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A review by emtees
A Sisterhood of Secret Ambitions by Sheena Boekweg
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
A young woman living in 1920’s America, Elsie Fawcett knows what her future holds: she will marry and spend her life in her husband’s shadow, guiding him to achieve great things. As a member of the First Ladies Society, Elsie is part of a line of women going back to the founding of the United States who have weaponized their femininity to control the direction of the country. While some hide in the shadows, collecting information, and others focus on rescuing abused women from dangerous men and planting them in places where they can do the most good, Elsie has been selected to become a Wife, marrying a man who the society has decided to make a Supreme Court Justice, Senator or even President. Andrew Shaw is one of these men, and so Elsie and her friends are sent in to “charm” him - a competition in which they vie for his attention, knowing that whomever he selects will eventually wield great, if secret, power. But Elsie is conflicted; while she wants the power that a powerful marriage could give her - not just to shape the country, but to lead the society itself - a part of her wishes that her accomplishments wouldn’t have to be overshadowed by a man’s.
The idea of this novel is an interesting one, but I found a lot of the execution messy. The biggest issue was with the First Ladies’ Society itself. It was difficult to grasp exactly what it was - an organization of women supporting women in a patriarchal and sexist world? A ruthless political cabal completely controlling the country while clueless men follow the path laid out for them? An idealized depiction of a sorority, where all women are accepted equally? The answer was ultimately all those things, but the result was a story that seemed to be struggling between realistic alternate history, feminist utopia and one of those teen girl competition fantasies that were so popular a few years ago. Some of that messiness ended up serving the story. For example, it was implied that the First Ladies Society literally controlled the country, that they had chosen every powerful man, secretly written every law and policy, since the very beginning - and yet, other than some presidents with different names, nothing about the world seemed to be any different. But that ended up being part of the point.By focusing on the (admittedly not very realistic) way they could influence men as wives and mothers, the Society had ended up reinforcing the very systems that kept women oppressed, something Elsie realized when she saw the way the society discouraged women from running for office out of fear of them being ridiculed or pushed girls with other talents to become wives and mothers only. That was an interesting direction to take the story and it led to some really good scenes where the characters debated the value of women’s different types of work.
But in other ways it really felt like the concept of the society wasn’t completely thought out. This was especially clear when it came to the handling of race, sexuality and body diversity. The society is presented as embracing all races, sexualities and body types; though there are only a few token characters of color, we are assured that women of color play a significant role in the society, and Elsie’s circle of friends includes one woman who is trans and another who is asexual, both of whom find acceptance in the society. Elsie herself is fat and proud of it. For me, this easy acceptance of all types of women felt uncomfortably idealistic, especially when compared to how nuanced the book was in handling sexism. I just couldn’t buy that an organization founded by the wives of the Founding Fathers would inadvertently continue to enforce patriarchal norms - but not, say, racism or transphobia. That’s just not historically how feminism has worked and it had the probably unintended effect of diminishing those other types of oppression. The book has characters arguing passionately over issues that were very important to people in the 1920’s, but are, if not resolved today, at least areas where we’ve made a lot of progress: things like the way women in power are viewed, or how to support working women while still valuing work like motherhood. Meanwhile, it completely glosses over areas like racism and transphobia, significant issues in the lives of real women today, with an attitude of “we got over that by just learning to value everyone!”
Elsie’s character arc felt similarly messy to me. Elsie and several of her friends are selected to charm a “priority one,” a man the society intends to set up as president. The girls are therefore competing for his attention, a process that mostly involves setting up fake “meet cutes” and twisting their personalities to fit his expectations. For Elsie this creates two conflicts - one between her desire to win the competition and the power that comes with it and her desire to support her friends, including one who has genuine feelings for their target, and another between the potential future a relationship with Andrew represents and the one she secretly dreams of as a woman with power and ambition in her own name. The conflicts are nicely set up, but once Elsie’s character arc begins, it is very erratically written. Elsie changes her mind about her goals often multiple times within a single scene, learns the same lessons over and over. It isn’t until a shocking series of events at the end of the book that the point of Elsie’s story became clear. Some of this erratic writing in her character arc may have been intended to highlight an anxiety disorder - aka “nerves” - that she is implied to have, but the depiction of anxiety felt more like a plot device than a real attempt to portray a character with a mental illness.
The last twenty percent or so of the book is really good - clear themes, strong emotion, some exciting action. The resolution of the plot and Elsie’s relationships is really strong and well written. I just wish the rest of the book had lived up to the ending.
The idea of this novel is an interesting one, but I found a lot of the execution messy. The biggest issue was with the First Ladies’ Society itself. It was difficult to grasp exactly what it was - an organization of women supporting women in a patriarchal and sexist world? A ruthless political cabal completely controlling the country while clueless men follow the path laid out for them? An idealized depiction of a sorority, where all women are accepted equally? The answer was ultimately all those things, but the result was a story that seemed to be struggling between realistic alternate history, feminist utopia and one of those teen girl competition fantasies that were so popular a few years ago. Some of that messiness ended up serving the story. For example, it was implied that the First Ladies Society literally controlled the country, that they had chosen every powerful man, secretly written every law and policy, since the very beginning - and yet, other than some presidents with different names, nothing about the world seemed to be any different. But that ended up being part of the point.
But in other ways it really felt like the concept of the society wasn’t completely thought out. This was especially clear when it came to the handling of race, sexuality and body diversity. The society is presented as embracing all races, sexualities and body types; though there are only a few token characters of color, we are assured that women of color play a significant role in the society, and Elsie’s circle of friends includes one woman who is trans and another who is asexual, both of whom find acceptance in the society. Elsie herself is fat and proud of it. For me, this easy acceptance of all types of women felt uncomfortably idealistic, especially when compared to how nuanced the book was in handling sexism. I just couldn’t buy that an organization founded by the wives of the Founding Fathers would inadvertently continue to enforce patriarchal norms - but not, say, racism or transphobia. That’s just not historically how feminism has worked and it had the probably unintended effect of diminishing those other types of oppression. The book has characters arguing passionately over issues that were very important to people in the 1920’s, but are, if not resolved today, at least areas where we’ve made a lot of progress: things like the way women in power are viewed, or how to support working women while still valuing work like motherhood. Meanwhile, it completely glosses over areas like racism and transphobia, significant issues in the lives of real women today, with an attitude of “we got over that by just learning to value everyone!”
Elsie’s character arc felt similarly messy to me. Elsie and several of her friends are selected to charm a “priority one,” a man the society intends to set up as president. The girls are therefore competing for his attention, a process that mostly involves setting up fake “meet cutes” and twisting their personalities to fit his expectations. For Elsie this creates two conflicts - one between her desire to win the competition and the power that comes with it and her desire to support her friends, including one who has genuine feelings for their target, and another between the potential future a relationship with Andrew represents and the one she secretly dreams of as a woman with power and ambition in her own name. The conflicts are nicely set up, but once Elsie’s character arc begins, it is very erratically written. Elsie changes her mind about her goals often multiple times within a single scene, learns the same lessons over and over. It isn’t until a shocking series of events at the end of the book that the point of Elsie’s story became clear. Some of this erratic writing in her character arc may have been intended to highlight an anxiety disorder - aka “nerves” - that she is implied to have, but the depiction of anxiety felt more like a plot device than a real attempt to portray a character with a mental illness.
The last twenty percent or so of the book is really good - clear themes, strong emotion, some exciting action. The resolution of the plot and Elsie’s relationships is really strong and well written. I just wish the rest of the book had lived up to the ending.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child death
A major plotline revolves around the death of a child which is depicted as happening in a fire