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The Downstairs Girl

  • Book
  • Aug 13, 2019
  • #HistoricalFiction
Stacey Lee
@staceyleeauthor
(Author)
www.goodreads.com
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4.00/5 21.1k ratings
1 Recommender
1 Mention
1 Collection
Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9781524740955. From the founding member of We Need Diverse Books comes a powerful novel about identity, betrayal, and the meaning of family. By day... Show More

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9781524740955.

From the founding member of We Need Diverse Books comes a powerful novel about identity, betrayal, and the meaning of family.

By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, "Dear Miss Sweetie." When her column becomes wildly popular, she uses the power of the pen to address some of society's ills, but she's not prepared for the backlash that follows when her column challenges fixed ideas about race and gender. While her opponents clamor to uncover the secret identity of Miss Sweetie, a mysterious letter sets Jo off on a search for her own past and the parents who abandoned her as a baby. But when her efforts put her in the crosshairs of Atlanta's most notorious criminal, Jo must decide whether she, a girl used to living in the shadows, is ready to step into the light. With prose that is witty, insightful, and at times heartbreaking, Stacey Lee masterfully crafts an extraordinary social drama set in the New South.

(From Goodreads)

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Number of Pages: 374

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Annika Barranti Klein @noirbettie · Nov 19, 2021
  • Curated in 8 Fictional Books About Writers and the Writing Life
Set in the late 1800s, this is a charming YA novel about Jo Kuan, lady’s maid by day and “Dear Sweetie” by night. She writes an advice column for the gentile ladies of Atlanta, doing her best to help fix society’s ills. When she pushes back on race and gender roles, angry readers try to find out who Miss Sweetie is. Then Jo receives an anonymous letter that could lead to the identity of her birth parents, and she has a lot of decisions to make.
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