The Great Divorce
A Nineteenth-century Mother's Extraordinary Fight Against Her Husband, the Shakers, and Her Times
Grove/Atlantic · Print & ebook · August 26, 2011
Ilyon Woo’s The Great Divorce is a dramatic, richly textured narrative history of early America’s most infamous divorce case.
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- Who it’s for
- A sharp, readable collision of family law, faith, and nineteenth-century social pressure.
- Genres
- Women's Lives, Divorce & Separation Law, Women's History
- Published
- Grove/Atlantic, August 26, 2011
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Start with this bookAbout this book
Ilyon Woo’s The Great Divorce is a dramatic, richly textured narrative history of early America’s most infamous divorce case. A young mother singlehandedly challenged her country’s notions of women’s rights, family, and marriage itselfall in a bid to win back her kidnapped children from the celibate, religious sect known as the Shakers.
Continue reading
Pulling together the pieces of this saga from crumbled newspapers, Shaker diaries, and long-forgotten letters, Woo delivers the first full account of Eunice Chapman’s epic five-year struggle. A moving story about the power of a mother’s love, The Great Divorce is also a memorable portrait of a rousing challenge to the values of a young nation.
Family Fault Lines
A sharp, readable collision of family law, faith, and nineteenth-century social pressure.
Come here for
- marriage, custody, and social rules in collision
- layered cultural and legal context
Expect
- playful but serious historical framing
- plenty to talk over afterward
Where it sits
| Divorce & Separation Law | 37% |
|---|---|
| Women's History | 29% |
| Women's Lives | 28% |
Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.
Publisher categories
- Divorce & Separation
- 19th-Century America
- Family Law
- Authors
- Ilyon Woo, Suzanne Toren, Audible Studios
- Publisher
- Grove/Atlantic
- Published
- August 26, 2011
- Format
- Print & ebook
- Reading lane
- Divorce & Separation