by Nancy Horan
First published 2023
Fourteen-year-old Ana Ferreira arrives in Springfield, Illinois from Madeira, Portugal and finds work in the Lincoln household. She helps Mary Lincoln care for their children and manage the social duties of a politician's wife as Abraham Lincoln rises from small-town lawyer to president. Ana watches Lincoln's views on slavery and the Union develop while she observes Mary Lincoln's complex personality and struggles. Through her friendship with someone in the Black community, Ana witnesses the Underground Railroad's operations and confronts the racial prejudice that contradicts America's promise of freedom. She experiences firsthand how slavery undermines the democratic ideals her adopted country claims to uphold. The story follows Ana through the transformative years of Lincoln's political ascent and continues to the Springfield race riot of 1908, showing how the conflicts over equality that defined Lincoln's era persisted long after his death.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, 19th-century, american-history
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, found-family
Setting: Illinois, Madeira, Springfield
Period: 19th-Century, 1908
352 pages · Hardcover · Sourcebooks Landmark
Content warnings: racism, slavery