Review: Lone Women

Lone Women by Victor LaValle

Publisher One World Penguin Random House
Publication Date March 28, 2023
Library Purchase We purchased this in our digital catalog

Synopsis

Adelaide Henry carries an enormous steamer trunk with her wherever she goes. It’s locked at all times. Because when the trunk opens, people around Adelaide start to disappear.

The year is 1915, and Adelaide is in trouble. Her secret sin killed her parents, forcing her to flee California in a hellfire rush and make her way to Montana as a homesteader. Dragging the trunk with her at every stop, she will become one of the “lone women” taking advantage of the government’s offer of free land for those who can tame it—except that Adelaide isn’t alone. And the secret she’s tried so

desperately to lock away might be the only thing that will help her survive the harsh territory.

Crafted by a modern master of magical suspense, Lone Women blends shimmering prose, an unforgettable cast of adventurers who find horror and sisterhood in a brutal landscape, and a portrait of early-twentieth-century America like you’ve never seen. And at its heart is the gripping story of a woman desperate to bury her past—or redeem it.

Review

I heard about this book on the Reading Glasses Podcast and the description and the way they talked about it check so many of my boxes. Black woman, mysterious trunk, and I have this weird obsession with the black experience while homesteading. I can't explain it so I wont even try. 

This book was so good. I bought it while on a book date with a friend and started reading it that night. I was so hooked that while I was at work the next day I couldn't stop thinking about it so I checked out digital catalog and than goodness, it was available on audio book. I listened most of the day hypothesizing about what might be in the box. And I was wrong. Then when I figured out what was in the box, I spent the rest of the day hypothesizing about how it got there. I was also very wrong. 

The audiobook had me so hooked that I had to frog (pull out) ten rows of a crochet project I was working on. 

While I wish we saw more of Adelaide actually homesteading the property, watching her wrestle with the family responsibility of caring for this trunk, build community with the other lone women in the area, was such an experience! Learning about the dynamics of the community from the busy bees to the Mudges pulled me into this book in a way that hasn't happened in quite some time. 

I absolutely love reading historical fiction like this and I hate that its so hard to find. If we didn't already have this book in our digital catalog I would have demanded it.