At the beginning of this book, we learn that Cora was transported by the Orphan Train in the late 1800’s to Kansas, where she is one of the lucky ones, chosen by a family that actually want a daughter, not just a servant. She thinks she is lucky again, when she meets and marries Alan Carlisle, a wealthy Wichita attorney. It is in Wichita that she learns of the Brooks family. It is their daughter, Louise, who she will chaperone to New York, so Louise can study with a dance troupe. Cora is fictional, but Louise Brooks was a real person. Louise really did go to New York in the 1920’s to study with a dance troupe; I don’t know if she had a chaperone. However, the fictional Cora uses this trip to visit the orphanage where she lived, in an attempt to learn about her birth parents.
This book covers a lot of ground with regard to American history, fashions, even at least one childhood game from the era. The Orphan Train was a real phenomenon, and we learn Cora’s feelings about that, as well as her thoughts on Prohibition, Women’s suffrage, the length of hemlines, racial integration, and a number of other issues. Although her summer in 1922 with Louise is the focus of the book, Cora lives into her nineties, so we get to see quite a bit of history through her eyes. Cora is impacted by her trip to New York, by Louise and Louise’s antics, as well as her attempt to learn about her parentage, both what she learns and what she does to learn it.
Cora’s trip to New York changes her. It forces her to reexamine her outlook and values on a number of issues, and she takes this newfound knowledge back to Wichita with her. This puts her out of step, or maybe just ahead of, her friends and neighbors. She kept her origins as an orphan a secret from everyone but her husband, in order to gain acceptance. During the course of the book, Cora learns several other secrets, both her own and other people’s, that she also keeps.
If this was your family, how would you research them? Cora likely grew up with the dictum that a lady should only be in the newspaper three times; when she is born, when she marries, and when she dies. Genealogists hope for much more than that! As a movie star, Louise Brooks was in multiple publications, many times. And Cora would have been in the local papers later in her life as well, due to her social activism. As an Orphan Train rider, her challenge to discover more about her parentage is not uncommon. Many adoptees hit a brick wall when they try to get any kind of records at all from orphanages or governmental sources. Cora did not have access to DNA testing, which is something adoptees now are finding very helpful. While I don’t recommend Cora’s method, it was really the only recourse she had, and would probably only work in a book of fiction.