Vera Johnson has lived a long, long life and in all of her years none have proved to be as momentous, as exciting, as devastating as 1906, the year San Francisco was nearly leveled by an epic earthquake. In 1906 Vera was 15, a bastard child of SF’s most popular madam, given to and paid for a Swedish single mother to raise alongside her own child. Vera has a scant relationship with her birthmother, a potently ambitious well connected woman who for all her admirable qualities doesn’t have a maternal bone in her body. Until the earthquake rips through the city permanently altering all preexisting arrangements and Vera and her (nonbiological) sister Pie find themselves taking possession of a fancy mansion she never got to grow up in, her birthright. But the girls are not alone, they are antagonized and cared for in equal measures by her mother’s former employee Tan and his family, just as the position of Chinese people in the city gets suddenly quite precarious. There’s a love interest that slowly makes his way into the picture. There are all the terrific variegated players who slowly come to populate the place. And then there are real life characters cleverly integrated into the fabric of the plot, from politicians to socialites. All set against the backdrop of the city ravaged by nature and yet poised to make yet another comeback, to live up to its flag, to rise from the ashes. There are great many things this novel gets right the first and foremost of them being creating a genuinely excellent young protagonist in adult fiction. It isn’t often than a 15 year old can carry a story with such aplomb. It’s a bildungsroman in a way, of course, 1906 shapes Vera into a person of steel, will and drive she becomes, albeit possibly stealing away too much softness through teaching some lessons too early and too brutally. Secondly, there are some terrific descriptions of the city. I’ve recently armchair traveled to SF, but a present day version. This was a time machine armchair trip, which is almost as good as hot tub time machine and by some accounts more so, especially in the summer. The writing is good, the characters are enjoyable, it’s sad without being depressing. Not sure why I didn’t love it, though I definitely liked it a lot. A transporting sort of entertainment, Great for fans of historical fiction. Recommended. Thanks Netgalley
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