“Technically, part of it survived the fire.”
Briar’s heart sank. “No. So it’s not over?”
“It’s over. Isodora is gone. Her spindle is gone. No more curses. But this remains.” He held out the wrapped bundle she’d been waiting to see. “It won’t hurt you. It’s actually a family heirloom. Made by Aurora’s father for her mother at Aurora’s birth. I’m glad it survived. It’s a symbol of love, of hope for the future.”
Briar opened the bundle under the moonlight. It was the beautiful whorl, the disk that made the spindle spin. She ran her finger over the carved roses. There were now two darkened scorch marks that marred the wood.
“This was in my apron pocket. How did it end up in the mill?”
Henry frowned. “It’s hard to explain anything with this spindle. Maybe Isodora found it in the cottage when we weren’t looking. Maybe one of the boys had it?”
Briar handed it back, but Henry refused to take it. “It belongs in your family,” Briar said. “You should keep it.”
He shook his head. “That one hasn’t been our favorite heirloom.”
She held on to it with both hands. “Thank you.” She would keep it as a reminder of what she could have lost if she hadn’t been so blind to what was right in front of her.
Author’s Note
Part of the fun of writing a historically based novel is trying to wrap a fantastical story around reality. What parts are real in Spindle?
Conditions in the cotton mills, the boardinghouses, the games they played in the 1890s, the lectures the operatives attended, the introduction of the safety bicycle…all real. (Hope you liked the quote from Susan B. Anthony about women, freedom, and the bicycle!)
Cotton mills were one of the first places where women joined together and realized the power they had to help each other when they acted together. Early mills, while not ideal places to work by today’s standards, offered young women a chance to earn their own money, a novelty for many of the hardworking farm girls who flocked to the cities. But, as time went on, good intentions gave way to deteriorating conditions, and operatives went on strike to try to change their increasingly difficult lot.
In writing this novel, I wanted to get past the photos of sad and tired mill workers (mostly taken in the early 1900s by photographer Lewis Hine, whose powerful images were instrumental in shedding light on child labor) and remind us that these were real people who lived and loved, worked and played.
At the time this novel is set, the women’s suffrage movement was well under way. However, Mrs. Tuttle and Miss Nan Whitaker are invented characters, as I couldn’t find any suffrage or WCTU speakers who were in the area during my time frame. I patterned them after several other speakers, and in Mrs. Tuttle’s case, had her quote Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s famous “Solitude of Self” speech from 1892, just two years before this story takes place. Mrs. Stanton quite coincidentally mentions an example of a girl of sixteen, which was so fitting to Briar’s circumstances I had to include it.
Sunrise Valley is my invention, but located near Rutland, Vermont, a real place and the location of the first polio epidemic in the USA during the summer of 1894. Also true to Vermont history, the Queen City Cotton Company built a new cotton factory in Burlington with 26,000 spindles in 1894.
The first of the strikes in the great railroad strike of 1894 started May 10. The issue was primarily a disagreement between workers making and repairing Pullman sleeper cars and Mr. Pullman. The conflict affected passengers, mail, and freight, and lasted until mid-late July of that year.
Lastly, did you catch the Easter eggs in the story? Briar’s last name, Jenny, comes from the spinning jenny, an invention from the 1700s that utilized a row of spindles instead of a singular one as in a spinning wheel—get it? She’s a spinner girl, a spinning Jenny. Ah, history is fun! Also, when the safety bicycle was being introduced, I mentioned Annie Londonderry, who set out on a bicycle trip around the world after the fashion of Nellie Bly’s trip around the world in eighty days. Well, that Easter egg was a nod at my novel Liz and Nellie, which was a little side project I worked on between my fairy tale stories for Entangled TEEN.
The following resources were immensely helpful in helping me ground my characters in both the late 1800s time period, and in the life of a cotton mill operative: Out of Ireland: The Story of Irish Immigration to America, DVD narrated by Kelly McGillis and written by Paul Wagner; The Lowell Offering: Writings by New England Mill Women (1840-1845) by Benita Eisler; The Belles of New England: The Women of the Textile Mills and the Families Whose Wealth They Wove by William Moran; Limping Through Life: A Farm Boy’s Polio Memoir by Jerry Apps; also, the novels Lyddie by Katherine Paterson and Counting on Grace by Elizabeth Winthrop.
Acknowledgments
The acknowledgments section always seems to sneak up on me when my brain is exhausted from all the work my editors put me through… But what amazing editors I have! Stacy Abrams and Lydia Sharp challenge me to become a better writer with each edit pass. I am so grateful for their dedication. Layer by layer they pull the details of the story out of me, and when I’m stuck, they’ve got great ideas to get me going again. Thank you, ladies, for caring so much! Along with their tireless work is a whole team working away at Entangled: Christine Chhun, Melissa Montovani, Melanie Smith, Heather Riccio, Meredith Johnson, Lisa Knapp, Louisa Maggio, and Toni Kerr.
A quick shout-out to the booksellers, librarians, and English teachers who were so welcoming to me and my debut Cinderella duology and are kindly anticipating this book’s release. You all rock the stacks: Brandi Stewart, Faith Hochhalter, Kirsten Flint, Dallas Parke (and family!), Allyson Bullock, Jared Duran, Jessica Wells, Traci Avalos, and James Blasingame.
What is a book without good beta readers to find plot holes, lapses in logic, and the joy in the story? Thank you Kristi Doyle, Sarah Chanis, Andrea Huelsenbeck, and Rebekah Slayton.
And, as always, I have to acknowledge the support of my family. The writing life can be an odd and unpredictable one, so everyone has to stay flexible. God knew what He was doing when He put us together. I need you guys, and I’m so glad that you need me too. (Because you do, teenagers of mine! You do.)
Now, you readers: I hope you enjoyed this story as much as I enjoyed writing it for you. If you want to stay in touch, the best way is through my newsletter. I send out exclusive content just for you and read all my own email. Sign up on my website: ShonnaSlayton.com.
About the Author
SHONNA SLAYTON writes historical fairy tales for Entangled TEEN. Her books include: Cinderella’s Dress, Cinderella’s Shoes, and Spindle. She finds inspiration in reading vintage diaries written by teens, who despite using different slang, sound a lot like teenagers today. When not writing, Shonna enjoys amaretto lattes andspending time with her husband and children in Arizona. The best way to keep in touch with her is to sign up for her newsletter at ShonnaSlayton.com.
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Table of Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
More from Shonna Slayton
More from Entangled Teen
Spindle Page 27
