Full disclaimer, I was sent this novel back in February of 2022 by a PR company on behalf of Laila Ibrahim and they asked if I would be willing to review it. if you can believe it, and while I sat down and devoured half of the book, life got in the way and I forgot about it. It turns out, that is something that is extraordinarily easy to do when the book format is a PDF. I don’t often sit down at my computer to read, since that’s where I work, so other tasks often pull me away. (If you are an author who has ever sent me a PDF and wondered why it took months to read it, well, now you know.)
ANYWAY, I did finally find some time to sit down and read the book and I’m sharing my thoughts with you all today. I’m giving you a spoiler alert now. I do talk about some things that you might consider spoilers if you haven’t read the books and I also discuss some of the historical relevance between some of the major real-life events and the ones that occur in the book. While I was sent this book for free, I am sharing my honest thoughts in this review.
Scarlet Carnation is a standalone novel, but some of the characters are familiar because they all branch off from the same family that we met in Yellow Crocus. (More on this below.) This is the third book that I’ve read by Laila Ibrahim, including Paper Wife and Yellow Crocus. I enjoyed both of those books, so I had a feeling I would like this one too.
In an early twentieth-century America roiling with racial injustice, class divides, and WWI, two women fight for their dreams in a galvanizing novel by the bestselling author of Golden Poppies.
1915. May and Naomi are extended family, their grandmothers’ lives inseparably entwined on a Virginia plantation in the volatile time leading up to the Civil War. For both women, the twentieth century promises social transformation and equal opportunity.
May, a young white woman, is on the brink of achieving the independent life she’s dreamed of since childhood. Naomi, a nurse, mother, and leader of the NAACP, has fulfilled her own dearest desire: buying a home for her family. But they both are about to learn that dreams can be destroyed in an instant. May’s future is upended, and she is forced to rely once again on her mother. Meanwhile, the white-majority neighborhood into which Naomi has moved is organizing against her while her sons are away fighting for their country.
In the tumult of a changing nation, these two women—whose grandmothers survived the Civil War—support each other’s quest for liberation and dignity. Both find the strength to confront injustice and the faith to thrive on their chosen paths.
Book Description for Scarlet Carnation by Laila Ibrahim
How Does Scarlet Carnation Connect to Yellow Crocus?
If you read Yellow Crocus, then you might remember that Mattie is an enslaved woman who is a wet nurse for a white family in the Antebellum South. Lisbeth was the daughter that Mattie helped raise and the story follows both of them, as Lisbeth struggles with feeling closer to Mattie than she does to her own mother but at the same time knowing that there are a million things separating the two of them. It’s a powerful story and in my review of that book, I do go over the things that I disliked about the book as well (mostly Lisbeth’s little brother Jack becoming a villain). So, with Scarlet Carnation, we are following the family lineage down a few generations. Lisbeth goes on to have a son named Sam who goes on to have a daughter named May. Mattie has a daughter named Jordan who has a daughter named Naomi, and Naomi has 3 children of her own. At the beginning of the book, there is a handy dandy little infographic that traces the lineage.
Okay, keep in mind that none of this is pivotal to the story because it can definitely be read as a standalone, but I think if you have read Yellow Crocus then you might be wondering how it all connects.
Here’s another quote that draws the connection between the two families:
“…I have not seen Naomi since . . .”—Nana Lisbeth considered, her white eyebrows pulled together in thought—“too long! Perhaps Jordan’s birthday the year before last.” Nana Lisbeth shook her head, and continued, “Can you believe Naomi saved you twenty years ago . . . and today she will be welcoming my next great-grandchild. What a blessing!”
Scarlet Carnation, Page 63
The Setting + Historical Influence
This story takes place in 1915 in Oakland, California. The first chapter opens up just off the campus of the University of California in Berkeley. This novel is very well-researched and I felt like there was a good mix of historical events happening while this fictional story takes place. If you like historical fiction, specifically during this time period, then I think you will appreciate all the thought that Ibrahim put into this.
Mother’s Day and The Sacrifice of Motherhood
This story reflects on the sacrifices that mothers make and reflects on the origins of Mother’s Day. That is partly why I’ve chosen to post this review today, on Mother’s Day. Here is a quote that explains a little more about that:
“… she went to work harvesting the blooms she’d nurtured for this day—Mother’s Day. The white-haired woman clipped
Scarlet Carnation, page 12.
one carnation followed by another until all the white blooms, representations of love and protest, were in her hands. She clipped two scarlet ones but left the rest. At May’s church, congregants wore white carnations to honor deceased mothers and scarlet ones to honor living ones. The tradition began after the Civil and Prussian Wars when Julia Ward Howe encouraged mothers to wear white carnations to protest sons being sent to be killed in battle. Decades later, Anna Jarvis popularized the symbol as an honor to motherhood, going so far as to successfully advocate for a federal law making the second Sunday in May a time to honor mothers.”
Abortion in the Early 1900s
One of the plot points early in the book is how life for young, unmarried mothers is often very difficult and often traumatic. One of the characters, May, makes a mistake in trusting a man that she believed would marry her. Instead, he abandons her after finding out that she is newly pregnant. May is left with a difficult choice: become a pariah in her community (by choosing to be a single mother) or attempt to get an abortion. The concept of abortion, especially pre-modern medicine, is terrifying to me. After reading this part of the book, I did some digging into the history of abortion, something I had previously researched for my own book, The Disappearance of Susannah Dane, and found the methods so interesting, so disturbing, and so dangerous.
“Motherhood by choice, not by chance,” May said, modifying Mrs. Sanger’s quote just a bit. Her entire life would be changed, and not for the better, if she became a mother now before she was married.”
Scarlet Carnation, Page 53
In Scarlet Carnation, May drinks a tonic that her cousin recommends to her. After doing research, I know that many of these tonics were combinations of different oils and herbs that often worked, though they sometimes made women extremely ill and even caused death. I was shocked in my research to see some of the plants they mentioned because I know from my side hobby of gardening that many of those plants are extremely toxic. I washed my hands every time I touched my beautiful hellebores and I couldn’t imagine gulping down a drink made from any part of the plant! For context, hellebores are rumored to be the cause of death for Alexander the Great.
Abortion is obviously a very touchy subject, but I think when we look at it through a historical lens then whatever side of the road you fall on with how you feel about abortion in today’s climate, you can empathize with the characters and their struggle to survive during this time. Keep in mind that in the 1900s, birth was not simple nor easy and it was often a death sentence. (The same is true today, even if the social stigma of being a single mother isn’t quite the same as it once was.) So, while the subject has a lot of nuance, I think it was important to include when telling a story about the reality of motherhood in the early 1900s.
World War I
This book takes place during World War I, which was a very tense time in history and it’s also a time when a lot of “progressive” ideas are coming into play. I liked the way that Ibrahim tied these real historical events into the story and made them personal for the characters.
How Does Scarlet Carnation Compare to the Other Laila Ibrahim Books?
In Yellow Crocus, the characters were so vivid and their relationships were so entrancing that I couldn’t put it down. I have seen some reviews of Scarlet Carnation saying that the dialogue was off, and I agree. it does some a little bit wooden or unnatural. I think that is because Ibrahim is trying to be accurate to the time period, so the way that they talk is very much a symptom of that. But it doesn’t come across as all that natural. Imagine that you are watching a period piece from PBS or BBC and imagine that the characters are talking in that setting and I think you’ll get it. I’m not sure why it doesn’t feel completely immersive, and it isn’t bad – it just feels a little off. There are also a lot of repetitive actions like most characters in the early chapters raising their eyebrows a lot.
Other than that, there are a lot of the details that I love about Scarlet Carnation. We get some dramatic birth scenes, which are always well-done and accurate. One of the things that I love about her books is how well she portrays the resilience of women and their ability to do the best they can for their families, no matter the circumstances. This theme is strong in this book, as it is in her other novels as well, and I enjoyed reading it. She takes these stories about mothers trying to do the best that they can, with the resources available to them, and makes you feel completely invested in their success. This seems almost effortless for Ibrahim and it’s one of the reasons why I love reading her books so much.
Have You Read Scarlet Carnation? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
I’d also like to thank Laila Ibrahim and her team for sending over this book and I look forward to reading her next book.
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