Sunflower Sisters

Readers were first introduced to American benefactor Caroline Ferriday through Lilac Girls, who assisted young girls who were freed from the Ravensbruck concentration camp. Now, in Sunflower Sisters, Kelly relates the tale of her ancestor Georgeanna Woolsey, a Union nurse who enlists in the Civil War and how her calling brings her into contact with two characters: Ann-May Wilson, a southern plantation mistress whose husband enlists, and Jemma, a young enslaved girl who is sold off and forced into the army.

It isn't the world of opulent parties and subdued attitudes of women of her rank that Georgeanne "Georgey" Woolsey belongs in. Georgey pursues her love of nursing as the war engulfs the country, even though at the time doctors thought women were an inconvenience on the front lines. She sets out to disprove their claims, and she and her sister Eliza travel from New York to Gettysburg, D.C., where they participate in the war effort and encounter the unspeakable evils of slavery.

Jemma is a slave in the South; she resides with her parents on the Peeler Plantation in Maryland. Both Patience and her sister live in constant fear of LeBaron, an abusive overseer who follows them everywhere, and Patience is a slave on the plantation next door. Jemma sees a chance to finally escape when she is sold by the ruthless plantation mistress Anne-May at the same time the Union army arrives, but only if she leaves her beloved family behind.

When her brother enlists in the Confederate army and her husband enlists in the Union Army, Anne-May is left to take care of Peeler Plantation alone. As the head of the home, she takes advantage of the chance to pursue her own goals and gets entangled in a covert spy network in the South, ultimately exposing herself to the end she deserves.

Sunflower Sisters, which draws inspiration from real-life experiences, offers a realistic and comprehensive portrayal of the Civil War era, encompassing the brutal and merciless plantations, the devastated city of New York, and the terrifying battlefields. This broad tale of women trapped in a nation on the verge of collapse and a culture struggling with unimaginable acts of racial cruelty is still incredibly relevant today.