Paula Wall, The Wilde Women

The Wilde Women

Atria, Apr 2007, $24.00

ISBN: 0743496213

In 1929 in Five Points, Tennessee, Pearl Wilde finds her fianc Bourne Cavanagh, oldest son of the owner of Cavanagh Whiskey Distillery, having sex with her sister Kat, who to add insult to injury is wearing her shoes. Pearl takes her shoes back and leaves for Chicago. As she travels overseas and across America, Pearl sends home post cards to Kat telling her to go to hell. However, late in 1932 she returns home to open up a whore house.

Pearl enters the dilapidated hardware store owned by Bud Marshall. The men who hang out there are awed by her except the handsomest nineteen year old Eddie McCowan. She hires him to work for her and tells his mom Maysie that she is pleased with her son's work. Bud cleans up his store and Maysie persuades the men to accept work at Pearl's place. The Mayor informs the town council they will do nothing to prevent Pearl opening up her business, the first new one in town in a decade.

Kat works at the Randolph and Hughes Shirt Factory where she sews sleeves onto the shirts. Mason Hughes, the son of the owner, sees her and wants her. She rejects his advances. Still Mason visits Kat who tells him to leave, but unbeknownst to both of them Pearl watches and realizes her sister wants this man because she pushes away those she desires; she now has her tool of revenge.

The ensemble cast contains unique characters that bring to life Depression-Era Tennessee while the storyline has an underlying whimsical feel as the Wilde sisters wink at American history yet brings a sense of time and place to the delightful storyline. The final wild twist will surprise readers as Paula Wall provides the audience with a fascinating historical romance starring two Wilde women, their men, and the fully developed townsfolk who observe the sibling war.

Harriet Klausner