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The Seamstress of New Orleans

It’s 1900 and the dawn of a new century carries a sense of change, possibility, and female empowerment, as two women from very different circumstances are fated to meet in the jasmine scented humidity of New Orleans, a city of decadence and danger…Behind parlor doors, high society women of New Orleans prepare to seize the reins as the only all-female krewe, Les Mysterieuses, at this year’s Mardi Gras. For Constance Halstead—a young, wealthy widow whose husband’s suspicious death has left her indebted to a vicious Storyville gang—Les Mysterieuses feels like a rare opportunity to take control of her life and upend social convention. While for Alice Butterworth, pregnant, abandoned by her husband, broke, and newly arrived from Chicago, sewing Constance’s Krewe gown means survival. Piece by piece, the breathtaking gown takes shape, becoming a symbol of strength, their growing bond, their resilience in the face of grief, and a path towards greater independence. But a secret could unravel their progress.

Inspired by her time living in New Orleans, acclaimed Southern author Diane C. McPhail’s atmospheric historical fiction novel weaves New Orleans and Mardi Gras history with the unlikely kinship between two women riding on the cusp of societal change, the secrets they must hide, and the glittering gown that binds them together.

The Abolitionist’s Daughter

The Abolitionist’s Daughter is a vividly rendered, culturally important and unexpectedly personal debut novel. Set in Mississippi during the violent turmoil leading up to and just after the Civil War, The Abolitionist’s Daughter illuminates a corner of Southern history that’s little-known and rarely glimpsed: the experiences and struggles of those openly opposed to slavery in a time and place when the freeing of slaves was illegal, the suggestion of it potentially fatal. At the novel’s heart are three extraordinary women who refuse to compromise what they know to be right, as they negotiate the devastations of war, betrayal and a world depleted by the conflict of men: Emily, the daughter of an abolitionist; Ginny, a slave who was illegally educated alongside Emily; and Adeline, the mother of Emily’s husband.