![]() ![]() Do you think most women were unhappy during this time? Were you surprised by the treatment and attitudes toward women during the 19th century? Discuss the idea of women as the “weaker sex” that permeated society during this time, particularly as portrayed by Archer Campbell and Anthony Comstock. How hard is this decision for her? Could you marry someone, knowing they will likely be gone within a year? Sophie agrees to marry Cap despite his deteriorating health condition, and to accompany him to the clinic in Switzerland. Are there characters who embrace society’s unspoken rules or stereotypes? How are those characters portrayed? Discuss how several of the protagonists-Anna, Sophie, Jack, Aunt Quinlan, Cap-exemplify this theme. Why is Anna drawn to Jack? What makes them a good match, and how does the romance change Anna, if at all?Ī theme that works throughout the novel is the rejection of society’s expectations. Sophie identifies as a “free woman of color.” How does this shape and inform her actions and thoughts throughout the story? What other passages, characters, or settings illuminate the class disparities existing in New York at the time? The Gilded Hour frequently juxtaposes the very rich with the very poor, such as when Anna and Cap attend an extravagant costume ball at Alva Vanderbilt’s house, while thousands of orphans spend the night homeless. ![]() What surprised you the most about New York in 1883? How would this story have differed if it was set in the South? A rural town? A European city? The setting of New York City plays a major role in the story. If you have read that series, how do you think the women in The Gilded Hour have evolved from their ancestors? What personality traits do you see have been passed down through the generations, and what is different about the Savard women in 1883? How are Anna and Sophie alike and different?Īlthough she met many orphans in Hoboken, why is Anna immediately sensitive to Rosa Russo’s situation? How does Rosa’s plight resonate with her? Why does she feel responsible to find Rosa’s brothers? Do these traits make her a sympathetic character, or not?Īnna and Sophie Savard are descendants of Nathaniel Bonner, the patriarch in Sara Donati’s “Into the Wilderness” series. Discuss these differences about Anna, with regard to her profession, her dress, and her attitudes. Anna Savard give readers a sense of how different Anna is from her contemporaries. less …įrom the very first pages of the novel, Sister Mary Augustin’s observations of Dr. With its vivid depictions of old New York and its enormously appealing characters, The Gilded Hour is a captivating novel by an author at the height of her powers. Faced with their helplessness, Anna must make an unexpected choice between holding on to the pain of her past and letting love into her life.įor Sophie, an obstetrician and the orphaned daughter of free people of color, helping a desperate young mother forces her to grapple with the oath she took as a doctor-and thrusts her and Anna into the orbit of anti-vice crusader Anthony Comstock, a dangerous man who considers himself the enemy of everything indecent and of anyone who dares to defy him. The year is 1883, and in New York City, Anna Savard and her cousin Sophie-both graduates of the Woman’s Medical School-treat the city’s most vulnerable, even if doing so puts everything they’ve strived for in jeopardy…Īnna’s work has placed her in the path of four children who have lost everything, just as she herself once had. The international bestselling author of Into the Wilderness makes her highly anticipated return with a remarkable epic about two female doctors in nineteenth-century New York.
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