Joanna Higgins

Eugenie and her parents believe that some people are inherently better than others, which is why they have to run for their lives from the chaos of the French Revolution. When they and other nobility arrive in America with the promise of a safe and luxurious new life, they are alarmed to find that their village has not been built. Perhaps, they think, everything will be better once Queen Marie Antoinette arrives.

Local Quaker families, including Hannah and her father and brother, have moved to the area to help build and to assist the French nobles. They believe that all people are equal, no matter how much money or status they have, no matter what color their skin is.

Through the cold, inhospitable northeastern winter, Eugenie and Hannah deal with illness and suffering in the village. They also realize that despite having been raised with very different ideas about how to treat other people, they both abhor the brutality the marquis shows to his black slaves.

The two girls find a way to cross the language barrier and cook up a plan to free the marquis’ slaves. But when the time comes to take action, will their boldness and courage be enough to overcome centuries of belief about inequality?

This is top-notch historical fiction. If you’re a Karen Cushman fan or if you like to find out about nearly-forgotten slivers of history, pick this one up.

Grown-up portion of review:

Echoes of Waiting for Godot, anyone? Half the cast is waiting earnestly for the arrival of Marie Antoinette to change everything, but in the meantime they themselves are changing.

Including a glossary of French terms would help kids get a bit more of a nuanced understanding of what the nobles are saying; the context clues weren't always quite enough.… (meer)

I was eager to read this book since I have an ancestor who was an American anarchist during the the early part of the twentieth century. I had a hard time getting going with the book because of the first person narrative, and felt that another device to bring the characters into focus would've served the reader better to get into the story. I think this book would be best for those who have no prior knowledge of anarchism in the US and the history of oppression here. As a novel, I was not impressed.… (meer)

The Anarchist, Joanna Higgins

If you’ve ever wondered what makes anarchists tick, you’ll get an insider’s view of the answer in Joanna Higgens’ The Anarchist. This historical fiction spans the decades from the 1870’s to the 1930’s, from the roots to the flower of the golden age of anarchy in Europe and the United States. Higgins weaves historical figures and events of the time into a fictionalized narrative spoken by the people who played large and small roles in that tumultuous era.
It is not by chance that the era coincides with political and social unrest in Europe, with wars, border disputes, pogroms and despotic monarchs squeezing the life out of peasants and workers. In America, it was the Gilded Age, the time of the Robber Barons, the likes of J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller. Major industry was controlled by greedy tycoons and corrupt governments. In response, American workers were waking up to the possibility that in unity there was strength; protests, riots and violence ensued.
Higgins shows us both sides of the struggle. Each chapter tells a story from the point of view of an individual. Although engaging and full of strong emotions, at first we cannot see the relationships among the disparate characters. For example, early on we meet Emma, a young Russian immigrant, living with her frightened family in the sweatshop bowels of New York. Unwilling to work in degrading atmospheres, she begins to defend the actions of strikers in the big cities, an independent spirit in the making.
We also meet Leon, the native born son of Polish Catholic immigrants fleeing the Kaiser, living in America’s heartland who, unlike his laborer father and brothers, loves books and learning. Nothing he can do is ever good enough for his work-weary mother.
Finally, we meet The Major, an unnamed isolationist Republican Senator who favors market protection while living in genteel comfort with servants and a delicate, aristocratic wife.
By the fourth chapter, we begin to see the outline of how these contrasting realities are leading to one grand story – but only an outline. We are invested into the puzzle now, and I, personally, enjoyed how the author subtly reveals who these people really are and how they fit into the history we think we already know. While under Higgins’ spell, we are living the history from the inside and this cannot help but color our view of these “crazy rabble rousers.”
Conversely, we watch our Republican senator rise in the ranks of the party, eventually landing in the pockets of the Captains of Industry. Backed by Standard Oil, Carnegie Steel and Big Banking, he dismisses Democrats’ critical cries of “Monopoly!”, ‘trusts’ and “protectionism.” With the stage set, we are whisked along the historical highlights of the anarchists’ infamous acts – never far from the intimate motivations and doubts of the perpetrators. The poignant ending puts everything back into place, but the reader’s view of that reassuring place has undoubtedly been changed.
In retrospect, I could not help but feel the story as eerily reminiscent of the recent events that have rocked America to its core. Emma and her cronies abhor corporate “capitalism” while the established powers of her time accuse the opposition of “communism.” Sound familiar? Today we watch our government bend to the will of the corporations while the average citizen loses his power and works for pennies – or does not work at all. Thus, The Anarchist becomes both engaging historical fiction and an eye-opening caveat to Americans and Europeans of every stripe, a dystopian scenario of our future that may be closer than we think. –Miranda Childe (I received The Anarchist as a member of Library Thing’s Early Reviewer Program.)… (meer)

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

The Anarchist, a historical novel, dramatizes the interplay of forces leading to the assassination of an American president at the beginning of the Twentieth Century. at a turbulent time in American history, a time of protests, hangings, hunger riots, strikes, bombings, and massacres.

Higgins tells the story from several perspectives, fictional as well as historical figures: Emma Goldman, Alexander Berkman, Leon Czolgosz and William McKinley. The author tries to forcefully humanize each of her subjects. I'm sure the historical research was done, but the subject seemed to me similar to soap characters with little connection to their real life inspirations. The treatment of the germane political philosophies came across flat or two dimensional. Without a background knowledge of the anarachism of the day, a reader might be confused or mislead.… (meer)