Pandora Carmichael is the daughter of a once-famous tennis player who now teaches the sport to the well-to-do in the Hudson Valley in 1920s New York. She grows up around opulence, but she possesses none of it. A teenager at the beginning of the book, she explores dating relationships, but struggles to achieve exactly what she wants out of life. She has a deep passion for fashion design, but in pre-World War II America, a college education is more reserved for the elite, which is definitely not her.
The persistent quality of her dreams push her on past more “practical” routes, such as secretarial school or factory work. Her heart is periodically broken but quickly resurrected. She makes pragmatic compromises but never compromises her integrity and truthfulness to herself. Like many of us, she ends up achieving her dreams – “the life she wanted” – only in a more circuitous way than she would have designed as a teenager. She learns a lot about life and her place in life along the way.
Although set in the past, this book’s historical moorings are not essential to its character. It’s centrally a coming-of-age tale of love and life. The cultural backdrop of late-1920s and early-1930s America plays a role in the plot, but this book contains much more fiction than history. That may disappoint some who look for deeper historical insights in their historical fiction.
That said, it definitely is a solid, light-hearted, romantic story with a strong feminine protagonist in an era where feminism was harder to live by. Themes that current-day society wrestles with are seen in prior, silenced settings. In framing social squabbles of today, Anita Abriel’s novel remembers where society has evolved from to see where we must go. Looking forward, it reminds us that love is humanity’s universal motif.
The Life She Wanted: A Novel
By Anita Abriel
Copyright (c) 2023
Lake Union
ISBN13 978-1662509827
Page Count: 287
Genre: Historical Fiction
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