It's not literature, but it was an enjoyable page-turner. Despite being fairly predictable, there were elements to the story that held suspense, with some little twists here and there. I enjoyed it, in that way that someone enjoys stuff like this - like maybe on a long plane ride It would, however, be a lovely film, which I think would give the characters themselves a lot more depth.

I’ve always enjoyed reading historical fiction books about the 1930’s in America: the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, FDR’s New Deal. Kristina McMorris’s Sold on a Monday tells the story of a desperate journalist who makes a snap decision to take a staged picture and the ramifications of his actions on so many people, innocent or not.
It was a slightly slow start; I thought we were going to dwell on the flirtations between Ellis and Lily. But Lilly became a strong female lead role, which was refreshing. Ellis went through a major transformation after realizing how damaging his zest to succeed could be to others. I thoroughly enjoyed the characters, the setting, and the historical accuracy that McMorris strived for. I was surprised to find while reading her acknowledgments where she got the idea for the novel. I could easily see this becoming a movie in the near future.
I plan to read more of McMorris’s work, which she bases on historical events. Thoroughly good reading!
(I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. Thank you to Landmark for making it available.)

McMorris creates a world that is both familiar and historical at the same time. So often one wonders what it would be like to live “back then.” Sold on a Monday gives a brief answer to those ponderings. The characters, their motivations, and their reactions are tangible and sympathetic. Then, there is also a convincing sense of the 1930s with the fallout from the stock market crash, mobsters, gender roles, and day to day life for different strata of society. The mystery behind the photograph and the journey undertaken by Ellis and Lily to ultimately give the children the home to which they’re entitled keeps a reader engaged through the final chapter. A good read.

Historical fiction at its finest! Loosely based on a true picture, but relatable to the times after the Depression when families could no longer afford to keep their own children. This is similar to The Orphan Train with the startling realizations of what did happen to some of those poor, innocent children. The main characters are easy to fall in love with and root for, the settings of eastern PA, NJ and MY made it more interesting for me since they are my local areas. I would definitely recommend this book!!!

This book was wonderful! I loved the character development, the story, and the ending. I started reading....and then the end of the story....I couldn’t stop reading. Please don’t miss this book!

This was a great historical fiction novel. I really enjoyed the premise of the story. This novel was very well written and interesting. I highly recommend!

During a time when almost the entire nation was in dire straits from the Great Depression, many did not have jobs, a place to live or enough food to eat. This story begins with a picture taken of two young children sitting on a porch with a sign stating they were for sale. As Ellis Reed, a struggling newspaper reporter sees the children, he can’t help but take their picture. It somehow makes its way to his Chief, who wants an article to publish in the paper. Due to various circumstances, he has to obtain another picture immediately for the paper which is the beginning of some terrible circumstances. As the story progresses, Ellis struggles between his ambition and his need to make things right, no matter the cost.

We also meet Lily Palmer, who is the secretary for the Chief at the newspaper, and who longs to be able to write for the paper. As a woman in 1931, she is dismissed unless she wants to write for the women’s fashion or other sections. She lives in a boarding house while also hiding a secret from everyone.

The description of Ellis’s boarding house was so depressing with tiny rooms, thin walls, and numerous people who had nowhere else to live, waiting in long lines for the one bathroom. Even for those with jobs, it was a difficult time.

This story reminded me of the vulnerability of the extreme poor and those considered less than by many people. I read the author’s notes on how she saw a photo from the 1940’s with children on a porch and a sign that said they were for sale, which triggered the basis for this book. At first I couldn’t understand why parents were selling their children versus finding someone that could take care of them, but they were starving. “Even decent, well-meaning people could make poor choices under pressure.”

I enjoyed the story setting of Philadelphia and New York City along with the very rich who could get away with anything, mafia-types, prohibition, and difficult to start crank cars. Many people bought and sold these children, not as family, but to work almost like slaves with horrible living conditions and treatment.

Although at times it was slow reading, this is a compelling, well written story that has enough suspense to keep you reading, while also thinking of honor, ethics, society stigma’s and desperation. It was interesting and horrifying to read about the ‘breaker boys’ that worked in the coal mines before child labor laws were enacted, and the injuries and deaths that occurred. The story makes me appreciate our modern conveniences and better job opportunities for women.

This story has a subtle romance aspect with Lily, Ellis and another reporter, all whom worked at the newspaper in Philadelphia. It’s not the main aspect of the story but comes to a satisfying conclusion.

Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher and author for allowing me the opportunity to read this new work.

A fast paced read centering on a photo and two young journalists. There are consequences when a photo gets published in a newspaper. The rich details of the period made you feel like you were right with our star crossed lovers. If you like historical fiction and bit of intrique and romance, this book is for you. It is also very relavent today when truth in news or fake news is discussed.

I don't like that prologue that starts the book. I would rather not know where the book was headed. I started liking the characters and then I started to see where they were headed and I didn't like the choices that they made. It didn't draw me to find out more like some other books instead I wanted to stop reading.

This story is an agonizing, heart-wrenching, thought-provoking, emotional journey. Kristina McMorris immerses us within a period of history with such precision that I not only understood the desperation of the times, but I experienced it.

We have two narrating characters, and both are fully developed, step-off-the-pages human beings. Reed is a young man struggling to make it in journalism, while still holding on to his sense of morality. Lily is a young woman pushing ever so slightly but steadily against the boundaries set for women of her time.

McMorris provides just the right amount of details. All those little things that place us in a setting and activate our senses are sprinkled throughout. I felt like I was there - on the dirt roads, in the news office, at the deli - but I never felt the story was bogged down by too much detail.

The plight of the children is handled exceptionally well. I saw a few reviewers mentioned they wanted more from the kids, but I thought the balance was just right. Their situation is horrifying, and I didn't need to dwell there to feel it.

The pace is steady, though more of a slow burn. The content has a literary feel, with the focus on getting to know the characters so we understand their motivations and so we care about the outcome.

A couple of dramatic twists occur in the last quarter of the book, adding more layers of realism to a story set in a difficult historical period. This is a story that will stick with me for a long time.

This was a fascinating look at how newspaper publishing in the early 1900s worked. It also offered a glimpse into the desperation felt by people in different circumstances, whether that desperation was because of finances, fear, status, judgement, etc. That common sense of desperation was woven through the entire story, and the author did a wonderful job of showing how happenstance can have lasting effects on many people in so many unforeseen ways.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC for my kindle.
Desperation due to poverty or illness sometimes makes one do things a mother would never think of doing, but there are other circumstances that are part of this story.
Overall, an easy and sweet read.

Sold on a Monday is a well written novel with a good plot and well developed characters. I enjoyed the author's style of writing. I received an ARC from the publisher via Netgalley and this is my unbiased review.

4 stars

A picture is worth a thousand words, but sometimes the story behind the picture is worth a thousand more…
Philadelphia, 1931. A young, ambitious reporter named Ellis Reed photographs a pair of young siblings on the front porch of a farmhouse next to a sign: “2 children for sale.” With the help of newspaper secretary Lily Palmer, Ellis writes an article to accompany the photo. Capturing the hardships of American families during the Great Depression, the feature story generates national attention and Ellis’s career skyrockets.

Sold on A Monday by Kristina McMorris is a deeply moving story. The author has weaved a tale with captivating characters that draw you in from the very beginning. This is a tale of the Great Depression and people doing what they have to in order to survive. This book really surprised me, as it was not at all what I thought it was going to be. Sold On A Monday is just one of those incredibly rare books that encourage the reader to try and read it in just one setting. It is just so very difficult to put down!
I highly recommend this book.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. #SoldonaMonday #NetGalley

The consequences of a photograph can change lives in many ways. Lilly only meant to help get Ellis career started as a journalist but mishaps led to a change in a printed photo. This started a chain of events that affected many lives.

McMorris, Kristina
SOLD ON A MONDAY

Hard times, hard choices, and the courage to try to make things right. SOLD ON MONDAY is a compelling saga of mistakes and misunderstandings, and love and loyalty and dreams of happiness. I don’t know how I didn’t know of Kristina McMorris already, but I do want to read so much more of her beautiful writing.
It all started with a photograph, in real life as inspiration for the book and in the fictional tale that kept me reading and ignoring all else. People, with all their faults and frailties, so real I really cared about them as they moved through so many twists and turns and dangers.
Lily Palmer wants to be the next Nellie Bly, but is hired as a secretary, bringing “the Chief” his coffee properly cooled to lukewarm — woman’s work (even in the ‘70s want ads specified men/women, and most female college grads became secretaries). Ellis Reed dreams of front page bylines, but is relegated to writing about and photographing society event — also “woman’s work,” so humiliating to him and his desire to impress his father, but in the Depression, one didn’t turn down work, any work.
What’s a little deception if it furthers his honorable goals? What if children suffer for it? What if amends can be made? Is it worth the risks involved? Is there even a chance of succeeding against the rich and powerful? Some of these issues resonate strongly in present time.
Lily’s mother’s question, “You’ll be fine, but will you be happy?” Both, please. <3

Sold On a Monday is a novel based on a tragic, depressing time in history. A photographer happens upon a scene that shocks him. Off a porch in a rural house stands a sign “2 children for sale”. Could the parents really be so desperate as to sell their children? He snaps the picture and develops it. A co-worker sees the photo, shows it to her boss, and suddenly this becomes a full story. But what exactly is the truth? How are the children in the story? How are the parents impacted? Did they truly feel desperate enough to sell their own children to strangers? And how can good come from such a heartbreaking offer to sell your own flesh and blood?

Strong characters make you feel the tug on their hearts. I found myself pushing them to acknowledge their part and do all they could to get more information and make things right. This historical fiction stays with you long after the cover is closed.

“Sometimes we have to make sacrifices for the ones we love...”

[The detective pulled a chair over to me in the hospital.] I heard, "Can you tell me how it all started?" The reporter in my head blended with the detective before me. I wasn't entirely sure which of them had asked...
I nodded at him slowly, remembering as I replied.

"It started with a picture."

Sold on a Monday, like many popular works of historical fiction set in the 1930's Great Depression is based on an iconic photograph. My favorite being, Mary Coin by Marissa Silver based on Dorothy Lange's photograph entitled, Migrant Mother. Sold on a Monday was inspired by a photograph (later questioned as authentic) of a mother and four children on a porch. A sign near them reads - 4 children for sale, inquire within.

Author, Kristina McMorris, nudged by the writer's innate question..".what if"... has created a world where a dramatic photograph, taken for personal use by a newspaper reporter on his own time, is found drying in the darkroom by the editor's secretary, Lily Palmer. The moving picture shows two children near a sign reading - "2 children for sale. Recognizing the work of Ellis Reed, Lily shows the photo to the editor.

The editor, recognizing the dramatic impact the picture will have on newspaper readers, instructs Ellis to write a story about it. Sniffing a chance to advance himself, perhaps leading to his own column, Ellis obliges. Puffed up proud, Ellis is brought down quickly when he is told that the negative and photo have been damaged and he must replace it immediately. Returning to the house, he finds the sign leaning against the porch and the family gone. (We never learn what happened to the original family; something that nagged at me long after I finished the book.)

In that instant he panics. He spots 2 children playing nearby at another house. Grabbing the "children for sale" sign, and with their mother's reluctant permission along with a handful of money, Ellis stages a new photo. Thus begins a spiral of disquiet that follows Ellis into his new career at a larger newspaper; a success launched by this story. As he rises in notoriety, he is constantly aware it is based on a lie. Lily, also observes, he has lost that special something that reaches the common man.

Lily Palmer, harboring a deep secret of her own, is reminded time and again of the deception when letters and gifts continually arrive at her newspaper for the exposed children. The gifts and letters are placed on the porch in the dead of night, the deliverers unable to face the family. The innocent children were never for sale.

After a time, and independently, Ellis and Lily seek to find out what consequences their individual actions have had on that misused family. They are both rocked to learn that the mother has been confined to a sanitarium and has died. The children were placed in an orphanage. The now infamous photograph led to the sale of the two children to a wealthy family.

Using his newspaper network, Ellis finds the family and scouts the new home. Peering through a window, he spots the young girl, Ruby, neatly dressed, and sitting near a smiling woman. He believes he hears a young a boy giggling in another room.

He tells Lily that all seems wonderful at first glance. But further efforts reveal that appearances don't necessarily define reality. Ellis and Lily set out to right their consciences and dredge up darkness they never dreamed possible. Their lives and the lives of the children are in danger.

Sold on a Monday is a fabulous 1930's era "Agatha Christie" mystery with some really sharp edges. The suspense moves slowly at first, careers sputter, personal relationships simmer, and all along we are aware that this is the Great Depression. Desperate times where desperation can lead a person to the "Dark Side." The novel does come to a spectacular moment that then settles down to a "happily-ever-after" finish.

Good read for a rainy day!
ARC provided by Sourcebook Landmark and NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.
Rated: 4 stars

I thoroughly enjoyed "Sold on a Monday." While the subject content was at times unpleasant, McMorris did a masterful job of weaving the story and allowing the reader to connect with the characters. Learning about the history involved in the story was a bonus.

I received this book as an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book takes a true depression-era photograph about a family selling their children and contextualizes and expands it.

As a mother myself it was so horrifying to read, and yet absolutely amazing.

I could not get over my love for it, and read it all in one sitting on a plane - which is basically the dream.

A must-read!