I’m so thrilled that my friend (and fellow Coloradoan) Jeannie Mobley’s gorgeous debut novel, Katerina’s Wish, is hitting bookstores today! Last week, we had a launch party over at EMU’s Debuts (featuring a post by yours truly on how to make Czech plum dumplings, which are an important meal in the book), and now the book is out in the world. You should strongly consider getting yourself a copy–after all, it’s received starred reviews from Kirkus and Publisher’s Weekly, not to mention five stars at Goodreads from me. 🙂

Here’s my review.

Katerina’s Wish by Jeannie Mobley

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Quite simply, I adored this book. It reminded me of the very best historical fiction I read as a kid, in that I didn’t feel like I was learning a history lesson at all–I just felt totally immersed in the world of the story and invested in the fate of the main character’s family as forces beyond their control threatened to crush them.

With skeptical-yet-hopeful Katerina, the author creates a wonderful character to guide us through life in a turn-of-the-century coal camp. She concocts various schemes to try to earn enough money to get her family out of the camp and into possession of a piece of land they can farm. But the powers that be at the camp aren’t about to let her have her way so easily.

I hope that this book finds its place both in classrooms and far beyond them, because anyone who enjoys a beautifully-written and tension-filled story will love it.

View all my reviews

You can read the opening pages of the book here on the Simon & Schuster website. Go get’em, Trina!