March Book Club Book

We had a great discussion at LouAnn's home last night. It's such a pleasure to read a good book and then discuss it among your dear friends. Juliet is such a loveable character and if more people could be as selfless as Elizabeth was, our world would be a better place. What an amazing group of friends we meet through that book. Thank you LouAnn. Next month we will be meeting at Diane Walker's home on Wednesday, March 3rd at 7pm. This is her pick:


A description of the book from Goodreads:


"While much has been written about the men who signed the Declaration of Independence, battled the British, and framed the Constitution, the wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters they left behind have been little noticed by history. Roberts brings us the women who fought the Revolution as valiantly as the men, often defending their very doorsteps. While the men went off to war or to Congress, the women managed their businesses, raised their children, provided them with political advice, and made it possible for the men to do what they did. The behind-the-scenes influence of these women - and their sometimes very public activities - as intelligent and pervasive." Drawing upon personal correspondence, private journals, and even favored recipes, Roberts reveals the often surprising stories of these fascinating women, bringing to life the everyday trials and extraordinary triumphs of individuals like Abigail Adams, Mercy Otis Warren, Deborah Read Franklin, Eliza Pinckney, Catherine Littlefield Green, Esther DeBerdt Reed, and Martha Washington - proving that without our exemplary women, the new country might never have survived."

Another Goodreads review:

"The book is divided into historical periods, which was helpful. What was not so helpful, for me, was how often I felt the narration jumped around - either from person to person or from past to present (well, Revolutionary Present). There were so many people and names that when we kept jumping back and forth I had a really hard time keeping everyone and their story straight. To remedy this, instead of trying to be 100% aware at all times of who I was reading about, I tried to mostly just appreciate what this book intended to teach me: that these women deserve to have their stories told. And while Martha Washington and Abagail Adams are familiar names, many more women were influential on not only their own men, but on pre-Revolutionary society as a whole. A good part of what our country is today is a result of their opinions and their valiant efforts both during the Revolution and while our country was being slowly pieced together. Not all the women in this book made great choices, of course. Some had affairs with married men - and these affairs affected the course of historical events. Some women even held their husbands back from public office, adding to the workload of other Revolutionaries. For good or bad, these ladies had an important place in the events of the Revolution. What Cokie did particularly well was to place these women in the context of the lives of their men. And by doing so, without ever stating it outright, she helps us to realize that these men, immortalized on our money and in the names of our elementary schools, they were just that: mortal men. They had flaws and they made mistakes and they loved their wives and cheated on them. They mourned the loss of their children, traveled back and forth constantly throughout a war torn land and fought tirelessly for a dream of governing themselves. And while these men worked in the public sphere, the women oversaw plantations alone, ran fundraising campaigns for the soldiers, wrote political plays, raised children and buried them. Martha, Abagail and all the others who supported the Founding Fathers absolutely deserve three cheers of their own. "

Enjoy reading and see you next month.