A beautifully-written, sweet YA novel about an ornithology-loving girl who feels trapped by the sexist conventions of her time, until she meets an alluring flapper named Isabella. I had trouble believing in the book's 1920s setting, but I can't pinpoint why.
Also, wow, the lovely cover! ( )

teen/adult historical fiction with LGBTQ interest (1920s poor city girl meets worldly flapper girl)
This was written in more of the classical lit style (the style that does not have appeal for some teens), so don't expect high drama or suspense.

The Silhouette of a Sparrow is a charming book. Probably one of the best I've read this year. It's 1926. Sixteen year old Garnet has been sent to a Minnesota resort to stay with cousins, Mrs. Harrington and her stuffy daughter Hannah, while her mother tries to make her father better. Ever since returning from WW I, he hasn't been the same. While away, Garnet ponders her boyfriend Teddy's "important question" while also thinking about alternatives to marriage, such as college.

Her friend Alice writing that she got a summer job prompts Garnet to ask her mother if she, too, could work. Repsonding positively, Mrs. Harrington gets Garnet a job in a hat shop where she meets, Isabella, a dance hall dancer who ran away from home three years earlier at age 15 and is living on her own. Again, this causes Garnet to ponder her future, both in terms of college and love.

Lesbian relations are no stranger to Garnet as her Aunt Rachel lives with her partner Sarah.

I'll leave it at that. Molly Beth Griffin has created great characters, everyone having something to hide. But truly, Garnet and Isabella take the prize and all you want is for them to stay together. At a scant 188 pages, Silhouette of a Sparrow says it all.I'd love to read more from Molly Beth Griffin. ( )

I borrowed this book from the library, but I think I would like to own a copy. It was published in 2012, but took until just this past week to come to my attention, and I am sad for that. It should be better known and a staple of lists of f/f stories.

Silhouette of a Sparrow is mellow and contemplative, but bright and warm. The summer lakeside setting infuses the narrative voice: even though it isn't really a slow-paced story at all, it feels to me like a quiet, relaxing day, toasting gently in the sun as the water laps at the shore and birds call overhead. The story isn't entirely sweetness and light, as my description of the narrative might suggest. It takes place in a wealthy, white lake resort in 1926 and the story doesn't pretend that the people populating that time and place weren't homophobic, or sexist, or racist, and it also deals with WW1 shellshock in Garnet's dad and the class differences between Garnet, from St Paul, and Isabella, a flapper originally from a poor farm family.

This is a book about Garnet choosing to make her own path in life, and how she discovers the options available to her. She is at Lake Minnetonka thanks to her father's cousin, a very wealthy woman, and her teenage daughter, who represent much of the old way of doing things. Hannah, the girl, isn't expected to do anything but marry and Mrs. Harrington, the cousin, has little truck with modern styles, much less female independence. When Garnet asks for permission to find a summer job (for pocket money, and a little bit of variety - the Harringtons are very boring), Mrs. Harrington only agrees because Garnet is merely middle class, and Mrs. H would prefer not to have her around. Garnet works for Miss Maple, an older woman who has chosen to never marry and instead manage her own hat shop, where Garnet meets Isabella, another woman who has struck off on her own. She is not much older than Garnet, but works as a dancer and dresses very stylishly with bobbed black hair, bright red lipstick, and dresses that show her knees and arms. Garnet yearns to be like Miss Maple and Isabella, but she feels obligation to her family to follow the traditional route Mrs. Harrington and Hannah represent, and to marry the boy she has been going with back home.

In the course of things, Garnet and Isabella strike up a summer romance, which is sweet and gentle, but by no means chaste. I really liked the way their friendship grew and how Garnet began to see possibilities open before her. They spend a lot of time in the more secluded areas outdoors, to avoid prying eyes (after all, Isabella is scandalous, and Garnet can't risk Mrs. H revoking permission to wander on her own), which leads to lovely descriptions of the lake and resort area. Garnet is a junior member of the Audubon Society, which adds a nice thematic touch as she describes the birds she sees and compares people to birds as well.

At less than 200 pages, this isn't a very long book - honestly, I feel like being cliché so I will: it's fleeting, like summer. Warm and joyful while it is here, but eventually it ends, and to make it longer would ruin what makes it so good. ( )

I was utterly charmed from the first page of this historical novel. Set in the 1920's, it tells the story of Garnet Richards, a young woman who chafes at the strict rules her mother, and then her aunt lay out for her, ladylike pastimes, like embroidering for her hope chest, marriage after high school. When Garnet is sent away for the summer, to a lakeside resort with her even stricter aunt, she meets a flapper named Isabella.

I really loved the way this evolved, the descriptions of the setting, and of Garnet's cutouts of paper birds- transforming her passion for learning and science into something more ladylike... and the way her friendship, and relationship with Isabella evolve. I zoomed through it in one sitting. ( )