Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

Lisa See, author of the critically-acclaimed international bestseller, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (2005), has always been intrigued by stories that have been lost, forgotten, or deliberately covered up, whether in the past or happening right now in the world today. For Snow Flower, she traveled to a remote area of China – where she was told she was only the second foreigner ever to visit – to research the secret writing invented, used, and kept a secret by women for over a thousand years.  Ms. See’s new novel once again delves into forgotten history. Peony in Love takes place in 17th-century China in the Yangzi River delta. It's based on the true story of three "lovesick maidens," who were married to the same man – one right after the other, not one reaching age twenty.

Foot Binding

The origin of the practice is uncertain. Multiple accounts attempting to 

explain its beginning exist, each advancing a different theory: from the desire to emulate the naturally tiny feet of a favored concubine of a prince, to a story of an empress who had club-like feet, which became viewed as a desirable fashion.Bound feet were considered intensely erotic. Qing Dynasty sex manuals listed 48 different ways of playing with women's bound feet.

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan

Loving Frank is a work of fiction based on events relating to the love affair of a brilliant, controversial architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, and one of his clients,
Mamah Borthwick Cheney. Mamah, along with her husband Edwin Cheney, commissioned Wright in 1903 to design a house for their family on East Avenue in Oak Park, Illinois. This book portrays the period 1907 to 1914, during which the Wright/Cheney affair flourished. by the author



"Is the purest, most liberating love you've ever known worth giving up your children, your faithful spouse, your friends – your life as you know it? For Martha "Mamah" Borthwick Cheney and her lover, architect Frank Lloyd Wright, the answer was yes."


Who was Mamah Cheney?

Mamah Borthwick Cheney was born in Boone, Iowa in 1869, just four years after the American Civil War ended. Mamah, born Martha, was no woman of the times, as it were—educated at the University of Michigan, she ultimately took a job as a librarian in nearby Port Huron. She spoke several languages, earned a master’s degree in language studies and didn’t marry until she was 30, to Oak Park’s Edwin Cheney, an electrical engineer. They eventually had two children, John and Martha, and Mamah became involved in the community, and through a social club met Catherine Wright. This chance meeting led to the Cheneys' commissioning of Catherine’s husband, Frank Lloyd Wright, to construct them a home.


Frank and Mamah soon began an affair. Both unhappily married and excited by one another, they fled Oak Park, left their spouses and children, for Europe, where they stayed in Italy for a year. Wright’s career took a massive hit, and income was low. The first thing he did was to retreat to his family homestead and build fortress for Mrs. Cheney and himself, (Taliesin - Welsh for "shining brow") On August 15, 1914, Frank Lloyd Wright was overseeing work on Chicago’s Midway Gardens, while Mamah Cheney was in their Taliesin home with her two children, two of Wright’s associates and a father and son, the father another of Wright’s colleagues. After a quarrel with Julian Carlton, one of the home’s workers, Carlton set fire to the complex, and as each tried to escape the blaze, he murdered them, one by one, with an axe. "Death in a Prairie House," published earlier this year, is a captivating look at the Taliesin massacre by William R. Drennan.Wright himself was so overwhelmed that it took him ten years to recover his confidence and return to more stable existence. He remarried in 1922 to Mariam Noel,
who was his second wife.He paid tribute to Mrs. Cheney, his greatest love, the one for whom he had thrown away a normal career, by building her the simplest grave. Wright built Taliesin Two on the ashes of Taliesin One and developed even further his defensive style. Tragedy followed tragedy. Taliesin Two was burned, and during the fire neighbors not only helped douse the flames, but helped themselves to some of Wright's oriental art as well. Brief biography of Frank Lloyd Wright

2007 Bookmark

The Girls by Lori Lansens

I have never looked into my sister’s eyes. I have never bathed alone. I have never stood in the grass at night and raised my arms to a beguiling moon. I’ve never used an airplane bathroom. Or worn a hat. Or been kissed like that. I’ve never driven a car. Or slept through the night. Never a private talk. Or solo walk. I’ve never climbed a tree. Or faded into a crowd. So many things I’ve never done, but oh, how I’ve been loved. And, if such things were to be, I’d live a thousand lives as me, to be loved so exponentially.    We’ve been called many things: freaks, horrors, monsters, devils, witches, retards, wonders, marvels. To most, we’re a curiosity. In small-town Leaford, where we live and work, we’re just ‘The Girls’.  by Lori Lansens

The Girls is written with two voices – each twin, Ruby (the pretty one, artistic and fashion conscious, but intellectually lazy) and Rose( frizzy haired, bookish and rather serious), writing in turn. Lori Lansens manages to create two distinct and colourful personalities, drawing the reader into the experience of living as a conjoined twin. Ruby and Rose each have their own jobs, their own interests and their own fantasies. The twins find their way into the hearts of most people they meet. Although this might appear unlikely, it seems that once people move beyond the extraordinary way the girls look, they are captivated by their courage and individuality. The girls have different friends, relationships and even a love affair. There are moments of profound sadness and moments where the reader might well envy the girls their deep and abiding love for one another. by Elaine Walker

Critical Praise

"The Girls skillfully tackles a tricky subject with both laugh-out-loud humor and grace."

—Redbook

"A complex consideration of identity and individuality, of sameness and difference, of what it means to be normal and what it takes to feel at home in the world."

—Francine Prose, People

"Lansens, who has a gentle, open way of writing, makes of these two girls a kind of perfect marriage, harmonious and everlasting."

—Stacey D'Erasmo, New York Times Book Review

"This is not a book about the grotesque but a book about love, about being bound to someone else and accepting the situation gracefully, even gratefully."

—Malena Watrous, San Francisco Chronicle