Vera

November 1, 2020
The place: San Francisco. The year: 1906. Though raised by a foster mother, 15-year-old Vera is, in fact, the illegitimate daughter of Rose, the most successful madam on the Barbary Coast. Vera's life is upended on April 18 when the great earthquake strikes San Francisco, followed by disastrous fires. With her foster mother dead and Rose missing, Vera and her foster sister, Piper, move into Rose's house, adjacent to tony Lafayette Square. Strong-willed, sharp-tongued Vera doesn't rest until she finds the gravely injured Rose in an emergency hospital tent and then brings her home with the help of Bobby, a seemingly homeless boy she has met. Against all odds, Vera, with the help of a neighboring doctor, nurses the imperious Rose back to health. Desperate for her mother's love, Vera is devastated when Rose clearly prefers a second illegitimate daughter, Lifang, whose father is ill-tempered Tan, Rose's butler. Bobby then moves into the stable behind Rose's house, and he and Vera fall in love. But can their relationship, born of disaster, last? Part survival story, part story of a young woman's quest for love, this richly plotted historical novel is brilliantly conceived and beautifully realized. Edgarian brings the nearly destroyed San Francisco to vivid life, but it is Vera's own troubled life that is the main attraction and what will live in the reader's memory.

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January 4, 2021
Edgarian (Three Stages of Amazement) follows a teenage girl who comes of age in the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake in this visceral novel. Vera, 15, is the illegitimate daughter of Rose, a brothel madam who made a name for herself as a “much-favored prostitute” among gold miners. Raised by a foster mother, Vera longs to be independent like Rose, while her foster sister, Pie wants only to marry a local shopkeeper. Their plans change when an earthquake devastates the city. Vera and Pie seek shelter at Rose’s house, which is still standing but Rose is gone. The two girls form an odd community of sorts with Tan, Rose’s Chinese butler; Tan’s family; several of Rose’s girls; and a psychiatrist neighbor. While Tan sets up a makeshift outdoor kitchen to feed the city’s dispossessed, Vera scours San Francisco for her mother. Slowly, the city begins to rebuild itself around them. Despite some anachronistic word choices, the author paints a vivid portrait of a metropolis teeming with sex workers, immigrants, corrupt politicians, and artists, and it’s fun to follow two strong young characters with very different views on life. The result makes for a stirring testament to a resilient city that never knew the meaning of the word quit. Agent: Dorian Karchmar, WME.

January 1, 2021
The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 extinguishes all sense of normalcy for 15-year-old Vera Johnson, who must survive by sheer pluck and intelligence in the newly rattled landscape. Olive-skinned, dark-haired Vera looks nothing like her blond sister, Pie. After all, Vera is the illegitimate daughter of San Francisco's most successful madam, Rose, who made an arrangement with Morie Johnson, Pie's Swedish mother, to raise Vera as her own in exchange for the physical comforts money can buy. Morie favors her biological daughter while not sparing the rod on Vera. Then Morie dies in the earthquake, leaving Vera to fend for herself and her sister. Having been an occasional visitor to Rose's Pacific Heights mansion, Vera knows she will be able to find succor there. With Rose missing, though, Vera resorts to her internal drive to slowly craft a new life for herself, Pie, and a whole cast of colorful characters. Edgarian zooms the lens in on Vera, who narrates the book, and her immediate landscape, a choice that too often straightjackets the story. The novel shines in painting a vivid picture of early-20th-century San Francisco, including its rowdy politics, but it falls short of truly immersing the reader. Too often it reads like a daily chronicle of Vera's doings, which gets claustrophobic. Rose's mansion registers some damage but seems to escape the earthquake largely unscathed, a point that also strains credulity. Frustratingly, the plot takes a huge leap after the early post-earthquake days, barely skirting by Vera's adulthood before we catch her again in old age. Even a memorable historical event can't shake up a mostly bland story.

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