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March 2005

Women have made a significant contribution to the history of the world. In March, we recognize this contribution by celebrating International Women’s Day. There are many stories of the lives of remarkable women who have made a difference and recently authors have featured women through the telling of their stories on the pages of novels. Here are a few for you to consider:

Marrying Mozart by Stephanie Cowell

"Mannheim, 1777. The four Weber sisters, daughters of a musical family, share a crowded, artistic life in a ramshackle house. Their father scrapes by as a music copyist; their mother keeps a book of prospective suitors hidden in the kitchen. The sisters struggle with these marriage prospects as well as their musical futures - until one evening when twenty-one-year-old Wolfgang Mozart walks into their home and their lives." "No longer a prodigy and struggling to find his own place in the music world, Mozart is enthralled with the Weber sisters: Aloysia's beauty and talent captivate him; Josefa's rich voice inspires him; Sophie becomes his confidante; and Constanze comes to play a surprising role in his life. Marrying Mozart is the love story of a remarkable historical figure - and four young women who engaged his passion, his music, and his heart."—from the Book Jacket.

I Am Madame X by Gioia Diliberto

Even before John Singer Sargent painted her portrait, Virginie Gautreau's reputation for promiscuity and showy self-display made her the subject of Paris gossip. Her scandalous portrait, unveiled in 1884, provides the inspiration for this debut novel--a compulsively readable immersion in Belle Epoque Paris.

Queenmaker: a novel of King David’s Queen by India Edghill

A man's weapons are the sword and spear; a woman's are her wits. . . . All the world knows of King David, how he slew the giant Goliath, united Israel and Judah, and brought the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. But none knew him so well -- knew him as a man -- as his queen, Michal. She saw the truth behind the songs, behind the beauty, behind the praise of men and the favor of God. Daughter of a king, beautiful, proud, Michal was the prize David would risk his kingdom to win. She could ask anything and have it granted; anything but her own happiness. . . .

A Name of Her Own by Jane Kirkpatrick

Based on the life of the first mother to cross the Rocky Mountains and settle in the Northwest, "A Name of Her Own" is the fictionalized account of a real woman's fight to establish a home in a new landscape, to survive in a nation at war, to protect her sons and raise them well, and, despite an abusive, alcoholic husband, to keep her marriage together.

Beneath a Marble Sky by John Shors

“This debut novel tells the story of the eldest daughter of the 17th century emperor who built the Taj Mahal” – from the Book Jacket.

Isobel Gunn by Audrey Thomas

In 1807, a young Orkney woman disguises herself as a man and signs on with the The Company of Adventurers to work in what was then called Rupert’s Land and her identity went undiscovered until a year later when she was about to give birth to a child.

For more reading suggestions, check out our Summer Reading List or one of our other booklists.