The house of Lincoln : a novel

Title:

Author:

Summary:

Rich with historical detail, The House of Lincoln is an insightful account of Lincoln's transformative vision for democracy as observed through the eyes of a young immigrant who arrives in Lincoln's home of Springfield, Illinois from Madeira, Portugal. Showing intelligence beyond society's expectations, fourteen-year-old Ana Ferreira is offered a job in the Lincoln household assisting Mary Lincoln with their boys and with the hosting duties borne by the wife of a rising political star. Ana bears witness to the evolution of Lincoln's views on equality and the Union and observes in full complexity the psyche and pain of his bold, polarizing wife, Mary. Yet, alongside her dearest friend in the Black community, Ana confronts the racial prejudice her friend encounters daily as she watches the inner workings of the Underground Railroad, and directly experiences how slavery contradicts the promise of freedom in her adopted country. Culminating in an account of the little-known Springfield race riot of 1908, The House of Lincoln takes readers on a journey through the historic changes that reshaped America and continue to reverberate today. -- amazon.

Physical Description:

343 pages ; 24 cm

Genre:

Historical fiction.

Personal Subject:

Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865-Fiction.

Subject Term:

Women immigrants -- Fiction.

Slavery -- Fiction.

Household employees -- Fiction.

Antislavery movements -- Fiction

Geographic Term:

United States -- Race relations -- 19th century -- Fiction.

Springfield (Ill.) -- History -- 19th century -- Fiction.

Publisher:

Sourcebooks Landmark,

Publication Date:

2023

ISBN:

9781728260549

Publication Information:

Naperville, Illinois : Sourcebooks Landmark, [2023]

Call Number:

HORAN

Holds: Copies:

Available:*

Item Barcode	Collection	Call Number	Status	Item Holds
33607003664540	New Adult Fiction	HORAN Nancy	Searching... Unknown	Searching... Unavailable

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

An unprecedented view of Lincoln's Springfield from the acclaimed and bestselling author of Loving Frank.

Nancy Horan, author of the million-copy New York Times bestseller Loving Frank, returns with a sweeping historical novel, which tells the story of Abraham Lincoln's ascendance from rumpled lawyer to U.S. president to the Great Emancipator through the eyes of a young asylum-seeker who arrives in Lincoln's home of Springfield from Madeira, Portugal.

Showing intelligence beyond society's expectations, fourteen-year-old Ana Ferreira lands a job in the Lincoln household assisting Mary Lincoln with their boys and with the hostess duties borne by the wife of a rising political star. Ana bears witness to the evolution of Lincoln's views on equality and the Union and observes in full complexity the psyche and pain of his bold, polarizing wife, Mary.

Along with her African American friend Cal, Ana encounters the presence of the underground railroad in town and experiences personally how slavery is tearing apart her adopted country. Culminating in an eyewitness account of the little-known Springfield race riot of 1908, The House of Lincoln takes readers on a journey through the historic changes that reshaped America and that continue to reverberate today.

Author Notes

Nancy Horan is the author of novels such as Loving Frank and Under the Wide and Starry Sky. Her first title, Loving Frank, is about Mamah Borthwick and her relationship with Frank Lloyd Wright which earned her the 2009 Jame Fenimore Cooper Prize for Best Histrical Fiction by the Society of American Historians. Before becoming a recognized author Nancy Horan was a middle school English teacher and a freelance journalist.

(Bowker Author Biography)

Reviews (1)

Publisher's Weekly Review

This pallid historical from Horan (Under the Wide and Starry Sky) surveys Abraham Lincoln's life from the perspective of Portuguese immigrant Ana Ferreira, who spent years serving in the Lincoln family's home in Springfield, Ill. In 1854, Mary Lincoln hires 12-year-old Ana to assist with housework and child care. Horan rushes through the years as Ana grows up around the Lincoln family, watching Abe run unsuccessfully for the Senate before eventually being elected president. Along the way, Ana falls for a reporter assigned to cover the politician. Much of the narrative covers familiar ground including Lincoln's assassination and its aftermath, though Horan offers something original in a later section chronicling a historical 1908 riot in Springfield, which targeted the city's Black citizens. Still, the lackluster retreading of familiar terrain and clunky writing are tough to get past (on Mary Todd's half sister: "like the South itself, Emelie had made her own bed, and now she had to lie in it"). This one's for Lincoln obsessives only. Agent: Lisa Bankofff, Bankoff Collective. (June)