A White Room was featured as a Notable Page Turner in Shelf Unbound Magazine and named 2013's Best Cross-Genre Title by USA Book News.
Based on historical trends of the era and inspired by Gothic Victorian novels The Yellow Wallpaper, The Secret Garden, and Wuthering Heights, author Stephanie Carroll has taken women's empowerment in fiction to an all new level in this inspiring debut.
At the close of the Victorian Era, society still expected middle-class women to be "the angels of the house," even as a select few strived to become something more. In this time of change, Emeline Evans dreamed of becoming a nurse. But when her father dies unexpectedly, Emeline sacrifices her ambitions and rescues her family from destitution by marrying John Dorr, a reserved lawyer who can provide for her family.
John moves Emeline to the remote Missouri town of Labellum and into an unusual Gothic house where her sorrow and uneasiness edge toward madness. Furniture twists and turns before her eyes, people stare out at her from empty rooms, and the house itself conspires against her. The doctor diagnoses hysteria, but the treatment merely reinforces the house's grip on her mind.
Emeline only finds solace after pursuing an opportunity to serve the poor as an unlicensed nurse. Yet in order to bring comfort to the needy she must secretly defy her husband, whose employer viciously hunts down and prosecutes unlicensed medical practitioners. Although women are no longer burned at the stake in 1900, disobedience is a symptom of psychological defect, and hysterical women must be controlled.
Praise for A White Room:
"A novel of grit, independence, and determination ... An intelligent story, well told." Renée Thompson, author of The Plume Hunter and The Bridge at Valentine
"The best historical fiction makes you forget it's fiction and forget it's historical. Reminiscent of The Yellow Wallpaper ... the thoughtful, intricate story Carroll relates is absolutely mesmerizing." Eileen Walsh, Ph.D. U.S. Women's History, University of San Diego
What Reviewers Are Saying:
"The writing in this book is gorgeous which really lifts the story up a notch. It's also based around a very interesting main story, something that I have not yet come across in my years of reading. . . this book was definitely worth it!" - Ravings and Ramblings
"From the moment we meet the Evans family to the turn of the final pages on the Dorrs, the pages are filled with characters to remember for better AND worse, events that will both inspire and sicken, and a creeping madness that will make you second guess the sanity of many, including your own. It's THAT riveting. It's THAT enthralling. It's THAT well written that you become involved in everyone's life by book's end and you'll never see where everything is creeping to ... never." - Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers
"This book, like the furniture, like Emeline's sanity perhaps, is snaky, hard to pin down. At first, I thought it was simply going to be a send up on Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper', but it's more than just a look at Victorian attitudes toward women and their mental health. There's an oppressive kind of mystery, right out of a Shirley Jackson story or a Stephen King novel ..." - Unabridged Chick
"The plot complexity, historical and literary allusions, and depth of character in A White Room impressed me from start to finish ... The story becomes as darkly layered as the strange, weirdly inventive Victorian furniture that crowds Emeline's home ... and then Carroll takes it all up a notch, telling a tense, dark, but in the end very human story." - Military Spouse Book Review
Categories: Historical Drama, Literary Historical, Gothic Romance, Historical Suspense, Historical Women's Fiction, Victorian Historical Fiction, Historical Victorian Historical Fiction, Victorian Historical Romance.
"The writing in this book is gorgeous which really lifts the story up a notch. It's also based around a very interesting main story, something that I have not yet come across in my years of reading. . . this book was definitely worth it!" - Ravings and Ramblings
"From the moment we meet the Evans family to the turn of the final pages on the Dorrs, the pages are filled with characters to remember for better AND worse, events that will both inspire and sicken, and a creeping madness that will make you second guess the sanity of many, including your own. It's THAT riveting. It's THAT enthralling. It's THAT well written that you become involved in everyone's life by book's end and you'll never see where everything is creeping to ... never." - Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers
"This book, like the furniture, like Emeline's sanity perhaps, is snaky, hard to pin down. At first, I thought it was simply going to be a send up on Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper', but it's more than just a look at Victorian attitudes toward women and their mental health. There's an oppressive kind of mystery, right out of a Shirley Jackson story or a Stephen King novel ..." - Unabridged Chick
"The plot complexity, historical and literary allusions, and depth of character in A White Room impressed me from start to finish ... The story becomes as darkly layered as the strange, weirdly inventive Victorian furniture that crowds Emeline's home ... and then Carroll takes it all up a notch, telling a tense, dark, but in the end very human story." - Military Spouse Book Review
Categories: Historical Drama, Literary Historical, Gothic Romance, Historical Suspense, Historical Women's Fiction, Victorian Historical Fiction, Historical Victorian Historical Fiction, Victorian Historical Romance.
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