State of Wonder by Ann Patchett
Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague by Geraldine Brooks
Natural Childbirth, the Bradley Way by Susan McCutcheon-Roseg
The Murder of the Century: The Gilded Age Crime that Scandalized a City and Sparked the Tabloid Wars by Paul Collins
March by Geraldine Brooks
Frozen Heat by Richard Castle
I barely remember State of Wonder, but Year of Wonders made a big impression on me. The setting in the plague was heartbreaking and eerie, and the character work that Geraldine Brooks does in this book is wonderful.
My son was born in 2012, so I read parts of a lot of the What to Expect type books and then barely had time to read at all!
The Murder of the Century surprised me. I had known a bit about “yellow journalism” before, but I learned a lot more about it while reading this. And the description of the early days of the expansion of New York City to cover the island of Manhattan was fascinating. I can barely imagine the natural landscape of Manhattan, but it’s very well described in this book by Paul Collins.
Interesting for its historical information.
—From my Goodreads review of The Murder of the Century, ⭐️⭐️⭐️
March tells the story of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women from the perspective of the March family father serving in the Civil War. It won the Pulitzer, but I don’t think it’s as strong of a work as Year of Wonders. It was very good, but I don’t like the derivative world of retellings of classics.