Vera Caspary - Bedelia: the wickedest woman who ever lived

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Title: Bedelia

Author: Vera Caspary

Storyline: Charlie Carrington has married a babe, Bedelia.  They live the perfect life together, but careful what you wish for!  This is not your manic pixie dream girl there to get you out of your rut, Charlie.  Bedelia may be plotting to bury you under that rut--six feet under!  By day Bedelia is an earthy “Susie Homemaker” who transforms into a wild animal by night.  And why does the artist guy living down the street seem to know her?  You’ve got problems Charlie!  A Lusty suspense novel by Vera Caspary, author of the best selling “Laura.”  Was made into a popular WWII-era Hollywood film.  This is the Blackiston edition with dust jacket.  Blackiston brought hardcover books to the mass market using the same type setting plates used in the more expensive editions.  (Thanks to Wiki and IMDB)

Copyright: 1945; this Triangle Books edition dated Feb. 1947

Publisher:  The Blackiston Company

Format:  Cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count:  188


Author Biography:

Caspary, Vera (b.1899–1987) Vera Caspary’s own life as an independent working woman author, in an age when there were few, is worthy of novelization all on its own.  She lived from 1899 to 1987.  Born late in their lives to Jewish parents in Chicago, she was doted on.  She is most well known for having written the book and very successful Hollywood film noir “Laura,” which caused many girls of the time to receive that name.  Her education went no further than a typing course, but her life was the stuff of every office girls’ dreams.  She traveled and lived around the world, had best-selling novels, wrote and produced plays, was sought after as a writer by nearly every major Hollywood studio, got rich, went broke, and got rich again.  A very shrewd business person, Vera was able to write and sell manuals, periodicals, and correspondence courses for which she had no expertise, such as ballroom dancing.  She even manage to re-sell the same plot reworked as books and movie scripts four separate times.  She met the love of her life, worked with him as an equal partner, lived openly in sin with him, and married him when he became terminally ill.  She also had major intrigue in her personal life flirting with the communist party, then dumping them, and forcing two governments to bring her to England during a world war so she could be with her lover.  Vera’s experiences definitely provided the fodder the engaging thrillers she wrote.

Works include: A Manual of Classic Dancing (1922), Ladies and Gents (1929), The White Girl (1929), Music in the Street (1930), Thicker than Water (1932), Laura (1943), Bedelia (1945). Stranger Than Truth (1946), The Murder in the Stork Club (1946), The Weeping And The Laughter (1950), Thelma (1952), False Face (1954), The Husband (1957), Evvie (1960), Bachelor in Paradise (1961), A Chosen Sparrow (1964), The Man Who Loved His Wife (1966), The Rosecrest Cell (1967), Final Portrait (1971), Ruth (1972), Dreamers (1975), Elizabeth X (1978), The Secrets of Grown-Ups (1979), The Murder in the Stork Club and Other Mysteries (2009)

Castle Ugly: A Love Story by Mary Ellin Barrett

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Title: Castle Ugly

Author: Mary Ellin Barrett

Storyline: By all accounts this melodrama, Castle Ugly, is a good read.  Writers are advised to write what they know, and it seems, Mary Ellin Barrett did.  This is a tale of high strung mid-century artistic people vacationing on the tip of Long Island with their coterie of jaded and successful friends.  Mary Ellin tells it from the standpoint of a now adult family member, living in Europe,  and looking back on her childhood view of the events.  The novel probably doesn’t fall far from the author’s real experience as the daughter of a world-famous American composer, Irving Berlin.  The characters are all smart, bored, given to winding each other up, and getting involved with the wrong person.  But with all their smarts, they never seem to learn from their experience, even after karma catches up with them in the form of an epic hurricane!  The book jacket says this story is somewhere between the world of F. Scott Fitzgerald and la dolce vita depicted in that era’s art house cinema.  Want to know what it was like to be too smart, too talented, and too successful with too much time on your hands?  Read on!

Copyright: 1966; Book Club Edition

Publisher:  E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc.

Format:  Cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count:  218


Author Biography:

Barrett, Mary Ellin (b.1926–) is the eldest daughter of famed American composer Irving Berlin (who can forget “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas”?), and Ellin Mackay.  Despite her mom and dad having an unusual for the time May-December marriage blending their Jewish and Irish backgrounds, she had a typical well-to-do upbringing New York City where she attended The Brearly prepschool on the upper east side, and then went on to Barnard College.  Her mother, Ellin, was a novelist, short story writer, and contributor to the New Yorker Magazine.  Following in her mother’s footsteps by becoming a writer, Mary Ellin published three novels, a memoir of life with her father, and was the book critic for Helen Gurley Brown’s racy Cosmopolitan women’s magazine. (Thank you to Wiki, The New York Times, and IMDb)

Works Include: Castle Ugly (1966), An Accident of Love (1973), American Beauty (1981), and  Irving Berlin: a Daughter's Memoir (1995).

Private Duty by Faith Baldwin. Nurse's love x 3!

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Title:  Private Duty

Author:  Faith Baldwin

Storyline:  The heroine of our story, newly-minted registered nurse Carolyn Cutler, has a big problem on her hands---she wants to marry three guys!  Forget conflict of interest, Carolyn is telling herself she should tie the knot with her invalid house-bound boss, for whom she is a private duty nurse, because she feels sorry for him and loves his tender-aged son.  She also loves a surgeon at the hospital where she trained.  But does she love the doctor or just the idea of being married to one? But wait, there’s more!  Carolyn is also infatuated with a young ne’er-do-well whose claim to fame is racking up beach of promise suits because he proposes to everything in a skirt.  Apparently, the answer to these dilemmas comes to her in the midst of that frequent and much feared 1930s scourge: a labor riot!  Can’t make this stuff up, but author Faith Baldwin certainly could. Enjoy!

Copyright: 1935; this edition published March, 1941

Publisher:  Triangle Books

Format:  Cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count:  338

Author Biography:

Baldwin, Faith (b.1893–d.1978)  Faith Baldwin was a prolific writer of women’s fiction, having penned 85 books and stories.  When she died of a heart attack in 1978, she was still working, and was deemed the “doyenne of American light fiction writers” in her New York Times obituary. Some of her works were adapted into film screenplays during the golden age of Hollywood.  She also achieved fame for her advice column in the now defunct women’s magazine, Women’s Day, entitled “The Open Door,” named for an inviting door out to her garden.  Unfortunately, Faith was also slightly infamous for being party to a marketing scam of sorts.  She, and a number of other popular writers in the mid-1960s, were in the headlines for selling correspondence courses to aspiring writers. The advertising for the courses misled her customers to believe that their work would be personally reviewed by these famous writers.  An astute marketer nonetheless, having made millions on her books, rehabilitating her reputation and showing that she did care about the lowly reader may have figured into her decision to keep an extended correspondence with a young lonely girl, Kristen Houghton, who grew up to be an author of chick lit herself.  Faith, as it turns out, has achieved internet immortality on quotation websites for her pearls of wisdom such as: “Time is a dressmaker specializing in alterations” or “Character builds slowly, but it can be torn down with incredible swiftness.” (Thank you to Wiki, Kristen’s Blog in the Huffington Post about Faith, and quotation websites everywhere!)

Works Include: Mavis of Green Hill (1921), Those Difficult Years (1925). Laurel of Stonystream (1923), Magic and Mary Rose (1924), Sign Posts (1924) Poems, Thresholds (1925), Three Women (1926), Departing Wings (1927), Alimony (1928), Betty (1928), Rosalie’s Career (1928), Broadway Interlude(1929) (with Achmed Abdullah), Garden Oats (1929), Incredible Year (1929), Broadway Sensation(1930) (with Achmed Abdullah), Judy: A Story of Divine Corners (1930), Make-Believe (1930), The Office Wife (1929), Babs, A Story of Devine Corners (1931), Mary Lou, A Story of Divine Corners (1931), Skyscraper (1931), Today’s Virtue (1931), District Nurse (1932), Girl On the Make (1932)(with Achmed Abdullah), Myra, A story of Divine Corners (1932), Self-Made Woman (1932), Weekend Marriage (1932), Beauty (1933), Love’s a Puzzle (1933), White Collar Girl (1933), American Family (1934), Honor Bound (1934), Innocent Bystander(1934), Within A Year (1934), Wife vs. Secretary (1935), The Puritan Strain (1935), Men Are Such Fools! (1936), The Moon's Our Home (1936), Private Duty (1936), Heart Has Wings (1937), Manhattan Nights (1937), That Man Is Mine (1937), Twenty-Four Hours a Day (1937), Enchanted Oasis(1938), Hotel Hostess (1938), Rich Girl, Poor Girl (1938), Comet Over Broadway (1938), Career By Proxy (1939), High Road (1939), Station Wagon Set (1939), White Magic (1939), Arizona Star (1940), Letty and the Law (1940), Medical Center (1940), Rehearsal for Love (1940), Something Special (1940), And New Stars Burn (1941), Heart Remembers (1941), Temporary Address: Reno (1941), Blue Horizons (1942), Breath of Life (1942), Rest of My Life With You(1942), Washington USA (1943), You Can't Escape (1943), Change of Heart (1944), He Married a Doctor (1944), A Job for Jenny (1945), No Private Heaven (1946), Woman on Her Way (1946), Give Love the Air (1947), Sleeping Beauty (1947), An Apartment for Peggy (1948), Marry for Money (1948), Golden Shoestring(1949), For Richer, For Poorer (1949), Look Out for Liza (1950), Tell Me My Heart (1950), The Whole Armour( 1951), Juniper Tree (1952), Widow’s Walk, Variations on a Theme (1954) Poems, Face Towards the Spring (1956), Many Windows: Seasons of the Heart (1958), Three Faces of Love(1958), Blaze of sunlight (1960), Testament of Trust (1960), Harvest of Hope (1962), The West Wind (1963), Living By Faith (1964), Lonely Man (1964), The Lonely Doctor (1964), Search For Tomorrow (1966) Novelization of TV Soap Opera, Evening Star (1966), There Is a Season (1966), Velvet Hammer (1969), Take What You Want (1971), Any Village (1972), One More Time (1972), No Bed of Roses (1973), New Girl in Town (1975), Time and the Hour (1975), Hold on to Your Heart (1976), Thursday's Child (1976), Adam's Eden (1977).

Joan of Arc by Sarah Larkin 1951 First Edition Narrative Poem

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Title: Joan of Arc

Author: Sarah Larkin

Storyline: The thoughts, the visions and experiences of the Maid of Domremy as Joan, lying on her prison cot, recalls the salient events of her life. It is the story, too, of spiritual development and one is conscious of the self-discipline and courage required to walk the long path from the life of a simple village maid to that of a martyr.

Copyright: 1951

Published: 1951 (First Edition)

Publisher: Philosophical Library, New York

Format: Gray cloth-bound hardcover, with original dust-jacket

Page Count: 50

Making Over Martha by Julie M. Lippmann 1913 Women's Novel

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Title: Making Over Martha

Author: Julie Mathilde Lippmann

Storyline: The continuing adventures of Martha Slawson, a strong, kindly and humorous Irish serving woman in New York

Copyright: 1913

Publication: 1913

Publisher: Henry Holt and Company, New York

Format: Green cloth-bound hardcover with applied plate to front cover

Page Count: 292

Author Biography:

Lippmann, Julie Mathilde (b.1864-d.1952) A popular American novelist, playwright and political activist, Lippman rubbed elbows with the literati of the day. Her most well known book is Martha-By-The-Day (1914) which she successfully made into a stage play in 1919. Lippman's  friends included Louisa May Alcott  and Mark Twain. Lippmann was a dedicated supporter of Theodore Roosevelt, worked for womens' suffrage, and wrote American propaganda during the First World War. Lippman lived and worked in New York City until she moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, where she resided until her death.

Works include:  Sweet P's (1905); Making Over Martha (1913); Martha-By-The-Day (1914); Martha and Cupid (1914); Flexible Ferdinand (1919)

The Feast of Lanterns by Louise Jordan Miln 1920 Women's Novel

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Title: The Feast of Lanterns

Author: Louise Jordan Miln

Storyline: Author of many novels set in early 20th Century China, Mrs. Miln continues to write about Asian life and Asian characters as they relate to each other, rather than using the orient as an exotic setting for a story about westerners.

Copyright: 1920

Publisher: A. L. Burt Company, New York

Format: Cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count: 304

Contrary Mary by Temple Bailey 1914 Women's Novel

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Title: Contrary Mary

Author: Temple Bailey

Illustrator: Charles S. Corson

Storyline: Independent, youthful, and vivacious Mary Ballard has just inherited her parent's huge Victorian house on the hill. Mary throws caution to the wind and rents her father's book-filled living quarters to the genteel but mysterious Roger Poole. When her sister moves out after her nuptials, Mr. Poole and Miss Balllard will be alone under one roof! How could Mary behave so scandalously? What has caused Mr. Poole's reduced circumstances? Will they wind-up living happily ever after? Order Contrary Mary and find out!

Copyright: 1914

Publication: 1915

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Format: Green cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count: 388

Author Biography:

Bailey, Irene Temple (b.1885–d.1953) A prolific American novelist, short story, and screen writer. Bailey was a best selling author who contributed to American magazines like The Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, McClure's, Woman's Home Companion, Good Housekeeping, and McCall's.

Works include: Glory of Youth (1913); Contrary Mary (1914); Adventures in Girlhood (1917); Mistress Anne (1917); The Tin Soldier (1918) - No. 8 for the year 1919 in the U.S.; Trumpeter Swan (1920); The Gay Cockade (1921); The Dim Lantern (1922) - No.5 for the year 1923 in the U.S.; Judy (1923); Peacock Feathers (1924) - made into a motion picture; Holly Hedge, and other Christmas stories (1925); The Blue Window (1926) - No. 10 for the year 1926 in the U.S.; Wallflowers (1927) - made into a motion picture; Silver Slippers (1928); Star in the Well; a Christmas story (1928); Burning Beauty (1929); Wild Wind (1930); So this Is Christmas (1931); Little Girl Lost (1932); Enchanted Ground (1933); Radiant tree, and other stories (1934); Fair as the Moon (1935); I've Been To London (1937); Tomorrow's Promise (1938); The Blue Cloak (1941); Pink Camellia (1942); Red Fruit (1945)

The Hidden Heart by Dorothy Black 1940's Girl's Novel of Young Love

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Title: The Hidden Heart 

Author: Dorothy Black

Storyline: Will our young heroine Prudence Carlyon marry for romance or financial security? Will she follow her heart and snag gallant Ronald Mallow just home from the service and live in his enchanting English country cottage Wild Strawberry Farm, or will she marry her betrothed Sir Hector Massingberd and live in his palatial estate? Who will our dear young Prue choose in this age old dilemma of marrying for love or money?

Copyrights: 1946, 1947

Publication: 1948

Publisher: Triangle Books, New York

Format: Photo-printed hardcover

Page Count: 249

Family Pride by Mary J. Holmes c.1904 Women's Civil War Novel

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Title: Family Pride

Author: Mary J. Holmes

Storyline: The widowed Mrs. Lucy Lennox returns to her Revolutionary war era home in the bay state town of rural Silverton where she was raised by her steady clergyman uncle, Deacon Ephram Barlow, her diligent aunt Hannah, and maiden-lady cousin, Miss Betsy. Lucy brings with her two daughters, Katy and Helen. Bright young thing Katy has caught the eye of her staid cousin Dr. Morris Grant. Grant wrote to Katy while at medical school in Paris, and upon his return to Silverton, paid for Katy's finishing school at Canandaigua Seminary. But wait, home from the seminary, Katy is now off on a grand tour of Boston and Montreal with Mrs. Woodhull and party! Will Morris be able to make his move and capture the heart of cousin Katy before she is lost to eastern society? Order your vintage copy of bestselling author Mary Jane Holmes' Family Pride and see if it all ends happily.

Copyright: unstated, c.1904

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Format: Red cloth-bound hardcover with applied photo plate to front cover

Page Count: 320

Author Biography:

Holmes, Mary J. (b.1825-d.1907) Born Hawes in Massachusetts, to a large middle-class family that encouraged learning among their children, both boys and girls. At the early age of 13, she taught school and began to write. She married Daniel Holmes, a Yale graduate, and resided in Kentucky Bluegrass region before the Civil War, until she finally settled in Brockport, NY, where her husband went to study law. She used her experiences down south as the subject of a number of her novels. Although her work was not given serious critical attention from the literary establishment in her time (an old boys club), she sold millions of copies, and was second only to Harriet Beecher Stowe as a best-selling female author. Her books have recently been re-evaluated for their direct treatment of race, class, gender and slavery.

Works include: Tempest and Sunshine (1854); The English Orphans (1855); The Homestead on the Hillside, and other Tales (1855); Lena Rivers (1856); Meadow Brook (1857); Dora Deane, or the East India Uncle, and Maggie Miller, or Hagar's Secret (1858); Cousin Maude and Rosamond (1860); Marian Grey (1863); Hugh Worthington (1863); Darkness and Daylight (1864); The Cameron Pride, or Purified by Suffering, or Family Pride (1867); The Christmas Font, a story for young folks (1868); Rose Mather, a Tale of the War (1868); Ethelyn's Mistake (1869); Millbank (1871); Edna Browning (1872); West Lawn, and the Rector of St. Mark's (1874); Mildred (1877); Daisy Thornton (1878); Forest House (1879); Chateau d'Or (1880); Red Bird (1880); Madeline (1881); Queenie Hatherton (1883); Christmas Stories (1884); Bessie's Fortune (1885); Gretchen (1887)

We Must March: a Novel of the Winning of Oregon. Honore Willsie Morrow

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Title: We Must March

Author: Honore Willsie Morrow

Storyline: The historical story of Narcissa Whitman, a heroic soul who played a vital role in the early history of northwestern America. All names, places, and significant events are fact, based on Narcissa's own journal.

Copyright: 1925

Publisher: A. L. Burt Company, New York

Format: Brown cloth-bound hardcover with gilt lettering

Page Count: 425

Author Biography:

Morrow, Honore Willsie (b.1880-d.1940) Wife of famous publisher William Morrow. She is well known for her attention to historical detail and her vivid prose. Born in Ottumwa, Iowa to (lawyer) William McCue and Lilly Head McCue. Earned a degree in history from University of Wisconsin and married construction engineer Henry Willsie. Lived in Arizona and wrote western stories for Collier's magazine and Harper's Weekly. Her first novel was "Heart of the Desert" in 1913. She divorced Willsie in 1922 and married William Morrow the next year. They had a son, Richard, and two daughters, Felicia and Anne. She lived part of the year in a cottage in Devon, England.

Works include: Heart of the Desert (1913); Still Jim (1915); Enchanted Canyon (1921); We Must March (1925); The Devonshers (1924); The Father of Little Women (1927); Forever Free: A Novel of Abraham Lincoln (1927); With Malice Toward None (1928); Mary Todd Lincoln (1928); Splendor of God (1929); The Last Full Measure (1930); Yonder Sails the Mayflower (1934); Demon Daughter (1939); The Forbidden Trail

The Little Locksmith by Katherine Butler Hathaway 1940's Autobiography

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Title: The Little Locksmith

Author: Katherine Butler Hathaway

Storyline: An autobiographical narrative chronicling great events, from the loneliness of a childhood illness through to the accomplishments and fulfillment of womanhood. A deep and loving analysis of intimate family relationships told with astonishing candor and simplicity - wholly and entirely original. Portions were originally published serially in the Atlantic Monthly, the book presents the entire story, published soon after the author's untimely death. Boston Globe review: "No words can convey the fascination and charm of this story...The writing itself is a sheer delight..."

Copyrights: 1942, 1943

Publication: 1943

Publisher: Coward-McMann, Inc., New York

Format: Red cloth-bound hardcover with black floral decoration, in original dustjacket

Page Count: 237

Author Biography:

Hathaway, Katharine Butler (b.1890-d.1942) Born in Baltimore, Maryland. She spent her childhood in Salem, Massachusetts where she suffered tuberculosis of the spine and had to lie flat on her back for ten years. Her education consisted of one year at Abbot Academy, Andover and another year at Miss McClintock's School, Boston. She entered Radcliffe in the fall of 1910 as a special student and attended to 1912. Although she did not graduate, she was made a member of the class of 1914. She married Daniel Rugg Hathaway in 1932, lived at Blue Hill, Maine and died in 1942. She wrote autobiographical works, children's stories, and poems.

Works include: Mr. Muffet's Cat and Her Trip to Paris (1934); The Little Locksmith (1943); The Journals and Letters of The Little Locksmith (1946)

The Ballad and the Source by Rosamond Lehmann 1945 Women's Novel

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Title: The Ballad and the Source 

Author: Rosamond Lehmann

Storyline: Set between the mid-Victorian era and the First World War, 10-year-old Rebecca is living in the country with her family when Sibyl Jardine, an enigmatic and powerful old woman, returns to her property in the neighborhood. Rebecca becomes drawn into the strange complications of the old lady's life - with her husband, her errant daughter, and her grandchildren. Through the spellbound eyes of the young Rebecca we encounter the scandalous family history of the passionate, and stormy, life of the feminist Sibyl.

Copyright: 1945

Publisher: Reynal & Hitchcock, New York

Format: Green cloth-bound hardcover with red lettering

Page Count: 312

Author Biography:

Lehmann, Rosamond Nina (b.1901-d.1990) A popular, beautiful and talented British female writer of the 1920s and '30s. She was known for capturing the post WWI outlook of her "lost Generation." She was very skillful at depicting the bind women of the time experienced as war and technology modernized social conventions permanently. She brought home the now eternal feminist problem of having it all: surrendering to a man versus being independent.

Works include: Dusty Answer (1927); A Note in Music (1930); Invitation to the Waltz (1932); The Weather in the Streets (1936); No More Music (1939); The Ballad and the Source (1944); The Gipsy's Baby & Other Stories (1946); The Echoing Grove (1953); The Swan in the Evening: Fragments of an Inner Life (1967); A Sea-Grape Tree (1976); Moments of Truth (1986)

Four Roads to Paradise by Maud Wilder Goodwin 1904 Historical Novel

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Author: Maud Wilder Goodwin

Illustrator: Arthur I. Keller

Storyline: Considered to be Goodwin's best work, we have the story of a self-centered Episcopal priest, Stuart Walford, who travels Europe (where much of the novel is set). Complications arise when he is attracted to the bishop's niece, Anne Blythe. Anne's focus, however, is on befriending her dead husband's illegitimate child. Who will find happiness in the end?

Copyrights: 1903, 1904

Published: 1904

Publisher: The Century Company, New York

Format: Brown cloth-bound hardcover with black decoration and lettering

Page Count: 347

Author Biography:

Goodwin, Maud Wilder (b.1856-d.1935) American. Best known for writing a book about her relative, Dolly Madison, and for Four Roads to Paradise, which some have compared to the works of Edith Wharton. Her historical novels are well researched, if dull. Her contemporary novels are thought to be more vivid.

Works include: Open Sesame! Poetry and Prose for School Days (edited by Goodwin, 1889); The Colonial Cavalier (1894); The Head of a Hundred (1895); Dolly Madison (1896); White Aprons (1896); Flint (1897); Sir Christopher(1901); Four Roads to Paradise (1904); Claims and Counterclaims (1905); Veronica Playfair (1909); Dutch and English on the Hudson (1919)

On Christmas Day In The Morning by Grace S. Richmond 1908 illustrated

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Title: On Christmas Day In The Morning

Author: Grace S. Richmond

Color plate illustrations: Charles M. Relyea

Storyline: Christmas promises broken, and promises kept unexpectedly. A beautiful little book about family relationships to warm the heart at any time of the year.

Copyrights: 1905, 1908

Published: 1908

Publisher: Doubleday, Page & Company, New York

Format: Boards with integral dust-jacket. Each text page with green decorative border.

Page Count: 40

Author Biography:

Richmond, Grace S. (b.1866–d.1959)  If you are the daughter of a clergyman, what does one do at the turn of the last century? Write! Grace sure did! Grace was a prolific commercial romance author, best known as the creator of the Dr. R.P. ("Red Pepper") Burns country doctor series.

Works include: The Indifference of Juliet (1902); The Second Violin (1907); With Juliet in England (1907); On Christmas Day in the Morning (1908); Round the Corner in Gay Street (1908); A Court of Inquiry (1909); On Christmas Day In The Evening (1910); Red Pepper Burns (1910); Strawberry Acres (1911); Brotherly House (1912); Mrs. Red Pepper (1913); Under the Christmas stars (1913); The Twenty-Fourth of June: Midsummer's Day (1914); Under the Country Sky (1916); The Brown Study (1917); Red Pepper's Patients (1917); The Enlisting Wife (1918); The Whistling Mother (1918); Red and Black (1919); The Bells of St. John's (1920); Rufus (1921); Foursquare (1922); Red of the Redfields (1924); Cherry Square (1926); Light's Up (1928); At the South Gate (1928); The Listening Post (1929); High Fences (1931); Red Pepper Returns (1931); Bachelor's Bounty (1932); Midsummer's Day (1934)

The Spinners by Eden Phillpotts 1918 Gritty British Novel of Mill Life

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Title: The Spinners

Author: Eden Phillpotts

Storyline: Time frame - circa the turn of the century (1900). Set in the English county of Dorset, our story begins with the funeral of the mill owner. His younger son, Raymond, must now learn the business from the older. He meets Sabina, the beautiful 19-year-old chief spinner, promises to marry her, takes her to bed, and then abandons her. The story is told in two sections - the first about Sabina's history, the second (which opens some ten years later) about Sabina's bastard son, in whose spirit is concentrated all the despair and bitterness his mother felt before his birth. As he grows, can he be turned by the love of another woman from the mill and reconcile with his father?

Copyright: 1918

Published: 1918 (First Edition)

Publisher: The Macmillan Company, New York

Format: Red cloth-bound hardcover

Page Count: 479

A Place Called Saturday by actress author Mary Astor 1968 Novel 1st Ed

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Title: A Place Called Saturday

Author: Mary Astor

Storyline: Cora March takes her stand on abortion, a stand that is to have a profound effect on her husband, her marriage, her future, her life... For Cora and Rafe March the life they share together in a small Arizona desert community is idyllic in every aspect save one: after almost four years of marriage they are still childless. Then one hot summer day Cora is brutally raped by a young and unknown assailant; three months later she learns she is pregnant. As her marriage starts to unravel over her refusal to have an abortion, the rapist is discovered, leading to a tense and agonizing climax. Astor deals forthrightly with the moral, ethical and emotional problems of a subject surrounded by taboos and controversy.

Copyright: 1968

Published: 1968 (First Edition)

Publisher: Delacorte Press, New York

Format: Yellow cloth-bound hardcover with decorative cover, in original dust-jacket

Page Count: 212

Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch. Alice Hegan Rice 1962 Children's Story

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Title: Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch

Author: Alice Hegan Rice

Illustrators: Norma and Dan Garris

Storyline: Mrs. Wiggs, a widow, is left to raise five children in dire poverty, but faces life with optimism and hope. (This book was a bestseller for two years when originally published, and was adapted for a stage and screen several times, with one version in 1934 featuring W. C. Fields)

Copyright: 1901

Published: 1962

Publisher: Whitman Publishing Company, Wisconsin

Format: Photo-printed hardcover

Page Count: 138

Author Biography:

 

Rice, Alice Hegan (b.1870-d.1942) was an American novelist born in Shelbyville, Kentucky. Known as the author of her most famous work, Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch, Rice published over two dozen books in all. Many were produced in other languages, and are still in publication today. A best seller in 1902, the book was set in Louisville, Kentucky where she then lived, Mrs Wiggs was both a successful play in the early 1900s, and the basis of three Hollywood films. The 1934 version starred W. C. Fields. The story of Mrs. Wiggs was meant to bring attention and public sympathy to the plight of the less fortunate in the region where Rice lived. Married to Cale Young Rice (1872-1943), author, dramatist, and poet, Mrs. Rice rubbed elbows with other literary stars of the day, such as Thorton Wilder, and was well reviewed by Theodore Roosevelt.

Works include: Lovey Mary (1903); Sandy (1905); Captain June (1907); Mr. Opp (1909); A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill (1912); The Honorable Percival (1914)

At Home With The Jardines by Lilian Bell 1906 Women's Novel

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Title: At Home With The Jardines

Author: Lilian Bell

Storyline: "Cast iron angel" Irish serving woman Mary jovially runs the lives of two New York society newlyweds. For a domestic sit com analogue think of the 1960s vintage TV show housekeeper "Mabel."

Copyright: 1902

Publication: 1906

Publisher: A. Wessels Company, New York

Format: Blue cloth-bound hardcover with embossed decoration

Page Count: 322

Author Biography:

Bell, Lillian (Mrs Bogue) (b.1867-d.1929) Published her first novel at age 26. She wrote mostly from her experience and her travels as the wife of upper-crust Arthur Hoyt Bogue of Chicago. Her father, Maj. William W. Bell, fought in the Civil War, as did did her grandfather, Gen. Joseph Warren Bell  (a Southerner, who sold and freed his slaves before the war, brought his family North, and organized the 13th Illinois Cavalry). Her great - great - grandfather, Captain Thomas Bell, served Virginia in the American Revolution. Lilian Bell was born in Chicago, but she was brought up in Atlanta.

Works include: The Love Affairs of an Old Maid (1893); Hope Loring; A Little Sister to the Wilderness (1895); The Under Side of Things; From a Girl's Point of View (1897); The Expatriates (1900); Abroad with the Jimmies (1900); At Home With The Jardines (1902); As Seen By Me; Carolina Lee (1907)

The House of a Thousand Candles by Meredith Nicholson Romantic Mystery

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Title: The House of a Thousand Candles

Author: Meredith Nicholson

Illustrator: Howard Chandler Christy

Storyline: This melodramatic novel has it all - romance and adventure, love and valor, secret passages and tunnels, and hidden treasure. The hero must live an entire year in an isolated house if he is to inherit it from his grandfather. Should he fail, he'll lose the house to a young woman whom the will forbids him to marry. The answer to the dilemma is a secret to be discovered.

Copyright: 1905

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Format: Blue cloth-bound hardcover with applied plate, black lettering to spine

Page Count: 382

A Spinner In The Sun by Myrtle Reed 1906 Women's Mystery Novel

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Title: A Spinner In The Sun

Author: Myrtle Reed

Storyline: Miss Evelina Grey returns alone to her abandoned cottage and dormant garden after 25 years. What tragedy occurred to turn her hair white in one night? Who caused the fire that ruined her beauty and forced her to wear a veil? Why was she in the hospital all that time? There are many mysteries to be unraveled in the story of this enigmatic and interesting woman.

Copyright: 1906

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Format: Blue cloth-bound hardcover with applied decorative plate to front cover

Page Count: 393

Author Biography:

Reed, Myrtle (b.1874–d.1911) American, wrote best selling novels, poetry, and cookbooks (as Olive Green). Daughter of a preacher and an oriental scholar. Born and died in Chicago, Illinois, and was married to her high school pen-pal. Was also known as a philanthropist who ordered her estate divided among her favorite charities after her tragic death by an intentional overdose of sleeping powder.

Works include: Love Letters of a Musician (1899); Later Love Letters of a Musician (1900); The Spinster Book (1901); Lavender and Old Lace (1902); The Shadow of Victory (1903); Pickaback Songs (1903); The Book of Clever Beasts (1904); The Master's Violin (1904); What to Have for Breakfast (1905); At the Sign of the Jack o' Lantern (1905) - made into a silent film directed by Lloyd Ingraham in 1922; A Spinner in the Sun (1906); Love Affairs of Literary Men (1907); One Thousand Simple Soups (1907); How to Cook Fish (1908); Flowers of the Dusk (1908) - made into a silent film directed by John H. Collins in 1918; One Thousand Salads (1909); Old Rose and Silver (1909); Master of the Vineyard (1910); Sonnets to a Lover (1910); Everyday Desserts (1911); A Weaver of Dreams (1911); The White Shield, a collection of short sketches by Myrtle Reed (1912); Threads of Gray and Gold (1913); Happy Women (1913)