Prospects of a Woman
A Novel
by Wendy Voorsanger
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
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Pub Date Oct 18 2020 | Archive Date Feb 01 2021
PR by the Book | She Writes Press
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Description
“New Book Releases We Loved And Why You Should Read Them”
“New Historical Fiction You Won't Be Able To Put Down This Fall”
The story of one woman's quest to carve out a life for herself in the liberal and bewildering society that emerged during the California gold rush frenzy.
Elisabeth Parker comes to California from Massachusetts in 1849 with her new husband, Nate, to reunite with her father, who’s struck gold on the American River. But she soon realizes her husband is not the man she thought—and neither is her father, who abandons them shortly after they arrive. As Nate struggles with his sexuality, Elisabeth is forced to confront her preconceived notions of family, love, and opportunity. She finds comfort in corresponding with her childhood friend back home, writer Louisa May Alcott, and spending time in the company of a mysterious California. Armed with Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Self-Reliance, she sets out to determine her role in building the West, even as she comes to terms with the sacrifices she must make to achieve independence and happiness. A gripping and illuminating window into life in the Old West, Prospects of a Woman is the story of one woman’s passionate quest to carve out a place for herself in the liberal and bewildering society that emerged during the California gold rush frenzy.
Advance Praise
"Prospects of a Woman is a fascinating, complex, dark, and beautiful novel of women and sexuality on the frontier of the California gold strike days."
— Douglas Glover, two-time Governor General's award-winning author of Elle
"I loved this surprisingly feminist story of Gold Rush-era California! Elisabeth Parker is a heroine to fall in love with--plucky, sensuous, courageous and clear-eyed. It is a rare and unusual pleasure to—finally—have a narrative of the Gold Rush told from a woman’s point of view."
—Janis Cooke Newman, author of Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln
"Prospects of a Woman is thoughtful and thrilling. The landscape of California - the rough-scrabble mining towns, the wildness of the river and woods -- sings on every page."
—Alex Myers, author of the novels Revolutionary and Divide
"Prospects of a Woman is a riveting read about a woman who comes to California during the Gold Rush determined to escape societal constraints, find love and strike it rich. As a woman in a man’s world, she faces innumerable challenges but manages to rise above them. This is a bold, rollicking and satisfying tale, one that is hard to put down."
—Frances Dinkelspiel, award-winning journalist and author of the best-selling books, Tangled Vines and Towers of Gold
Marketing Plan
Massive print and online review campaign - Early reader review campaign - Virtual Book Tour - Social media targeted promotion - California museum and library outreach
Massive print and online review campaign - Early reader review campaign - Virtual Book Tour - Social media targeted promotion - California museum and library outreach
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781631527814 |
| PRICE | $16.95 (USD) |
| PAGES | 256 |
Featured Reviews
Cristina S, Reviewer
I requested this book to NetGalley, thinking it was a romance. In fact, I consider it a non-romance.
Elisabeth Parker is a young woman who escapes poverty and parental abandonment, getting married and traveling to California, in the middle of the gold rush.
What she finds is more unloving and more poverty, but also an entrepreneurial spirit that had the perfect California environment in 1849, which gave women rights that were forbidden to them in the rest of the world, such as the right to independent property of her husband or divorce.
An absolutely fascinating fact that I was unaware of. Its aim was to attract women to new territory for Americans who were stripping Indians and Californians of their lands.
Wendy Voorsanger is absolutely masterful in the development of the characters, in the way she involves us in the wild environment of California then and who lived in it. It is impossible not to feel involved in that crazy search for gold and the desperate ways of survival that many had to resort to.
It is, to this day, the best book on the gold rush period I read. But it is also a book about desire, the will to win as life's adversities and the capacity for personal reinvention in the face of disaster.
Great book.
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General Fiction (Adult), Historical Fiction, Women's Fiction
