1868), on which this book was based, particularly to learn more about Keckley's early life.

Not surprisingly for the author of a series of books tied to quilt-making, this book also found its inspiration in a quilt.  This one is attributed to Keckley, and is supposedly made mostly from scraps of fabric of dresses she made for Mary Todd Lincoln.  According to an interview, Chiaverini came across a photograph of it while researching Civil War era quilts for the fourth book in her Elm Creek Quilts Series, The Runaway Quilt.  Later, while researching for another Civil War-era book in the series, The Union Quilters, she "realized that many of my secondary sources cited the same work," Keckley's memoir.

Chiaverini said, "I longed to delve more deeply into Elizabeth Keckley’s history, to learn about the woman she was beyond her friendship with Mary Lincoln, to discover what had happened after the closing passages of her memoir, and to uncover the details of everyday life in wartime Washington she had omitted."  What comes across most strongly, though, is a more balanced portrait of Mary Todd Lincoln by someone (Keckley) more sympathetic to her than most of her contemporaries.

A good fictional complement to this book is An Unlikely Friendship: A Novel of Mary Todd Lincoln and Elizabeth Keckley, by Ann Rinaldi, which delves more deeply into the early years of these two women, before they meet.

© Amanda Pape - 2013

[The book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

302 (2012 #47). The Giving Quilt

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This is book #20 in the Elm Creek Quilts series.   I've read most (and reviewed many) of the others, and got on the wait list for this one at my local public library once its publication date was announced.  I came up in the queue right before Thanksgiving, which was perfect timing, both for me to read it, and because it ties in with the subject of the book.

Set during the week after Thanksgiving, the Elm Creek Quilt Camp provides a free week at Elm Creek Manor, "Quiltsgiving," if the participants agree to make and donate a quilt for Project Linus, a real organization that provides homemade blankets to children in need.

Some of the old favorites from the contemporary strand of Elm Creek novels are here--Sylvia, Sarah, and Gretchen in particular--but the book is mostly the stories of five of the Quiltsgiving participants.   Linnea, a public librarian in California, is having her annual vacation with her sister Mona* at the Manor this year.  Michaela is a college student with a broken leg, doing her required community service.  Jocelyn is a teacher, a young widow and mother sent to the camp as a reward by the parents of the "Imagination Quest" team she's coached.  Pauline is a member of a prestigious quilting group, but here at Quiltsgiving rather than at her own group's retreat.  And Karen is a quilt shop clerk who had previously been a finalist for a teaching position at Elm Creek Manor - but had a disastrous interview.   Chiaverini uses the events and activities of the week at Quiltsgiving to tie together otherwise unrelated chapters on the backstories of these five women and what brought them to Quiltsgiving.

Being a librarian, I could really relate to Linnea's story of a battle to keep the local public library open, in the face of a budget deficit, book banners, and people who think we don't need libraries any more because "everything we could possibly want to read is online." (page 146)

I also enjoyed the story of teacher Jocelyn, who takes over coaching her husband's and daughters' "Imagination Quest" team after his untimely death in an accident.  "Imagination Quest" is very obviously modeled after Destination ImagiNation and/or Odyssey of the Mind, two creative problem-solving team competitions in which I and my offspring were quite involved in school.  It reads like Chiaverini has also been involved in the program with her sons, as she nails the descriptions of the programs and of some of their problems with cheating (I was a judge one year at a regional tournament).

Karen's story talks about an interesting problem, that of people who "shop" in brick-and-mortar stores, checking out products, then ordering them cheaper online.  It's also interesting to read how Karen deals with her rejection by the Elm Creek Quilters and comes to find her own place in the world.

I was intrigued by Michaela's broken leg from the beginning of the book, not explained until her story is told.  Her goal in college was to be a cheerleader - not a particularly worthy goal in my opinion.  However, her determination and focus are admirable, as is her acceptance and ability to set a new goal when her attempt to challenge a tradition at her university is thwarted by an "accident" that may have not been an accident.

The only story I didn't particularly care for was the first one told, that of Pauline, the member of the exclusive quilting group with a lot of internal squabbles.  It just wasn't especially interesting to me.

The final chapter of the book tells briefly what happened to each of these quilters after Quiltsgiving.  *Note:  For some reason, there is no story for Mona, who is a state government employee and union official dealing with attempts by the government to abolish collective bargaining rights.  Chiaverini lives in Wisconsin, which recently dealt with such issues, and perhaps this hit just a little too close to home.

This was a nice, easy read, perfect for the holidays.  I have been surprised to see some online reviews taking Chiaverini to task for (in the reviewers' opinions) expressing her "political" views.  It would not surprise me if these are the same people who don't like the historical fiction books in the series (which are my favorites), and the ones who complain when the stories aren't set at Elm Creek Manor or don't focus entirely on the original Elm Creek Quilters.  There's just no pleasing some "fans."

© Amanda Pape - 2012

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

274 (2012 #19). Sonoma Rose

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This is #19 in the Elm Creek Quilts series, but you really don't have to have read any of the previous books to enjoy this one, since it's historical fiction.  The main character here, Rosa Diaz Barclay, was introduced in The Quilter's Homecoming, and this book is also set in California in the late 1920s, in the midst of Prohibition.

Rosa married John, a Southern California rye farmer and postmaster, a man she didn't love, to legitimize her true love's baby.  Eight children later (with yet another by her lover), Rosa is miserable - half of her children are dead of a mysterious wasting disease, and her husband has become abusive and won't let Rosa take the surviving sick children (who are the two who are his) to specialists in the big city.

In a jealous rage, John beats Rosa and threatens to kill her lover, Lars Jorgensen, who Rosa did not marry all those years ago due to her family's prejudices and Lars' drinking problem.  This time, though, Lars and Rosa run away with the children to San Francisco.  Rosa finds John's stash of cash from bootlegging and takes most of it with her.  John, meanwhile, is imprisoned for bootlegging and initially thinks Rosa and the children perished in a flash flood in a nearby canyon.

Rosa and Lars, posing as Rose and Nils Otteson, ultimately find work in a family vineyard in Sonoma County.  The sick children are diagnosed with celiac disease, and a diet of bananas (with no wheat products) improves their health.  Rosa/Rose and Lars/Nils face other problems though, with more bootleggers (including their employers), dirty Prohibition agents, and the fear that John (or the police or gangsters) will find them.

There's not a lot about quilts or quilting in this book, but I learned a lot about wine making and the sufferings of family vintners during the Prohibition years.  It was also very interesting to read about the early treatment of celiac disease, as I have a number of relatives with this illness.  Chiaverini provides her research sources in acknowledgments at the end of the book.

Rosa isn't always likable, but she is a strong heroine.  There's a lot of sadness and darkness in this book - illness, regret, loneliness, isolation, abuse, rape, alcoholism, adultery, lying, law-breaking - but that, and intriguing supporting characters, are what makes the story.  Ultimately, it's nice to see Rosa find happiness with the man she loves and her growing, healthy children.

© Amanda Pape - 2012

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

272 (2012 #17). The Wedding Quilt

by Jennifer Chiaverini,
read by Christina Moore

This book, the 18th in the Elm Creek Quilts series, feels like the last.  Technically, it's not, because #19 just came out, but that one is historical fiction.  This one does appear to be the last of the stories of the contemporary "Elm Creek Quilters."

The book is set in the future, 2028 to be exact.  Matt and Sarah McClure's twins, yet to be born in one of the last books I read in this series (The Aloha Quilt), are now 25, and the daughter, Caroline, is getting married.  Almost all of the Elm Creek Quilters (that are still alive) come back for the wedding, so it's the perfect opportunity to reminisce.

Previous books are recalled in the form of memories and flashbacks, and their storylines brought up-to-date.  Not surprisingly, some of the older members of the group have passed on, and children of other members have taken their places in the quilt camp staff and faculty.  Tying it all together are the typical wedding preparations in the week before a wedding, although in this case, with Elm Creek Manor also serving as a hotel of sorts for most of the wedding guests, preparations can involve a lot more characters.


Because much of this covered material I've already read in other books in the series, the storyline that was of most interest to me was the one about the saving of Union Hall (the building of which was described in The Union Quiliters).  I haven't read all of the books in the series, though, so perhaps that story was covered in a book I hadn't read.

Many reviewers are very upset that the contemporary stories in the series appear to have come to an end with this book.  I personally prefer the historical fiction books in the series anyway, so I'm not particularly upset.  Chiaverini certainly could go back and write a story that didn't get summarized in The Wedding Quilt using the contemporary characters.

Indeed, on her website, Chiaverini says, "Sonoma Rose [#19] is the last book of my current contract, but I have a verbal agreement with [publisher] Dutton for a new three-book deal. At the present time, it looks like a contemporary Elm Creek Quilts novel titled The Giving Quilt will be published in October 2012 as the first book of that contract."

Christina Moore once again does a fine job narrating the audiobook, with variations in voice for the different Elm Creek Quilters and other characters (although the men all mostly sound alike).  The photo at the top of this post is from the audiobook library edition, while that at the bottom is from the hardbound edition.

© Amanda Pape - 2012

[The audiobook and a hardbound copy for reference were borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

258 (2012 #3). The Union Quilters

by Jennifer Chiaverini

This was an engrossing piece of historical fiction set in Pennsylvania from 1861 - 1868.  It continues with many of the characters from The Runaway Quilt and shows the impact and effects of the Civil War on the men and women of the (fictional) Watersford community (which I always picture as being a little bit like Slippery Rock).

Chiaverini did quite a bit of research for this book, as evidenced by the bibliography in her acknowledgments at the front of the book.  She aptly demonstrates what life was like for the men who went to war (and those who didn't), the women at home (and in the community), and the free Blacks in Pennsylvania.  It's particularly appropriate with publication during the first year of the Civil War bicentennial.

The plot is compelling and the characters are intriguing.  Jonathan and Gerda were particularly interesting, obviously intelligent people, but not so wise in matters of the heart and tact, for continuing to carry a torch for the other despite Jonathan's marriage to another.

The book itself is beautiful, with a gorgeous cover that includes a white quilted background, lovely printed fabrics, an appliqué star, and a period photograph of women of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts sewing an oversized flag for the soldiers during the Civil War. The endpapers have pictures of some of the quilt blocks described in the text.

This was an easy but fascinating read.  It stands alone and it's not necessary to read other books in the Elm Creek Quilts series first (although one who's already read The Runaway Quilt will be able to make connections with this book).  As someone who has read some of the books in this series, I now want to read The Lost Quilter, which begins in 1859 immediately following the events chronicled in Gerda's memoir in The Runaway Quilt, and parallels The Union Quilters.

© Amanda Pape - 2012

[This book was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

206 (2011 #11). Round Robin

by Jennifer Chiaverini,
read by Christina Moore

This was the second book in the Elm Creek Quilt series (which fortunately, after the first book, doesn't really need to be read in order). The Elm Creek Quilters - Sarah, Diane, Agnes, Judy, Bonnie, and Gwen - decide to make a "Round Robin" quilt for their friend and mentor Sylvia, owner of Elm Creek Manor.  Agnes volunteers to make the central square, and the other quilters take turns adding a border.  The borders end up relating to some crisis going on in each of their lives - Sarah's frustrations with her critical mother, Diane fighting for her son's right to skateboard, Bonnie's husband's infidelity, Judy's contact with the family she didn't know she had, and Gwen's realization that daughter Summer, another Elm Creek Quilter, is grown up and can make her own decisions about her life.  And Sylvia rediscovers love in her life and faces a health crisis.

The stories will touch on many readers' personal experiences.  I was sympathetic to most of the characters, except philandering husband Craig, and Carol, Sarah's mother, who comes across as self-absorbed.  Narrator Christina Moore as usual does a fabulous job bringing the characters to life.

© Amanda Pape - 2011

[This audiobook and a hardbound copy of the book for reference were borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

186 (2010 #51). The Runaway Quilt

by Jennifer Chiaverini,
read by Christina Moore

Yet another book in the Elm Creek Quilts series, this one was rather interesting, as it explored the fascinating question of whether or not stationmasters of the Underground Railroad used quilts to signal to fugitive slaves.  In an author's note at the end of the book, Chiaverini says,

The debate about the role of quilts as signals on the Underground Railroad is ongoing [the book was published in 2002], with the oral tradition often at odds with documented historical fact.  In this novel, I have tried to remain faithful to the historical record while also presenting a plausible explanation for the evolution of the legend.

Since Chiaverini's book, it appears the argument has tilted more towards the side of legend than truth; nevertheless, it makes a good basis for the story, and the narrative is compelling enough.  Sylvia Bergstrom Compson finds three quilts and a memoir written by her great grandfather's spinster sister, Gerda Bergstrom, in the attic of Elm Creek Manor.  The memoir tells of the founding of the farm in 1856 and how Gerda, brother Hans, and his wife Anneke eventually become involved in the Underground Railroad movement, taking in a pregnant runaway slave, Joanna, before the Civil War.

The story was exciting and kept me turning the pages.  Of course Sylvia couldn't read Gerda's memoir straight through in one sitting and get all the answers, as that would have destroyed the novel, although reading it straight through at once is certainly what I would have done.

This book also poses some questions for genealogists about how you might react to surprising and perhaps unwelcome information about your ancestors.

Chiaverini has since written two books with characters from this novel.  The Lost Quilter takes up the story of Joanna, while The Union Quilters (to be published in February 2011) continues the tale of the Bergstrom ancestors and others in their Pennsylvania community during the Civil War.  More for me to listen to or read sometime.

Christina Moore, as usual, does a great job with the narration, providing recognizable variations in voice for different characters.  Recommended as an easy but intriguing "read."

© Amanda Pape - 2010

[This audiobook and hardbound copy were borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

177 (2010 #42). The Aloha Quilt

by Jennifer Chiaverini,
read by Christina Moore

This is book number 16 in the Elm Creek Quilts series, many of which I've read (and a few I've reviewed).  This one, obviously, is set in Hawaii. Bonnie, one of the founders of Elm Creek Quilt Camp, has been invited by her best friend Claire to come to Hawaii to help set up a quilt camp there.  Bonnie, having recently experienced the failure of both her quilt store and her marriage in Pennsylvania, agrees to come for six months as a consultant to help Claire get the quilt camp going.

There is some fascinating information about Hawaiian-style quilting, and the quilt made by Hawaiian Queen Lili‘uokalani during her imprisonment at 'Iolani Palace in Honolulu.  Most of the story takes place on Maui, particularly in Lahaina, so some of the sights in and around there are woven into the narrative.  I appreciate this after going to Hawaii in May and visiting some of the places mentioned in the story.

Sometimes Bonnie is rather intolerant in the story, particularly when it comes to Claire's mistakes.  However, I had a LOT of empathy for Bonnie when it came to her soon-to-be-ex-husband Craig.  His behavior reminded me of my own ex-husband, and one phone conversation the two of them had left me shaking and angry; it was SO real for me.  I wanted to keep listening the audiobook, beyond the 45-minute stretches of my commute, just to find out what happens in that situation.  There are also a couple of unresolved scenarios by the end of this book that I'm sure will be addressed in future books in this series.

So far I've enjoyed all of the Elm Creek Quilts novels I've read or listened to - Christina Moore does an outstanding job giving each character a little different nuance with her voice.

© Amanda Pape - 2010

[This audiobook was borrowed from and returned to my local public library.]

26. The Quilter's Homecoming

by Jennifer Chiaverini,
audiobook read by Christina Moore

I've read or listened to most of the books in this Elm Creek Quilt series over the past few years when I've wanted escapist fare; something not too challenging as respite from some of the more "serious" stuff I read for book clubs or advance reader editions to review. This was no different.

Set mostly in 1925, with an eventually-intertwining story that begins in the late 1800's, this is the story of Elizabeth Bergstrom Nelson, the cousin of the main character, Sylvia, in the present-day Elm Creek stories. Elizabeth and her new husband leave Elm Creek for a ranch in California, but circumstances aren't quite what they seem. Elizabeth becomes involved with Rosa, a descendant of the ranch's original Mexican owners, whose story is told in flashbacks.

Christina Moore has read all the Elm Creek audiobooks I've listened to so far, and does a fine job. Her rendering of Elizabeth's husband Henry seems appropriate, as he sounds as sarcastic and gloomy as the story implies he might be.

As with Chiaverini's other books, a number of quilts and their patterns play into the story. A "Chimneys and Cornerstones" pattern (that was also mentioned in Chiaverini's The Christmas Quilt) and a Double Wedding Ring design that are wedding gifts from Bergstrom women must be sold to make ends meet. Elizabeth eventually recovers the former, but the latter appears to be lost. Wanna bet it will reappear in a future Elm Creek tale?