The Saturday Evening Girls Club, the debut historical novel by local writer Jane Healey, will be released on April 25th by Lake Union Publishing. The novel is based on the true story of the real Saturday Evening Girls Club that existed in the North End in the early 1900s.
Several years ago, Healey wrote an article about the club’s highly collectible pottery (also called Paul Revere Pottery) in a column about New England antiques for Boston Home Magazine. While Healey thought the pottery itself was lovely, it was the stories of the club members that she found the most captivating. They were young Jewish and Italian immigrant women who forged lifelong friendships through the club and its pottery shop. With the help of the club’s three mentors, North End librarian Edith Guerrier, artist Edith Brown and philanthropist Helen Storrow, these women aspired to, and often achieved, much more than society expected of them. After doing a great deal of research on the club and its history, Healey decided to write a novel about these ambitious, inspiring young women.
The novel follows four best friends, – Caprice, Ada, Thea and Maria – as they navigate family clashes and romantic entanglements, career struggles and cultural prejudice. Through their unfailing bond, forged through their weekly club meetings, they draw strength—and the courage to transform their immigrant stories into the American lives of their dreams. The novel was recently #6 on Redbook Magazine’s “20 Books by Women You Must Read This Spring.” For more information about the book and its author, visit www.janehealey.com.
Healey will be discussing the novel and the history behind the story at two events in the North End in May:
- Friday, May 5th at 6PM at I AM BOOKS, North Square
- Saturday, May 20th at 10AM at the North End Historical Society, 9 Hull St.
