And a very Happy Birthday to Victoria Woodhull, American suffragette, activist, and the first woman to run for President of the United States in 1872.
Not only that, but Woodhull, born on this day in 1838, was the first woman to run a newspaper, the Woodhull & Claflin’s Weekly, founded in 1870, which she ran with her sister, Tennessee Claflin. Not only that, but that same year, she became the first woman to operate a brokerage firm on Wall Street, called Woodhull, Claflin & Company (also run with her sister Tennie).
Woodhull was born in Ohio, and though she had no formal education, she certainly had a remarkable mind and impressive will. She made her first fortune as a “magnetic healer” (not precisely a legitimate form of medicine, but one that was incredibly popular in the mid-19th century). During this time, she also met Cornelius Vanderbilt, who became a lifelong friend, a constant source of financial support, and very nearly her brother-in-law (rumors had it that he had proposed to Tennie, but his family refused to allow him to marry her). It was her work as a medium that allowed Victoria to fun her brokerage form and newspaper, and the intensity of her convictions that won her national attention. Woodhull was a champion of women’s legal, voting, and sexual rights, which polarized not only the women’s suffrage movement, but society in general. She was also an advocate for equality between races, as well– when nominated for president, nominated Frederick Douglass in turn for her running-mate.
Though votes weren’t counted in the same way they are now, so we can’t know for sure how many votes Woodhull received, but we know it wasn’t many. Her campaign was seriously harmed when a self-proclaimed “moral defender of the nation” named Anthony Comstock had Woodhull, her husband, and Tennie arrested for “publishing an obscene newspaper” a week before the election. They were acquitted at trial six months later, and Woodhull ran for president again in 1884 and 1892. Following her two defeats, she moved to England, where she offered lectures on health and the human body, and married her third husband (she had divorced her two previous ones, much to the chagrin of the American public). Victoria Woodhull passed away on June 9, 1927, leaving a legacy with which we, as a people, are still grappling today.
If you would like to read more about Woodhull and her radical run for president, check out this website from American Experience.
And now…on to the books!
The Last Days of Jack Sparks: This book…it’s a weird one that tricky to sum up in a few sentences. What you need to know going in is that (fictional) journalist Jack Sparks died while writing a book on the supernatural, and his quest to prove it definitely true or false. As a tribute, his brother Alistair, has put together Jack’s manuscript, along with notes that Alistair made in his quest to track down the truth about Jack’s final days, and how on earth a video got posted to Jack’s YouTube account that he insisted was not of his making. The result is a myriad of unreliable narrators all fixated on their own agendas and needs, and a story where nothing–or everything–is true, and the implications for both are really quite chilling. At turns hysterically, cynically funny, at times horribly insightful regarding the horrible isolating narcissism of social media, and at times just plain weird, Jason Arnopp’s book, I promise, is like nothing else you’ve ever read. Paul Tremblay, who wrote the sensational A Head Full of Ghosts, said that this book was “Funny, creepy and totally nuts.” And I agree. (For real devotees, Jack Spark’s website is still online, just to add to the verisimilitude.)
The Wonder: As we noted here last week, fall is the Season for Books, with publishers putting out all their heavy hitters now in time for literary awards and holiday shopping sprees. Irish author Emma Donoghue’s new release is among the most noted of the year, and being hailed as her masterpiece–high praise indeed considering the success of her previous works. Set in small Irish village of Athlone in 1859, the plot of this story centers on eleven-year-old Anna O’Donnell, who believes that she is living off the manna of Heaven, and thus, reportedly hasn’t eaten for months, yet shows no signs of fatigue or ill-health. As international interest in Anna’s case grows, Lib Wright, a veteran of Florence Nightingale’s Crimean campaign, is hired to watch over the girl for two weeks, and prove her story true or false for the press. The result is a deeply searching, insightful book about relationships and faith and darkness that shows Donoghue is as skilled in historical fiction as she is in any other genre. Booklist agrees, giving this one a starred review, and calling the book, “Outstanding…. Exploring the nature of faith and trust with heartrending intensity, Donoghue’s superb novel will leave few unaffected.”
Blood Crime: Another example of historical fiction done right, Sebastià Alzamora’s gothic thriller takes us to 1936, during the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, and to the besieged city of Barcelona. Death is everywhere, but when a Marist monk and a young boy are discovered dead, drained of their blood, the event is gruesome enough for the police to take notice–and for a thirteen-year-old Capuchin novice to take matters into her own hands, and risk meeting a monster face-to-face in order to discover the truth. Inspired by true events, but given a fascinatingly dark, unique twist by Alzamora, this book was a sensation in Spain when it was first published, and earned a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, that called it “”Extraordinary… Alzamora deftly balances a swiftly moving, multithreaded plot set firmly in a historical context with a transcendent, nearly timeless exploration of the dark, violent nature of humanity and the vain search for God’s mercy, and, in doing so, creatively fulfills the challenge of reinventing gothic horror for a modern age.”
Everfair: For a time, steampunk and neo-Victorian books were the stuff of romances and graphic novels, imaging a world of other-wordly inventions and providing an escape from the painful realities of our own history. But Nisi Shawl has reinvented the steampunk genre by using it, instead, to explore, question, and contest history, by creating a world where imperialism was challenged by natives who have harnessed the power of steam and established what our history calls the Belgian Congo into a utopia called Everfair, where native Africans and European socialists and escaped slaves from the United States can live in freedom. Told from a number of voices that have long been silenced by our histories, and whose complex relationships have gone painfully overlooked, this book uses alternative histories to tell a powerful story that is both wildly imaginative and deeply reflective of our reality. This also earned a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, who said of it, “This highly original story blends steampunk and political intrigue in a compelling new view of a dark piece of human history.”
Wilber’s War : An American Family’s Journey Through World War II: Written by local author–and Library patron!–Hale Bradt, this book is the reconstruction of his father life, his parents’ love, and the world events that shaped and defined his family. While Norma Bradt endured the Second World War on the American home front, protecting her family, dealing with rationing, and managing the daily stress of having a husband serving in the Pacific, Wilber Bradt fought with the U.S. Army in the Solomon Islands, New Guinea, and The Philippines, sending home richly detailed letters about his experiences, which form the backbone of his highly original work, that also looks at Hale Bradt’s own visits to the battlefields on which his father fought, and his considerations of the toll war takes, not only on armies and nations, but on individual families who are forced to endure it all. The Midwest Book Review called this book an “inherently fascinating read…deftly crafted…[and] very highly recommended”, and we are honored to have our patron’s work displayed right here on our shelves!
Until next week, beloved patrons…happy reading!