Historical fiction inspired by a letter found in the bedroom wall of the author’s home in 2007. Researching the name on the personalized stationery led to learning that the letter from Joan Dumann written as a teenager living in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to a boy in New Jersey was never mailed. In researching Joan’s life the author has crafted a compelling story of how Joan’s life might have transpired piecing together facts with creativity to lead the reader into the drama of one woman’s life journey.

Joan was born in 1915 to a prominent Quaker family and her life transpired through memorable times in history from an influenza pandemic to Prohibition to the Great Depression to the Vietnam era. Marrying a husband that inherited a family furniture business, Joan delighted in helping her husband with the business and in her eyes was an equal partner. With the birth of her first child she became a stay-at-home mother and felt the isolation in the loss of adult contact and connections as well as the loss of her husband’s confidences in sharing business conversations. Joan began to make choices that quickly became a pattern for the rest of her life.

A portrayal of the societal norms of the day through transitional and transformational periods of American history, family expectations based on religion and societal influences of social class, and a woman’s desire to achieve and contribute in business. It is a stark and dramatic reminder that decisions made along one’s life journey sometimes have long-reaching and unanticipated consequences. Many will judge choices made and sometimes only a few will understand. It also illuminates that a fulfilling life is different for each person.

My sincere thanks to Eileen Brill, and SparkPress for my complimentary digital copy of this title, via NetGalley, in exchange for my honest review.

#aletterinthewalleileenbrillbooks #NetGalley.

I am writing this review for Net Galley.

In this story we follow Joan whom at summer camp meets this boy in the middle of the night. They kiss but nothing more happens. Joan decides to write him a letter but decides not to mail it. She hides it in a wall instead. Then she gets married to her first husband and has her first child Barbara. After that she gets married 2 more times. There we follow her ups and downs in hopes she will finally find what it is to help her out in life.

I rated this a 3 because it was hard for me to read about the decisions she was making. I also did not like the ending. I highly recommend that you read the author's note first at the end before reading the book. When I read the author's note it helped me understand why the story was the way it was. I think if I would have read the author's note first it would have changed my mind while reading the story. The author's writing is very good especially for the challenge of writing this story.

My thanks to@SparkPress, as well as to @NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review an early copy of A Letter in the Wall.

I love that the inspiration for this book came about when the author actually found a letter in the bedroom wall of the house she lived in in 2007! As she started her search for who Joan was, she was unable to find out much more than the fact that she had been raised a Quaker, had been married three times, had had four children, and that she had been murdered in 1971. From there, the author used her imagination and filled in Joan's story, herself.

A Letter in the Wall goes through multiple time periods: From the 1918 influenza pandemic, to Prohibition, to the Great Depression, and even to Vietnam. Through it all, Joan wrestles with her turbulent thoughts and unfulfilled desires—an internal battle that often results in self-destructive tendencies. I very much enjoyed reading this book even though Joan wasn't always likable. Today she would be diagnosed with depression (at the very least).

I thought the author did a great job and I hope this won't be her last book!

I loved this book! I was not expecting to love it as much as I did, only because I feel that the description of the book doesn't do it justice. Would recommend to all my mystery lovers.

Back in 2007, Eileen Brill discovered an old, unsent letter hidden in the wall of her house. This unexpected find piqued her interest and launched her into researching the writer, which ultimately led to the writing of this novel. Because, as Brill explains in an afterword, while it was possible to learn a certain amount of factual information about the writer and her family, it wasn't possible to know what feelings motivated her.
This, then, is the richly imagined story of Joan Dumann, from the moment in her early childhood when her beloved mother, dying in the 1918 flu pandemic, seems to abandon her and continuing on to Joan's own shocking death in 1971. We see the development of an intelligent but resentful and often undisciplined girl from a Quaker family, who longs for a career in business which is mostly denied her as she navigates her often headstrong way through marriages and childrearing. Joan both charms and alienates those around her, which ultimately leads to her downfall. The reader simultaneously wishes her well and is dismayed by her often poor decisions, and wonders whether her life would have been different had she sent the letter in the wall and/or various other unsent later letters. And if her first husband had encouraged her to remain active in the family business after the birth of their daughter, would their marriage have succeeded?
I was impressed with the quality of the characterization throughout the novel, as well as with the intricacy of the web of business dealings that Joan enmeshes herself in at the end of her life.
I received an ARC through NetGalley in return for an honest review.