It’s always frustrated me it took women so long to gain the vote. More than a dozen countries gave us the right to vote before the United States; that’s mind-boggling to me. I’d like to think I would have been a suffragist back in the day, but I’m a sissy. The leaders of the movement—including Alice Paul, Maud Malone, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Lucy Burns, and Jane Adams—risked life and limb to secure passage of the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution.
I was excited to read this novel and learn more about the women’s suffrage movement in the United States, but what I got was a boring book by an author who couldn’t decide if the book was about the 1913 Woman Suffrage Procession or slavery and racial injustice. Ida’s story seems out of place… interesting for sure, but it departed from the overall premise of the book. The two storylines would have probably made great books had been they treated separately. There were so many incredible suffrage events that preceded and followed the March that could have been added to the plot to round out the narrative. It stunned me to learn there were women’s organizations whose sole mission was to oppose women’s suffrage, The National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage, for example. Employing a dual narrative between leaders on both sides of this contentious issue would have been far more interesting. My apologies to Jennifer Chiaverini fans out there; this one just wasn’t good. 3 stars.