Price: $21.99 - $4.99
(as of May 25, 2025 09:39:18 UTC – Details)
B0CKT8V7QD,
“Quinn evocatively balances the outward cheerfulness of the 1950s with historical observations exploring racism, misogyny, homophobia and political persecution in this sharply drawn, gripping novel.” – People Magazine
The New York Times bestselling author of The Diamond Eye and The Rose Code returns with a haunting and powerful story of female friendships and secrets in a Washington, DC, boardinghouse during the McCarthy era.
Washington, DC, 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital where…
, 4.5,
Reviewer: JayNikki
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Secrets, Sisterhood, and a Twist You Won’t See Coming
Review: The Briar Club by Kate Quinn is an easy five-star favorite—captivating, emotionally layered, and impossible to put down. Set in a 1950s Washington, D.C. boardinghouse, Quinn brings to life a remarkable cast of women, each grappling with her own secrets, dreams, and struggles, all woven together into a beautifully crafted story of friendship, ambition, and resilience.What I loved most is how you can see a piece of yourself in each of these women—their vulnerabilities, strengths, and determination—but somehow Grace was the one I connected with most, even with the shocking twist at the end. And let me say—I never saw that twist coming! Quinn’s ability to keep the tension simmering while still delivering genuine emotional moments is what makes this book so exceptional.With its rich historical detail, unforgettable characters, and perfectly timed surprises, The Briar Club is everything I crave in historical fiction. It’s a novel that stays with you long after you finish, and I absolutely adored every page.
Reviewer: Jean
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: A story’s thread that yearns to be unraveled
Review: Once I got into the book it sailed ahead. It was just the beginning that was confusing. A lot like reading an instruction manual and wondering what it means. I can’t help but think if Grace’s character had been deepened in the beginning to suggest she was hiding from someone in Russia after sneaking into the US the stories of the other tenants would have fueled more curiosity. Would McCarthy find her, would their jobs be in jeopardy? Did she have a link to local criminal behavior? That being said it was a good read.
Reviewer: Tabby1249
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Absolutely terrific
Review: It’s not often that you find a book with characters so finally drawn that you don’t have to put much effort into remembering who each of them are even though there’s a fair number of them. Not only do you not have trouble remembering, you come to care for them as if they are people that you actually know. I found my self rooting for them, crying with them, and in some cases hating them. All if these things being true for me, this is one of the best books that I’ve read in recent years.Set during the 1950s, the reader is treated to what is happening in the world in the early part of that decade. McCarthyism, the Korean war, and the place of women in the world are all given treatment in this book and are crucial for understanding the motivations of the characters. So for this reader, the setting is another highlight.The story is tightly woven, fast paced, and at times, keeps you on the edge of your seat. Understandably it might be hard to believe that when you know that the set in a womens’ only boarding house in Washington DC. This is a truly terrific book and I urge you to give it a read. I don’t think you’ll be sorry.
Reviewer: Jeanice
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: great read!!!!!
Review: This was such a great read! The way the author had given a story to each of these ladies, tied it up to when a murder has happened, is such a great rope tie! I love how in the end of the book the author had given The characters background as to where she had found them, and acknowledges parts that are fictional! Overall, this is a great read if you are looking for a historical fiction, and a what happened on that night!
Reviewer: baroque
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Great characters and great story
Review: Really enjoyed and wasn’t sure of the ending until the end.Had to keep reading it. Each chapter of the individual characters are very well written.A good story of people living their lives and getting to know each other.How hard times can bring people together.A good testament on Soviet life. The war in Ukraine has a long bitter history.This book gives us insight on how people from different countries cherish the American dream.
Reviewer: Thomas M McMahon
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Loved the characters
Review: The characters were all relatable, even the two that you did not want to like. Another great book by this author.
Reviewer: Olivia
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Didn’t want it to end!
Review: I loved this book from start to finish. The attention to details and historical references are captivating. And this is coming from someone who doesn’t usually like to read about history or pay much attention to historical references. There have been several times in my life where I could have used a group like The Briar Club. And had I lived during the 50s I very much would have loved a room at The Briarwood house to get through those times.I found this book enjoyable and one I wanted to ‘sit in’ for a while, like ‘City of Girls’. And I have recommended it to friends who loved that book as well.
Reviewer: Haley
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title: 2.5 ⭐️
Review: *sigh* I know I’m in the minority here but this book was not for me. I went into this thinking it would be like a regular historical fiction. It is not. It’s several small character stories thrown together in a mystery that happens to take place in the 50s.Pros- I loved the recipes. I screenshot some of them. I thought it was a very unique and different way to break up the chapters.- The beginning of the story really draws you in.- I enjoyed the writing for the most part.- I did not have any big triggers in this book.Cons (these might be pros for others)- Almost entirely character driven instead of a mix of plot and character.- Too many POVs. It got very confusing and I ended up having to Google characters to remember. I think I would have liked it better if it had fewer POVs and was more focused.- It is pretty slow. I almost DNF’d this at least three times.- the ending felt pretty anti-climactic.- LONG chapters. I think when chapter was around 60 pages. I need short chapters to keep my attention. The recipes in the chapters helped some to break them up, but not enough.All in all, I thought this book was OK. I’m not sure I would recommend it. It was far from terrible, but not for me.0 🌶️TW: domestic violence, racism, xenophobia, sexism.* please disregard grammatical errors due to voice texting. Thanks.
Reviewer: Amazon Customer
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I started reading this book slightly dubious whether I would read it to the end, but then got so engrossed in it I couldn’t put it down. I think the characterisation of each person is so good, they all became real to me and I loved most of them. Thank you Kate Quinn for giving me such pleasure.
Reviewer: Amazon Customer
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I loved every character and every moment of this book. For the first very few pages, I thought it might be a bit of a “light-weight” compared to the author’s previous work, but I soon realized how wrong I was. Beautifully constructed, it sucks the reader right in to where you don’t want to put the book down. I devoured each of these characters. Their strengths and weaknesses were completely exposed and the strengths far outweighed the weaknesses. Wonderful story line, great twist at the end. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.
Reviewer: OlgaNM
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I have heard a lot about Kate Quinn and read many glowing reviews of her novels but had not yet read any. I was intrigued by this one, which was on offer as well, and I took the chance. And, although I cannot compare it to the rest of her books, I enjoyed it, and I think her popularity is well-deserved.This novel has a pretty original structure, and I’ve seen some reviewers who are fans of the author who didn’t appreciate the novelty, but I thought it worked well, and it made for a kaleidoscopic effect. This is something of a coral or ensemble novel made up of many different stories, and they all come together beautifully and recreate an interesting period of US post-WWII history: the 1950s.The novel centres on a house located in Washington D.C., Briarwood House, whose owner, Mrs. Nilsson (a rather mean character) rents rooms to women. She lives with her teenage son, and her younger daughter because her husband ‘abandoned’ them when he returned from WWII. The house has its point of view chapters, which provide interludes from the other sections of the book, each one dedicated to one of the female lodgers and their stories (told in the third person). The house tells the story of what is happening on a particular day, Thanksgiving 1954. Something quite traumatic has taken place, but the house and the author only give us snippets of the information, and then the story starts in earnest going back to 1950, with a chapter from Pete (the landowner’s son) point of view. He shows the house around to a woman, a new lodger, called Grace, who will become the heart of the place and will gather all the women together, creating the “club” of the title, whereby the women (and Mrs. Nilsson’s two children) meet in her room every Thursday evening and each week one of them cooks a meal for the rest. Grace also starts bringing some life and cheer into the house, manages to convince the owner to loosen a bit her rules, and manipulates her into making other changes.Each chapter, dedicated to one of the lodgers, also contains a recipe, the one they cook for the weekly meal (usually) that tends to say a lot about their origins, who they are, or who they’d like to be. Apart from those chapters about each woman (some longer than others), which tend to go back in time and cover roughly the period the women have been living there, with some memories of their past thrown in, there are also letters from Grace addressed to Kitty, although we don’t discover who Kitty is until very late in the novel, because Grace’s story is the last one (apart from an epilogue) we get to read, for a very good reason. No spoilers.As I have said, not all the chapters are as in-depth or as long as each other, and not all the women will be interesting or likeable for all the readers, but I’d be surprised if many readers don’t feel able to connect to any of them. My favourites had to be Nora (I would happily had read a whole book about this woman, from an Irish family of local policemen, a Roman Catholic expected to do anything for the family and put up with corruption and mafia-style behaviour from those around her, who escapes and is determined to make her own way, even though her heart has other ideas), and Grace (I won’t say much about her, as the big twist of the story has something to do with her, but she is fabulous). I also liked aspects of the other women and the topics covered in their stories made for fascinating reading. Oh, and I also enjoyed the chapters from the point of view of the house. I like Briarwood House. And a dog and a cat that appear in the novel (but they don’t have their own chapters).Apart from the women (and we also have a British young wife and mother whose doctor husband is in Korea and who seems to be perfection herself; a Jewish immigrant and art lover who managed to escape Berlin during the war, but who had to pay such a big price for her safety that she is now bitter and angry; a P. E. teacher who played baseball professionally but suffered a serious injury and had to give up; a woman whose family lost it all and who had to learn to do anything to survive and hide her real self; a young woman who wanted to escape a rural community by finding the right husband and who is obsessed by the anti-communist messages…) we also get to meet many fascinating secondary characters: a local businessman and jazz club owner(who sometimes uses gangster-like methods); some of the jazz musicians (white and black) who play at the club; a Federal Agent conflicted about the job; the wife of a Senator’s son, from Bermuda, who doesn’t always agree with what goes on at home; a black senator who had to face racism and discrimination and a female senator who dared talk against Senator McCarthy; several female baseball players; New York artists and their representatives; people who work at the Federal Archives and a local library…The book, through these women and their stories, also illustrates some of the themes and subjects that permeated the history of the period in the USA: Veterans from WWII suffering from PTSD; the Korean war, so important for those involved, but not talked about much in the media; McCarthy and the Red Scare, with the communist witch-hunt and what it cost to so many innocents; the Rosenberg Trial (more of the same) and stories of Russian spies infiltrating society for years (like in the series The Americans); the Lavender scare; Jewish immigration to the US; some of the historical events that took place in other countries during WWII; family planning, birth-control, and women’s role on it (and the pill); racism and the scandal mixed-raced relationships caused in many places; police corruption; the women’s professional baseball league; the Atomic Bomb and its consequences; Baking competitions (nothing new under the Sun, it seems); American Abstract Artists and their exhibitions, and many more.I have mentioned that I enjoyed some chapters more than others, but I did like learning about all of the women, and I thought the different chapters worked together well, and I didn’t find them confusing, despite the diverse points of view and chronologies, and although I should have seen the twist coming, I didn’t. I enjoyed the ending, though, and I liked how those women, from such different backgrounds, ages, social standings, and outlooks, came together and became a family (well, almost all of them).The story is great, and I really enjoyed reading it, but I also have to agree with reviewers who say that the author’s note at the end is almost as good as the novel. She shares her inspiration for the novel (which came during the pandemic, in bits and bobs) and then goes into detail about how each chapter and what happens to each woman was inspired by topics relevant to the era. She also shares her real-life inspiration for some of the characters (protagonists and secondary) and expands on some of the changes she made to fit all the historical events into the chronology. As she says, it is fundamental not to read her note before reading the novel, as that would be a sure way to spoil it for readers. Having said that, don’t forget to read it. It offers a good overview of many of the important issues in the USA in the decade of the 1950s, and it is concisely and compellingly written.So, yes, I loved the novel, I recommend it especially to people who like ensemble novels with strong female protagonists, and those who enjoy a detailed historical background that melds nicely into the action rather than slowing it. People interested in the decade of the 1950s in the USA who love historical fiction, and fans of the author, should not miss this novel.And I leave you with the author’s own definition of the book so that you can make your mind up as to its suitability:I like to think of ‘The Briar Club’ as my postpandemic book, a novel that erupted out of a desperate need for light, for connection, for friendship. A need (like Grace’s) to gather round the table, to feed, and to fix. I hope you enjoyed the results.I sure did!
Reviewer: Kir Moar
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Very enjoyable reading all the different storylines in one book! Great insight into the early 1950s in USA. Loved the ending.
Reviewer: Kerry Cook
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I enjoyed the diversity of female characters giving the women a broader scope than what is typically thought of in the 1940’s.a good read, enjoyed the story but the wrap up at then end seemed too abrupt for me given how ‘drawn out’ the first part of the book seemed.I do love Kate Quinn’s writing though. Characters are exceptionally developed.
, Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Spies & Politics > Espionage, #Briar #Club #Thrilling #Powerful #Story #Female #Friendships #Secrets,
Instantly Access Your FREE Children’s Books Here!
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases; I may earn a commission from qualifying purchases as an affiliate.
