It’s about women’s choices and rights. We must open books like this to help us understand the dark and hidden parts of our past so we can move forward in a more positive direction.

The first half of the book alternates between the lives of Ruby in Philadelphia and Eleanor in DC. Both of these Black women are exceptionally brilliant and headed towards a bright future with a few obstacles. It’s the obstacles that make us pause.

Ruby’s mother gave birth to her when she was 15 years old. She was raised by her grandmother and later taken care of by her Aunt Marie. She was enrolled in a special scholarship program in high school that could allow her to go to college – her only way out of the difficult world for Black women in the early 50s. Then she met the landlord’s son, Shimmy, a Jewish boy who touched her heart like no other man has ever done.

Eleanor started as an English major at Howard University in DC. It was her goal to be a teacher until she met Mrs. Porter who changed her life with the love of being an archivist for books. And that’s where she met the handsome William Pride, third year medical student. His family was wealthy and when he invited her on a date to the Lincoln Theater, she was elated. But what would she even wear to impress him? She was from a hard-working family without a lot of money or choices. How could a girl like her fit into his world?

The plot thickens with the second half when the reader finds out how Ruby and Eleanor are connected with an overwhelming list of emotional complications. It’s well researched and written with the local dialect that was used by a few of the characters. While it’s a quick read, the story makes you pause and reflect about the sadness which was pushed aside until the early 70s when the laws started to change for women. I was totally absorbed in the story and didn't want it to end. The Author Notes are stimulating.

My thanks to Sadeqa Johnson, Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book with the expected release date of February 7, 2023.

My honest review is freely provided in return for the kindness by NetGalley and the publisher in providing me with an advance copy.

In the 1950’s, becoming pregnant out of wedlock was the worse thing that could happen to Ruby who had her sights set on a college education to escape her situation. The parallel story in The House of Eve follows Eleanor who falls madly for William who comes from “the other side of the tracks”. These two stories come together and both women struggle with where it takes them.

Ruby and Eleanor are both enjoyable characters, and the reader comes to know them and their lives intimately. SJ is an exquisite storyteller, and writes about uncomfortable race issues, as well as delving into the burden of hard decisions which proves pivotal for Ruby and Eleanor's future.

SJ's talented writing rises to a higher level in how she graciously conveys an understanding of the issues through her personal connection which inspired this book.

The House of Eve by Sadeqa Johnson

February 7

It’s the 1950’s. In Philadelphia, Ruby is taking enrichment classes to win the coveted scholarship that will make her the first in her family to attend college. Unlike her mother, she does NOT want to depend on a man to make ends meet. But a love affair with a white, Jewish man threatens all she’s worked toward.

In Washington, DC, Eleanor’s parents had scrapped and saved for her to reach college. She falls in love with a promising medical student and the son of wealthy and prominent Black DC parents. They don’t feel Eleanor belongs with their crowd. Perhaps if she has a baby someday, they will accept her?

Gripping, at times heart-wrenching and tough to read, this book reveals a cross-section of women who gave up babies—willingly or not—for other Blacks who could not conceive. Readers discover stories of Black women and their difficulties with unplanned pregnancies and poverty.

The author drew inspiration from her grandmother, with many of the book’s facts based on real people.

Description from publisher:
From the award-winning author of Yellow Wife, a daring and redemptive novel set in 1950s Philadelphia and Washington, DC, that explores what it means to be a woman and a mother, and how much one is willing to sacrifice to achieve her greatest goal.

1950s Philadelphia: fifteen-year-old Ruby Pearsall is on track to becoming the first in her family to attend college, in spite of having a mother more interested in keeping a man than raising a daughter. But a taboo love affair threatens to pull her back down into the poverty and desperation that has been passed on to her like a birthright.

Eleanor Quarles arrives in Washington, DC, with ambition and secrets. When she meets the handsome William Pride at Howard University, they fall madly in love. But William hails from one of DC’s elite wealthy Black families, and his par­ents don’t let just anyone into their fold. Eleanor hopes that a baby will make her finally feel at home in William’s family and grant her the life she’s been searching for. But having a baby—and fitting in—is easier said than done.

With their stories colliding in the most unexpected of ways, Ruby and Eleanor will both make decisions that shape the trajectory of their lives.

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My review:
I love historical fiction, especially about women. This book spoke to me as an educator who loves learning and as an adult adoptee. Ruby is in a position of having “no choice” and Eleanor feels the same about her life. The idea of choices that we make and how they affect a life long trajectory is fascinating to me. Ruby and Eleanor each had choices to make, some forced, some not. They both could have lived very different lives based on the times.

While I longed for Eleanor to stand up to William and Rose, it was easy to see how her love and her desires overshadowed her voice. She grew and learned, and that is what we like to see in literature. Ruby broke my heart…a victim of so many circumstances but with a life of promise.

The ending made me gasp even though I had an inkling a page or so before. It was the perfect way for Johnson to masterfully tie together the characters, the message, and the idea of hope.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for providing me with an advance digital copy in exchange for me honest review.

The House of Eve is a gorgeous, captivating novel about the prices and sacrifices women pay for love.

Sadeqa Johnson has a powerful craft building characters and executing historical events of taboo love affairs, pregnancies, and fitting in high societal circles from the 1950s.

What I loved most is the two alternating storylines that collide with a force that punch you in the gut but warm your heart. One of young girl wanting to be the first in her family to go to college fighting for a chance to live a life out of poverty. The second story of a young woman falling in love, not being accepted in the society circle, and not being able to carry a baby.

Thank you to @Netgalley and @simonandschuster for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

What an amazing story. Sadeqa Johnson does it again. The story of two women both from meager backgrounds, but want more for themselves. Ruby a young black girl whose mother hates her because she was a Inez could not fix. Ruby is a very talented painter who is accepted into a gifted school program where she can receive a scholarship to college. Ruby wants to become a doctor so she can help people like her beloved grandmother who has various health issues. Ruby lives on and off with her Aunt Marie and falls under the spell of a young white boy named Shimmy. Shimmy makes Ruby feel loved a love she has never known. They hide this forbidden love until the day Ruby finds herself pregnant. What is she to do about her dream of college, being the first to graduate and get her out of this life of poverty. Or will she turn into her mother and reject her child and call her a mistake.
Then we have Eleanor also from humbling beginning in Ohio. Hard working parents who did everything they could to send Eleanor to college and make them proud. Only as hard as Eleanor worked at her grades, and the various jobs she held, Eleanor never fit in. The life of the rich college girl who never had to worry about money or have to hold a job. Until William enters the picture. A handsome wealthy young man studying to be a doctor sweeps Eleanor off her feet into a life Eleanor could only imagine. How do these two women's lives intertwine and change their lives forever. Will they both get out of life what they asked for and at what price?
Sadeqa Johnson delivers another heart wrenching story that brings along forbidden love, heartache and accomplishment. She writes with such conviction when it came to her characters. I felt for both of these women and wanted them both to come out on top. I've read other works by Ms. Johnson and I am so happy that I was approved to read this one. I would highly recommend this to anyone who has read Ms. Johnson before. She gets into the hearts and souls of these two women. You feel their pain and hope they survive.
Thank you Ms. Johnson for another wonderful story and NetGalley for the approval. I look forward to more from this writer. She's on my favorite list of writers.

This is my second Johnson book, having read The Yellow Wife because the story was so intriguing and I lived in the area for a few years so wanted to know about some of the history that may not have been front and centre. I can happily say that I am going to keep following this author and will likely read some of her earlier works as well, once I find a free minute to go back to them. I do enjoy a good historical fiction, but I have tended towards the Holocaust and Civil War. So, this one moved me out of that space and into a different time, albeit with similar race-related challenges. I could tell very early on how the two stories would connect, but it didn't diminish the plot. And I truly liked the main characters and felt that they had such great personalities. The plot moves a bit slowly at first, but there is a lot of characterization in those first parts; and once Ruby went to the home for unwed mothers, I was well into things and ready for the next pieces. I did have to check myself a few times, similar to when I was reading Lessons in Chemistry, because the treatment of women was still so demeaning at that time. Eleanor is constantly subjugated to her husband, even though she is living in the lap of luxury. Ruby is living in a much harsher world but in some ways, she has more of a voice with the men. I was rooting for both women in the end. I really wanted them both to have a happy ending.

So, to sum up, a really solid follow up to The Yellow Wife, even though it's taking on a completely different piece of history.

This book was exceptional! You can feel everything happening and want happiness for all the characters. I love the characters and their development. I especially appreciated the full circle we were able to witness.

This is the first book I read by Sadeqa Johnson, and it won't be the last!

I was immediately transported to Philadelphia and Washington, DC in the 1950s and immersed in the lives of Ruby and Eleanor as they both thrive to succeed through the racial and class barriers they face. Sadeqa Johnson researched the era well and brought the plot to life with her well developed characters.

This book was SO GOOD, that I read it over two days. I love how Sadeqa likes to write about historical fiction. ***SPOILERS AHEAD***
This story is two from two different view points: Ruby, who is young and poor and finds herself pregnant by her landlord's Jewish son. As this is the 1950's, there is no chance for them to be in a relationship. let alone having a child together. She is sent to a home for unwed mothers where she has to give her baby up.
Eleanor ends up married to her college sweetheart William, and has trouble bringing a baby full term. As far as his mother is concerned, she is from the wrong side of the tracks, and not someone she wanted to see her son married to. The stories of Ruby and Eleanor end up intertwining in an interesting way. The story line kept me turning the pages late last night! I definitely recommend this book to anyone who is a fan of Sadeqa Johnson, or even if it's your first time reading her work. You will not be disappointed!
#ARC #NETGALLEY

Ruby is an ambitious young lady who hails from a impoverished but proud North Philly Black family. Eleanor's roots are steeped in Black working class values and traditions. Both are passionate about pursuing their education, yet love and unplanned pregnancies detour Ruby and Eleanor from their ultimate goals. Their path will cross in the most unlikely of ways. Will Ruby and Eleanor be able to maintain their dreams and their loves or will hard choices of unplanned pregnancies impact both their fates? Check out The House of Eve if your curiosity is piqued.

The House of Eve is simply superb. Very rarely as a librarian do I come across a book showcasing the beauty of Black life in its entirety, specifically set in the mid-Atlantic north, showcasing my community in all of its diversity, from the Black elite, to the Black working class, to the Black poor, so exquisitely in one book. Johnson is a sharp raconteur who takes the reader through a gamut of emotions, sometimes I just wanted to savor each chapter because the prose was so elegant yet economical that a reader could visualize each scene perfectly in their mind's eye, but when the book reaches its denouement, I was reading compulsively and totally vested in the fates of these two fully fleshed out characters of Eleanor and Ruby. If you love excellent writing paired with effective storytelling I implore you to pick up Sadeqa Johnson's The House of Eve, it is historically rich, heartwarming but heartwrenching, haunting yet hopeful simultaneously, I don't think readers will be disappointed.

I love a good historical read. And this novel does not disappoint, we see the world through our main characters eyes and are transported back in time, I don’t want to give spoilers, so I’ll just say read this lush gorgeous novel. Right now.

I enjoyed reading this book about the lives of two Black women in the 1950s. The story is fairly predictable, but the characters are well-developed and it isn't hard to identify with the dilemmas they both face. The locale, social situations, and time period are obviously well researched and the reader will come away with some idea of the kind of issues and circumstances of those times. Often with a book like this, you finish reading it and immediately wish for a sequel.
I recommend this book for book groups that are exploring race and history.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. She is a writer to follow!

I devoured Yellow Wife by Sadeqa Johnson and was thrilled to be chosen to read an ARC of this upcoming release.

In House of Eve, set in the early 1950s, we meet teenager Ruby, living in North Philadelphia, working and studying to earn a college scholarship, and college aged Eleanor, living in Washington DC and studying at Howard University. How their lives intersect is the main plot of this book.

This story presents a very realistic representation of being black in the 1950s, and the societal expectations of young black women from very different walks of life. Ruby comes from a troubled familial background, with her family part of the working poor. Eleanor is lower middle class, but becomes wrapped up in a relationship with a young man from extremely wealthy black family in DC.

Both characters have very distinct voices, with each narrator alternating chapters back and forth through out the book. I found it very easy to distinguish one from the other, and enjoyed the character development of both women as they grew and changed over the plot of the novel.

I found the book very well plotted as well, and how these two women intersect was certainly not a surprise, but I think reading the book and experiencing it for oneself is highly recommended.

Thank you to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for the electronic ARC for review.

Sadeqa Johnson, the author of Yellow Wife, writes another brilliant character-driven novel about Black women coming of age in the ‘50s. The House of Eve is drawn from Johnson’s personal experiences and the history of infertility among wealthy Black families in the ’40 and ‘50s.

Johnson writes about two strong, ambitious women whose parallel lives cross paths. Ruby, a pregnant teen, decides to give up her boyfriend, baby, and life to stay at a home for unwed mothers in exchange for a better life. Eleanor, a young married woman with secrets, desperately wants a child and reaches a breaking point to please her husband and mother-in-law. One gives up a baby to bring herself out of poverty, and the other gains her child to fulfill the dream of becoming a mother.

Because I enjoyed Yellow Wife so much, I was eager to read House of Eve. It is a fascinating book that touches on racial inequality, class differences, and religious hypocrisy in the 1950s time period. Johnson proves herself to be an exceptional researcher and historical writer a second time.

I look forward to reading her upcoming books and thank Net Galley and Simon & Schuster for allowing me to read and review it. #NetGalley #TheHouseofEve #historicalfiction

I thought Yellow Wife was fantastic, so I was eager to read Sadeqa Johnson's next novel, The House of Eve. From the beginning, I knew this would be an exceptional read.

I'm not sure where to begin! The relationships between the two couple ( Ruby and Shimmy and Eleanor and William) are poignantly and beatifully created, and their heartbreaks are raw, real, and authentic. The indignities and cruelties at the unwed mother's house are painfully depicted, but the connection between the girls is a highlight.

Johnson brilliantly brings to life not just the shameful customs of the time, but also the intriguing world of Howard University at that time (the careful monitoring of the dorm residents and the painstaking care of the archives), as well as the world of William's upper class family (and how Eleanor clashes with it).

It's not necessary to read Yellow Wife before this, but readers of that book will note the connection toward the end. (I literally gasped out loud!)

This will likely be one of my top picks for 2023 publications. Sadeqa Johnson is now one of the authors I will always read, no matter what she writes!

Many thanks to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for a digital review copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a beautiful, heartfelt, and heartbreaking story set in the late 40’s. It gives a glimpse both at the awful houses for unwed mothers were being run, shows yet another dark side to adoption facilitation, and how racism and discrimination even between light and dark skinned black people, let alone white and black individuals, was so entrenched and commonplace.

The book follows one poor, black teenage girl in an impossible relationship with a white Jewish boy, and a black college student finding herself in love and married to a rich, light-skinned black doctor whose family was trying to make a place for themselves in between two worlds, in 1948. The difficulties both of them faced in their own circumstances and the parallels in both their lives even though their environments were so different. Not just the houses for unwed mother, but the market for adoption, greed for those facilitating it, and awful practices I’ve read here and elsewhere is unbelievable.

I admire so much the tenacity to overcome and find a better situation for themselves and their children was for both women despite such an enormously uphill battle, and I loved the grace and humility that Eleanor and her family eventually found with each other.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced copy of this book. All opinions are mine.

Ebook received for free through NetGalley

A poignant historical fiction book that gets you hooked and is so tough to put down. A look into history that needs to be told. So glad I came across it and had the opportunity to read it.

Amazing. Simply amazing. A passionate, delicate tale. Heartbreaking, heart wrenching, and enlightening. Sadeqa is a passionate and dedicated researcher and her care of sensitive topics always shows in her eloquence. I highly recommend. This would be a great novel to read in an English or Social Studies classroom

This is such a powerful story of two young women, Eleanor and Ruby, as they pursue their dreams and find their way at a time (1950's and '60's) when society gave little value to the education and careers of women, especially black women. The book is beautifully written, and well researched, with characters that are just so memorable and unforgettable. It is narrated in alternate chapters by Eleanor and Ruby, each telling their own story, and the courage and determination of each, to overcome obstacles that neither should ever have had to face. Sadeqa Johnson brings the two stories together brilliantly for a wonderful, emotional ending! I just loved this book for so many reasons! Thank you to the author, the publisher and Netgalley for my advanced copy. The opinions of my review are my own.