Overview

""What has possessed her to try to shake Lady Celia's hand? Shouldn't she have curtseyed? Do women still curtsey? May's been away for so long now, she's got city ways. She tries to hide her surprise as Lady Celia takes her proffered hand. Close up, she's as sleek as a seal in her houndstooth suit and hat that fits close to her head like a helmet. There's something intense about her stance as she holds the long stick of her cigarette between two fingers. What made her breach the close, dead air of the waiting room to speak to two anxious, hungry strangers fraying at the seams?"" In the final volume of Ancestral Virgins, in the aftermath of war, the lives of Celia Ingham and May Hallam draw closer together as both bear the weight of a shocking family secret. Celia is struggling to accept the death of the only man she can ever love, and May is desperate to find her sister Lily, who has disappeared after becoming pregnant with her employer's child. As Celia and May each go in search of what they need to feel whole, they meet face to face in a railway station waiting room. By the time the train departs, one must reconcile herself to a troubling and unwelcome truth, while the other is on her way to a new life with an unexpected infusion of hope. Ancestral Virgins will appeal to fans of Sarah Waters and Kate Atkinson and to anyone enthralled by period dramas in film and television.

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Reviews

Move over Downton Abbey! Fiona J. Mackintosh reimagines the family saga with this daring trilogy that puts women in their rightful place at the center of the story. Told with panache and filled with vivid and unforgettable characters, Ancestral Virgins draws you into a bygone world that echoes long after its poignant ending. -Keith Donohue, author of the New York Times bestseller The Stolen Child

Author Information

Fiona J. Mackintosh is a Scottish-American author whose fiction draws from both sides of the Atlantic. Her flash fiction collection, The Yet Unknowing World, was published by Ad Hoc Fiction in 2021, and her debut novel Ancestral Virgins will be published in 2026. Her flashes have been selected for Best Small Fictions in 2023 and 2019, and her short stories have been finalists for the Cairde Word, Colm Toíbín, Bristol, Galley Beggar, Exeter, and Fish Short Story Prizes. She is a proud recipient of an Individual Artist's Award from the Maryland State Arts Council. www.fionajmackintosh.com

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