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The Phoenix Pencil Company : a novel / by King, Allison,author.;
"Monica Tsai spends her days analyzing data for a new computer program that seeks to connect strangers with the world around them. But one day the very program she's helping to build pings a result for her beloved grandmother Yun's long-estranged cousin: a photograph of two women in Shanghai. One of them, Louise Sun, is a digital archivist who holds keys to Yun's past, and whose gift of a single pencil upends Monica's day-to-day. Monica's discoveries of a hidden family history are exquisitely braided with her grandmother Yun's own memories, recounting her time growing up in the Phoenix Pencil Company in the 1940s. While Japan invades China, Yun's cousin Meng moves in with them-but when the government discovers their family can Reforge a pencil's words, magically reviving the memories they hold, the cousins are separated and forced into a life of betraying stories in order to survive. Combining the cross-generational family saga and epistolary form of Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being with the uplifting magic of Matt Haig's The Midnight Library, King's stunningly layered debut novel asks: who owns a story? The answers and secrets that surface on the page have the unerasable power to unite or threaten Monica, Yun, and their most valued relationships for good"--
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Magic realist fiction.; Novels.; Chinese Americans; Espionage; Families; Family secrets; Intergenerational relations; Magic; Memory; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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The Phoenix Pencil Company [text (large print)] : a novel / by King, Allison,author.;
"Monica Tsai spends her days analyzing data for a new computer program that seeks to connect strangers with the world around them. But one day the very program she's helping to build pings a result for her beloved grandmother Yun's long-estranged cousin: a photograph of two women in Shanghai. One of them, Louise Sun, is a digital archivist who holds keys to Yun's past, and whose gift of a single pencil upends Monica's day-to-day. Monica's discoveries of a hidden family history are exquisitely braided with her grandmother Yun's own memories, recounting her time growing up in the Phoenix Pencil Company in the 1940s. While Japan invades China, Yun's cousin Meng moves in with them-but when the government discovers their family can Reforge a pencil's words, magically reviving the memories they hold, the cousins are separated and forced into a life of betraying stories in order to survive. Combining the cross-generational family saga and epistolary form of Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being with the uplifting magic of Matt Haig's The Midnight Library, King's stunningly layered debut novel asks: who owns a story? The answers and secrets that surface on the page have the unerasable power to unite or threaten Monica, Yun, and their most valued relationships for good"--
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Large print books.; Magic realist fiction.; Novels.; Chinese Americans; Espionage; Families; Family secrets; Intergenerational relations; Magic; Memory; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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The queen's fortune : a novel of Desiree, Napoleon, and the dynasty that outlasted the empire / by Pataki, Allison,author.;
"As the French revolution ravages the country, Desiree Clary is faced with the life-altering truth that the world she has known and loved is gone. Her head -- as well as her family -- is at risk, and it's fallen on her to save them from the guillotine. A chance encounter with Napoleon Bonaparte, the ambitious and charismatic young military prodigy, provides her answer. When her beloved sister Julie marries his brother Joseph, Desiree and Napoleon's futures become irrevocably linked. Quickly entering into their own passionate, dizzying courtship followed by a secret engagement, they vow to meet in the capital once his career has been secured. But her newly laid plans with Napoleon turn to sudden heartbreak, due to the rising star of Parisian society, Josephine de Beauharnais. Once again, Desiree's life is turned upside down. Swept to the glittering halls of the French capital, Desiree is plunged into the inner circle of the new ruling class, becoming further entangled with Napoleon, his family, and his Empress. But her fortunes shift once again when she meets Napoleon's confidant and star general, the indomitable Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte. When these two men become political rivals and military foes, the question that arises is: will Desiree choose the love of her new husband or the love of her nation and its Emperor? From the lavish estates of the French Riviera to the raucous streets of Paris and Stockholm, Desiree finds herself at the epicenter of the rise and fall of an empire, navigating a constellation of political giants and dangerous, shifting alliances. Emerging from an impressionable girl into a fierce young woman, she discovers that to survive in this world she must learn to rely upon her instincts and her heart"--
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Biographical fiction.; Désirée, Queen, consort of Charles XIV John, King of Sweden and Norway, 1777-1860; Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821; Charles XIV John, King of Sweden and Norway, 1763-1844; Queens;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Ribbons of scarlet : a novel of the French Revolution's women / by Quinn, Kate,author.; Dray, Stephanie,author.; Kamoie, Laura Croghan,author.; Knight, Eliza,author.; Perinot, Sophie,author.; Webb, Heather,1976 December 30-author.; Pataki, Allison,writer of foreword.;
Includes bibliographical references.In late eighteenth-century France, women do not have a place in politics. But as the tide of revolution rises, women from gilded salons to the streets of Paris decide otherwise-- upending a world order that has long oppressed them. Blue-blooded Sophie de Grouchy believes in democracy, education, and equal rights for women, and marries the only man in Paris who agrees. Emboldened to fight the injustices of King Louis XVI, Sophie aims to prove that an educated populace can govern itself-- but one of her students, fruit-seller Louise Audu, is hungrier for bread and vengeance than learning. When the Bastille falls and Louise leads a women's march to Versailles, the monarchy is forced to bend, but not without a fight. The king's pious sister Princess Elisabeth takes a stand to defend her brother, spirit her family to safety, and restore the old order, even at the risk of her head. But when fanatics use the newspapers to twist the revolution's ideals into a new tyranny, even the women who toppled the monarchy are threatened by the guillotine. Putting her faith in the pen, brilliant political wife Manon Roland tries to write a way out of France's blood-soaked Reign of Terror while pike-bearing Pauline Leon and steely Charlotte Corday embrace violence as the only way to save the nation. With justice corrupted by revenge, all the women must make impossible choices to survive-- unless unlikely heroine and courtesan's daughter Emilie de Sainte-Amaranthe can sway the man who controls France's fate: the fearsome Robespierre.
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Women;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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