Page from a Tennessee Journal: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

Howard, Francine Thomas

United States

BRILLIANCE AUDIO ^

It is 1913, shortly before the start of the First World War, and Annalaura is alone again. Her gambling, womanizing husband has left the plot they sharecrop in rural Tennessee--why or for how long she does not know. Without food or money and with her future tied to the fate of the season's tobacco crop, Annalaura struggles to raise her four children. When help comes in the form of an amorous landowner, who is she to turn it--and him--away? In this remarkable first novel, as bracingly original as it is exquisitely rendered, Francine Howard tells a moving story of American desire and ambition and the tragic, slippery boundaries of race under Jim Crow. "Based on a true family story, this haunting first novel admirably revisits a painful time in history. Too often historical novels about women indulge in anachronistic explorations of feminism, but this novel admirably avoids that trap and instead portrays realistic characters dealing with their difficult lot in life." --Booklist

Paris Noire: A Novel

Paris, 1944: The city steams in the summer heat, bristling with anticipation of its impending liberation. It marks the beginning of the end of a devastating war...and the beginning of a year like no other for Marie-Therese Brillard and her children, Colette and Christophe. They first came to Paris from Martinique in 1928, among the immigrants of color who flocked to France in the 1920s and '30s. They settled in Montmartre, a vibrant neighborhood teeming with musicians, writers, and artists, and began the arduous task of building a new life in a new land. The rigors of World War II only added to the adversity beneath which Marie-Therese struggled. Its culmination should offer her relief, and yet... When Colette and Christophe are swept up in the jubilation following the Nazis' departure, each embarks upon a passionate love affair that Marie-Therese fears will cost them their dreams--or their lives. Twenty-year-old Colette begins a dalliance with a white Frenchman, a romance discouraged for the quadroon child of an immigrant. Her older brother Christophe becomes the lover of the beautiful wife of a French freedom fighter, a relationship Marie-Therese suspects can only end in heartache and bloodshed. Adding yet another complication is the man she calls Monsieur Lieutenant, the handsome black soldier whose mere presence intrigues Marie-Therese as no man has before. Set against the turbulent backdrop of wartime France, Paris Noire is a dramatic and engrossing novel that brings to vivid life the remarkable people once relegated to the fringes of history.

Three women embark on the trip of a lifetime. Three men learn what it means to love. Shy Elle Lytle, proper Leigh Hartwell and brash Olivia Baskins are traveling the world. A stop in Sengal challenges the women to not only rethink their identities, but their heritage as they spar and parry with the African born men they are attracted to. Richard Smythe-Phillips, Charles Dawud-Phillips and Abdou Dhanka understand what is both sad and great about Africa. As they pursue the women they are coming to love, they provide understanding into what makes Africa unique and beautiful. From the wilds of Africa to the exotic splendor of India and Hong Kong, the three couples struggle to understand their feelings and the bonds growing between them before realizing that some things are just meant to be.

The Sisterhood Hyphen

Romance

Contemporary

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Fourteen years after the end of slavery, Lord Henry Hardin and his wife, Lady Bertha, enjoy an entitled life in Union County, Arkansas. Until he faces a devastating reality: Bertha is unable to bear children. If Henry doesn’t produce an heir, the American branch of his family name will die out. So Henry, desperate to preserve his aristocratic family lineage, does the unthinkable.
When Salome, a former slave and Henry’s mistress, gives birth to a white-skinned, blue-eyed daughter, Henry orders a reluctant Lady Bertha to claim the child as their own…allowing young Margaret to pass into the white world of privilege.
As Margaret grows older, unaware of her true parentage, devastating circumstances threaten to shroud her in pain and shame…but then, ultimately, in revelation. Despite rumors about Margaret’s true identity, Salome is determined to transform her daughter’s bitter past into her secure future while Henry goes to extraordinary lengths to protect his legacy. Spanning decades and generations, marked by tragedy and redemption, this unforgettable saga illuminates a family’s fight for their name, for survival, and for true freedom.

The Daughter of Union County: A Novel

Dramas & Plays

Lake Union Publishing

Fourteen years after the end of slavery, Lord Henry Hardin and his wife, Lady Bertha, enjoy an entitled life in Union County, Arkansas. Until he faces a devastating reality: Bertha is unable to bear children. If Henry doesn’t produce an heir, the American branch of his family name will die out. So Henry, desperate to preserve his aristocratic family lineage, does the unthinkable.When Salome, a former slave and Henry’s mistress, gives birth to a white-skinned, blue-eyed daughter, Henry orders a reluctant Lady Bertha to claim the child as their own…allowing young Margaret to pass into the white world of privilege.As Margaret grows older, unaware of her true parentage, devastating circumstances threaten to shroud her in pain and shame…but then, ultimately, in revelation. Despite rumors about Margaret’s true identity, Salome is determined to transform her daughter’s bitter past into her secure future while Henry goes to extraordinary lengths to protect his legacy. Spanning decades and generations, marked by tragedy and redemption, this unforgettable saga illuminates a family’s fight for their name, for survival, and for true freedom.

Scattered Seed: A Novel

Three sisters navigate the horrors of the Middle Passage in a powerful historical novel about family, honor, and the will to live, by the author of The Daughter of Union County. 
Timbuktu, western Africa, 1706. Folashade, the fourteen-year-old daughter of a professor of linguistics, is sent south with her older sisters, Bibi and Adaeze, to endure the painful ceremony that a girl on the cusp of womanhood is expected to. 
In Djenné, on the banks of the Niger, the sisters’ fate and that of their fellow Bambara are changed forever when they’re kidnapped, marched toward grueling indignities on Gorée Island, and eventually hauled aboard an English slaver bound for the Americas. Before they are inevitably separated, Folashade, Bibi, and Adaeze plot to keep their memories alive. 
Drawing from her ancestry, Francine Thomas Howard gives an authentic voice to the horrors of the Middle Passage―and an empowered one to a girl who is determined to survive, to honor her father and Timbuktu, and to ensure that her and her sisters’ names will never be forgotten.

A family secret is the inspiration for Francine Thomas Howard's remarkable debut novel, set in 1913, that focuses on a white couple who own a rural Tennessee farm and an African-American husband and wife, sharecroppers who work their land. 
In the novel, Annalaura Welles is forced to become the mistress of landowner Alex McNaughton after her husband, John, abandons her and her children. But trouble ensues when McNaughton develops genuine feelings for her. A sexual relationship is culturally acceptable, but love is not. 
When John returns, Annalaura must make decisions that will preserve the lives of the main characters and a baby who's on the way. It's a story as suspenseful as it is rich in detail about the evolving relationships between blacks and whites and men and women in the rural south. 
Page From a Tennessee Journal is also of note because it's one of the first books to be offered by AmazonEncore, a publishing program from Amazon that includes books that may not catch the eye of traditional publishers. -- Carol Memmott, USA TODAY

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Howard, Francine Thomas. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Howard, Francine Thomas

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Howard, Francine Thomas. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Page from a Tennessee Journal: A Novel

Page from a Tennessee Journal: A Novel

Paris Noire: A Novel

Paris Noire: A Novel

The Sisterhood Hyphen

The Daughter of Union County: A Novel

The Daughter of Union County: A Novel

Scattered Seed: A Novel

Scattered Seed: A Novel

Page from a Tennessee Journal: A Novel