From the best-selling author of Giant and So Big, a sweeping look
at the lives of three generations of women on Chicago's South Side. Part
of Belt's Revivals series and with a new introduction by Kathleen Rooney
(Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk).
First published in 1921, Edna Ferber's The Girls revolves around the
"three Charlottes" of the Thrift family--Great-Aunt Charlotte, her niece
Lottie, and Lottie's niece Charley. All single "old maids," as the
narrator describes them, their lives weave together as they deal with
issues involving money, work, friendship, family, and love as they
strive to join Chicago's growing middle class in the early twentieth
century.
With a historic span that travels from the Civil War to World War I,
Ferber highlights how the three generations of Charlottes lead very
different lives. But we also see the ways their experiences rhyme with
one another and how, despite the social advances in America, as Kathleen
Rooney writes in her introduction, all three have to confront "a sexist
and claustrophobic societal atmosphere in which any little act of
self-assertion can feel like a leap from a precipice."
Told through Ferber's assured and generous style, and full of her
signature strong female characters, this rediscovered American classic
deserves a spot on the shelf next to other great Chicago novels like
Sister Carrie and The Adventures of Augie March.
