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The nature of fragile things

April 18, 1906: A massive earthquake rocks San Francisco just before daybreak, igniting a devouring inferno. Lives are lost, lives are shattered, but some rise from the ashes forever changed. Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a m...

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Main Author: Meissner, Susan, 1961- (Author)
Other Authors: Kerr, Alana (Narrator)
Format: Audiobooks eAudiobook Downloads eAudiobook
Language: English
Published: New York : Penguin Audio, 2021.
Edition: Unabridged.
Subjects:
San Francisco Earthquake and Fire, Calif., 1906 > Fiction.
Earthquakes > Fiction.
Natural disasters > Fiction.
Mail order brides > Fiction.
Irish > California > San Francisco > Fiction.
Friendship > Fiction.
San Francisco (Calif.) > Fiction.
Historical fiction.
Domestic fiction.
Downloadable audio books.
Online Access: Go to Downloadable Audiobook Here.
Summary: April 18, 1906: A massive earthquake rocks San Francisco just before daybreak, igniting a devouring inferno. Lives are lost, lives are shattered, but some rise from the ashes forever changed. Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a mail-order bride ad and agrees to marry a man she knows nothing about. San Francisco widower Martin Hocking proves to be as aloof as he is mesmerizingly handsome. Sophie quickly develops deep affection for Kat, Martin's silent five-year-old daughter, but Martin's odd behavior leaves her with the uneasy feeling that something about her newfound situation isn't right. Then one early-spring evening, a stranger at the door sets in motion a transforming chain of events. Sophie discovers hidden ties to two other women. The first, pretty and pregnant, is standing on her doorstep. The second is hundreds of miles away in the American Southwest, grieving the loss of everything she once loved. The fates of these three women intertwine on the eve of the devastating earthquake, thrusting them onto a perilous journey that will test their resiliency and resolve and, ultimately, their belief that love can overcome fear. From the acclaimed author of The Last Year of the War and As Bright as Heaven comes a gripping novel about the bonds of friendship and mother love, and the power of female solidarity.
Item Description: Unabridged.
Physical Description: 1 online resource (10 audio files) : digital
Playing Time: 10::3:9:
Format: Requires OverDrive Listen (file size: N/A KB) or OverDrive app (file size: 299745 KB).
ISBN: 9780593346952
Author Notes: In 1995, Susan Meissner was working as a part-time reporter for a county newspaper. In 1998, she was named editor of the Mountain Lake/Butterfield Observer Advocate, the town's weekly paper. The paper was named the Best Weekly Newspaper in Minnesota by the Minnesota Newspaper Association in 2002. She retired later that year to write her first book, Why the Sky is Blue, which was published in 2004. Her other books include The Girl in the Glass, The Shape of Mercy, In All Deep Places, and A Fall of Marigolds.

(Bowker Author Biography)

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