What readers think of The Briar Club, plus links to write your own review.

Kate Quinn develops characters, whose personalities have strong qualities, unique backgrounds with both predictable and unpredictable actions. This story begins with part of the climax and develops in dated chapters that move back and forth over several years.
Kate Quinn is an excellent writer, who keeps you engaged, surprised, and brings her characters right into your life. This is another one of her excellent books.

Thanksgiving 1954, Briarwood House, Washington D.C. “If these walls could talk well, they are certainly listening.” Briarwood house is an old boarding house for women only. It has seen three wars, ten presidents, and countless tenants. But never a murder.
There are a cast of characters, all with a story to tell and their own secrets.
Grace March is the newest tenant and the heart of the story. She hosts dinner parties every Thursday night in her tiny room. All these women have are hot plates to cook with.

My favorite character was Nora, a policeman‘s daughter in love with a gangster. Bea was a delight learning about the all women baseball team she was on. Each chapter is devoted to one of the characters. This book focuses on the friendship these women had and how they became a family. There are many issues of the 1950s, including McCarthy politics and the changing roles of women.

This book is well written and researched. I also loved the recipes. A captivating story.

Narration by Saskia Maarleveld is always spot on. Her ability with accents and dialects is amazingly done to perfection. A favorite narrator of mine.

“It’s seen three wars, ten presidents, and countless tenants… but until tonight, never a murder. Now its walls smell of turkey, pumpkin pie, and blood, and the house is shocked down to its foundations.”

An eclectic group of women living at a boardinghouse, called Briarwood House, in Washington, D.C., set in the McCarthy era. The prologue is written from the POV of the house. Each chapter follows a different character, resulting in nine narrative voices giving us insight into what makes each of them tick. Grace, a tenant of the boardinghouse, holds a weekly impromptu dinner party in her attic-room for the other tenants, thus forming the Briar Club. Prior to this, the tenants have kept to themselves and now a diverse group of people have come together. They all have their fair share of secrets, some more terrible than others. When an act of violence tears apart the house, the women must decide once and for all: Who is the enemy in their midst?

“Quinn’s novels feature strong female protagonists who must navigate the constraints of their male-dominated cultures to assert their right to self-determination.” I thoroughly enjoy reading Quinn’s books and her writing style. The Briar Club is no exception. I liked the concept of the house becoming something of a character in its own right and having a voice in this story. I found each of the characters stories compelling and wanting to know all about them. I liked that she incorporated recipes at beginning of each chapter. She is a favorite author of mine and I always look forward to her next book.

Themes of McCarthyism, struggles of freedom, friendship, finding support and overcoming differences, misogyny, progression of insularity to community, abuse, systemic racism, and reproductive rights.