A Short History of Women

Review by Helen McAlpin of the San Francisco Chronicle:

The common thread in Kate Walbert's fiction is an exploration, at once intellectual and lyrical, of women throughout the 20th century (and into the 21st) coming up against society's limiting expectations and constraints.

Her new novel, "A Short History of Women," is a complex, exquisitely rendered consideration of what used to be called "The Woman Question." Told through the interwoven stories of five generations of highly intelligent but variously thwarted women, it considers women's place in society over the course of more than a century, a time frame that spans both world wars and our current multi-fronted wars.