A delicious historical novel set in Gilded Age New York City, about an ambitious young immigrant woman and her rise from the floor of a sweatshop to the heights of haute couture, driven by an insatiable hunger for a place in society and her obsession with a madman.
Young Rivkah Milmanovitch arrives in New York expecting to be met by her fiancé, who never shows. Resilient and plucky, and pregnant, Rivkah makes her way to the Lower East Side tenement inhabited by neighbors from the Old World, and gives birth to a daughter named Miriam. While one might expect Miriam to follow in her mother's footsteps at the sweatshop, her fortune quickly changes when, as a teenager, she meets a member of the formidable Winthrop family, who ultimately loves her, leaves her alone and in trouble.
But Miriam is no victim. She knows how to take care of herself. With the advice of her beloved aunt and a healthy dose of old-fashioned moxie, Miriam aided by the Winthrops, who will do anything to protect their standing and avoid scandal, refashions herself as Mimi and becomes an international sensation as a designer. Still, she is consumed by the past and she cannot rest until she uncovers the mysterious truth about the Winthrop family.
Part history, part romance, with a shimmer of the gothic, “The Winthrop Agreement” is a spellbinding tale of a plucky heroine who will entrance “Bridgerton” and historical fans.
