Laurie Morin

This is the first portion of Chapter 1 of my dual timeline historical novel, Chasing the Seventies. It contains the inciting incident that sent the main protagonist, Kate Gardner, on a path to question her beliefs as a Millennial-era woman who grew up believing that women could have it all. 

 

It was the morning after the night that was never supposed to happen. Every major media outlet in America had predicted that Hillary Rodham Clinton was a shoo-in to become the 45^th President of the United States. Polls showed her sweeping the Electoral College and popular vote by wide margins.

 Excited about the prospects of electing our first female President, I invited five of my closest friends to watch the election returns. We all dressed in Suffragist white to honor the women who had made this all possible. The champagne was on ice, ready to pop the cork when the first network called the election for Clinton.

 The Associated Press announced its first projections around 7 p.m. ET. As predicted, Clinton won Vermont, and Donald J. Trump claimed Indiana and Kentucky. Wine and conversation flowed as we waited until the polls closed on the West Coast for the next projections. 

 “I don’t really like Clinton,” Sarah said from her center seat in the antique armchair. She looked like an elegant Town & Country model in her white linen pantsuit accented by gold pearl earrings.  “But it’s about time this country elected a female head of state. We are tragically behind Europe and Latin America. Despite my misgivings about her hawkish foreign policy views, I had to hold my nose and vote for her.”

 Sarah, my Bay View Law School mentor, teaches International and Comparative Law. She’s a prolific author in the field of global equity and economic empowerment. Judges, scholars, and nonprofit organizations cite her prolific articles. Last year, she received a prestigious Human Rights Prize from the United Nations. No wonder she earned early tenure and a Fullbright to study women’s political participation in India next year.

 “I don’t know much about foreign policy, but I think Clinton’s gotten a bum rap in the media,” Jessica piped in from the kitchen, her white chef’s apron covering her usual jeans, t-shirt, and tennis shoes. “I don’t hear them criticizing Trump’s orange hair or baggy suits.”

 Jessica is my closest friend and our resident foodie, fussing over a skillet on my Viking Professional stove. We went through high school and college together, but then our paths parted ways. Jessica married, had two tow-headed toddlers, and spent her spare time as an amateur chef. I went to law school, married a classmate after graduation, and put off having children until we both established our careers.

 I’m not much of a cook, but the house we bought in the suburbs five years ago came equipped with a double French door oven. The only time it got a workout was when Jessica came to visit, which was quite often now that we lived in the same suburban Boston neighborhood. The delicious aromas of caramelized onions wafted in on a wave of warm air, making me envy my childhood friend’s culinary skills. Maybe I’ll have time to learn to cook once I get tenure.

 “My students think Clinton is corrupt and stole the nomination from Bernie Sanders,” Tamika objected. She could have passed for one of the students in her white mini-skirt and Lululemon tank top.  “They don’t see any reason to support Clinton just because she is a woman. They don’t trust her positions on worker’s rights or the environment. Bernie supports a federal living wage and universal health care.  If they can’t vote for him, they’re planning to sit this election out.”

Tamika is the newest Assistant Professor at Bayview, hired to teach Legal Writing while she tries to break into her real love, Labor Law and Worker’s Rights. As a recent graduate, Tamika is more closely aligned with our Gen X students’ progressive politics. We can always count on her to bring a different perspective to the conversation.

 “Hold on a second,” I said, waving my hands for emphasis. My white pantsuit was a tribute to Clinton’s preferred professional uniform, purchased especially for the occasion. “Hillary and Bernie have nearly identical platforms. You mean to tell me they would rather lose the election than support Clinton?”

 “That’s right,” Tamika said. “They were furious when Madeleine Albright said there was a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other. Then Gloria Steinem added to the insult by suggesting that young women who support Bernie are just in it to meet boys. They were furious at older feminists for talking down to them and suggesting they should base their vote solely on gender.”

“But they’re okay with losing the election to a misogynist who talks about grabbing women by the pussy?” I exclaimed. “That’s like cutting off your nose to spite your face.”

As the words came out of my mouth, my heart sank to my knees. Don’t let this deteriorate into a contentious faculty meeting, I thought. We are supposed to be celebrating tonight.

Always the voice of reason, Olivia chimed in to save the day. Her flowing white wrap dress exuded calm and grace. She has to be a diplomat as the Dean of Students, even when fiercely advocating for her students.

 “You have to understand this generation,” she said. “They grew up during the Great Recession of the 1990s. They are accumulating hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans. They saw students being murdered in Parkland and Virginia Tech. They’ve seen an increase in natural disasters caused by global warming. It’s no surprise that feminism is not one of their top concerns with the world falling apart around them.”

Her words deflated my frustration as I felt my friends breathe a collective sigh of relief. Just then, Jessica called out from the kitchen, “Dinner’s ready!”

 I had set the table with my grandmother’s best china and crystal in honor of the occasion. Nana was a nurse in the Army Nurse Corps during World War II and defied the expectations of her time by continuing to work after she married. She would have been thrilled to see the first woman President be elected.

 Jessica had the caramelized onion mushroom crostini arranged artfully on a filigreed silver tea tray. I pulled the Belgian endive, apple, and blue cheese salad from the Frigidaire and drizzled it with walnut oil while Sarah uncorked the Bon Pari Russian River Valley Pinot Noir we had brought back from our summer vacation. We spent the next hour blissfully chowing down and chatting about our relationships. Sarah was the only one with children, and we happily passed around her iPhone to see photos of their adventures at summer camp.

At 10:30, Kendrick popped his head out the study door to let us know that the next projections were coming in. Ohio was declared for Trump, his first swing state victory. He led the polls there all along, but Democrats were hopeful that a last-minute swing through the state would help them beat the polls.

 Concern swept through our small living room as we watched breathlessly for the next projections. Close to 11 p.m., Trump claimed Florida's 29 electoral votes, making his path to the White House much more likely. Still, we hoped North Carolina and Pennsylvania would swing our way and clinch Clinton's victory.

By this time, the atmosphere in our small gathering had grown decidedly less celebratory. We collectively held our breaths for the next announcement, which came when Trump was declared victorious in North Carolina, followed by wins in Utah and Iowa before midnight.

 “How could this be happening?” Olivia cried. “All the polls said Hillary would win by a mile.”

 “That’s what happens when people sit out the election,” I muttered under my breath. “They are going to cost us the election.”

 “I can’t take this anymore,” Jessica said. “I’m going home to my kids. I’ll see the results in the morning.”

 “I’ll go with you,” Tamika said. “It’s going to be a crazy day at the law school tomorrow. I need my beauty sleep.”

 Olivia, Sarah, and I couldn’t pull ourselves away from the disaster playing out on the screen. At this point, Clinton's hopes hinged on the swing states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.  The pollsters had predicted those states for Clinton, but by now we had seen how wrong the polls could be.

 All hopes were dashed when Pennsylvania was declared for Trump at 1:35 a.m. Clinton would have to capture Wisconsin, Michigan, and Arizona to climb her way out of the hole, and Trump was leading in all three states.

 Olivia stood unsteadily, drunk with wine and bad news, tears streaming down her face. “Time to give it up,” she said. “There’s no hope she can pull this out.”

 “Let me drive you home,” Sarah said, putting her arm around Olivia’s shoulders. “You shouldn’t drive in this state. I guess we won’t see a woman President in my lifetime.”

Story Statement

My book is a dual-timeline historical novel with two main protagonists: Liliana Perez Cohen (1970s) and Kate Gardner (2000s).

Liliana is on a quest to break free from the restraints of her upper-class upbringing, explore her Cuban heritage, and find out who she is and where she belongs in the world by escaping to California, a hotbed of political activism in the 1970s. 

Kate is struggling with writer’s block and needs to publish her seminal law review article by next year to earn tenure. Her husband is ready to start a family, but she is concerned about juggling her career and parenthood, in addition to the challenges of raising a biracial child.

Antagonistic Forces

 

Both protagonists are fighting against the oppressive forces of a patriarchal society with prescribed roles for women.

In Liliana’s life, this oppression is first embodied in her father, a successful businessman who wants her to fit the mold of upper-class society ladies and disowns her when she deviates from that path. Later in the story, her major antagonist is the historical character Jim Jones, who draws her into Jonestown, traps her there, and rapes her before she narrowly escapes before the massacre.

For Grace, the antagonists are less clearly evil, but they are oppositional forces to her desire to be successful on her own terms. The Dean of her law school expects her to devote all her energy to the job and publishing in prestigious law reviews. Her husband wants her to put motherhood first, even if it means sacrificing her career.

Titles

Chasing the Seventies

The Pendulum Swings

From Good Girl to Feminist

Comps

Looking for Jane: A Novel by Heather Marshall, “follows three women who are bound together by a long-lost letter, a mother’s love, and a secret network of women fighting for the right to choose—inspired by true stories.” Spans the same time period (1970s – 2017) with a similar theme (women’s activism about the Jane Network and women’s right to choose in the 1970s).

All You Have to Do by Autumn Allen: “In ALL YOU HAVE TO DO, two Black young men attend prestigious schools nearly thirty years apart, and yet both navigate similar forms of insidious racism.” Spans the time period from 1968 campus protests to 1995, with both protagonists engaged in the struggle for racial equality.

Both comps involve the intersection of protagonists from different generations facing the same challenges around race, gender, and equality, illustrating the premise that “the more things change, the more they remain the same.”

Hook Line

 

Kate Gardner grew up believing that women could have it all, but as a tenure-track professor with writer’s block, she faces the reality that equality for women has not lived up to its promise as she wrestles with the tension between earning tenure and starting a family.

Liliana Perez Cohen has never felt at home in her upper-class Westchester County boarding school, but her quest for her mother’s Cuban roots and a sense of belonging leads her to confront the harsh realities of a woman pursuing her own path in the 1970s.

Inner Conflict

Kate’s husband Kendrick has earned partnership in his civil rights law firm and thinks the time is right to start a family. But Kate is not sure the time is right, with an important tenure decision coming up that could decide the future of her career.

Liliana rebels against her upper-class upbringing but is not sure where she belongs in the world. After dabbling with feminist socialism, she confronts the consequences of freedom when she is raped by her spiritual mentor, Jim Jones in Guyana.

Secondary Conflict

Kate want to be a mother, but she fears bringing a biracial child into the world in the wake of police brutality against young men of color. She also knows that despite formal equality, women shoulder the majority of homemaking and child care responsibilities in America.

Liliana discovers that she is attracted to women and slowly grows to accept that she is a lesbian, but knows that her parents will never accept her if she confesses who she really is.

Setting

 

Liliana’s story takes her from the upper class community of Westchester County NY to the hotbeds of activism on the West Coast – Berkeley, San Diego, and Los Angeles during an era of student protests over civil rights, racial equality, and the Vietnam War. Later, she follows charismatic leader Jim Jones to Guyana, and barely escapes to Cuba before the Jonestown Massacre. Her story ends in Florida, where she finds a partner and raises the daughter fathered by Jim Jones in Little Cuba, Miami.

Kate grows up on the tony suburb of Newton, MA and doesn’t stray far from her New England roots, but her work at Bay View Law School exposes her to a colorful band of faculty members and students who expand her horizons and support her budding feminism.