Uprising by Margaret Peterson Haddix

If you've followed this blog for a while, you know I have a strange fascination with New York history, specifically the stretch from Lower Manhattan through Brooklyn to Coney Island.  I've read and reviewed quite a few books set in such--Saint Mazie (to be donated Tuesday actually, more on that in a sec.), The Church of Marvels, The Museum of Extraordinary Things, Up in the Old Hotel, Undertow, The Murder of Helen Jewett...

When I was cleaning the other day, I saw this book, of which we have two.  Back when we had a much a larger book budget, my predecessors would order 2, 3, 4, or more copies of popular novels.  How had I not read this already?  In looking through our catalog for more on the subject to see what else we had (perhaps for the video version of this), I realized we didn't have Mazie.  I guess I had borrowed that from WHPL, but didn't purchase it.  Fixed thanks to Amazon.

This is historical fiction, set during the year leading up to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.  One of the owner's children seeks out a survivor for answers.  Bella, who was a new-to-America Italian immigrant and spoke little English, is now a married mother.  She takes us back, very much like the grandmother in Titanic, to understand the lives of her and her friends.  Bella and Yetta, a Yiddish-speaking Russian immigrant, represent the girls who worked on the doomed floor, locked in by their bosses in atrocious conditions.  Former strikers who sought better, Yetta will die in the fire, just after getting engaged.  Their third friend is Jane, a young woman raised in a wealthy family who dreams of college and the right to vote.  She runs away from her rich, domineering father, later becoming a governess to the owner's children. 

I cried several times in reading this, but none so much as when I read the acknowledgements.  The Triangle building still stands, now a part of NYU.  Haddix was given the opportunity to tour the building, able to stand at the windows so many girls jumped out of, rather than burn to death.  I won't spoil what our author sees from that spot, but it's heartwrenching.

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