This Slavery

The Rickard sisters (No Surrender) adapt Holdsworth’s 1925 novel, a rediscovered socialist and feminist classic, into a lavishly illustrated period epic with incendiary political fervor. Sisters Rachel and Hester Martin toil in a Lancashire textile factory, struggling to survive like their mother and grandmother before them: “Four women who’ve slaved since childhood, for nowt,” Rachel notes. Hester is forced to break off her relationship with the loving but poor Jack Baines and marry wealthy yarn merchant Mr. Sanderson, while Rachel becomes a union organizer and human rights crusader. Throughout their changes in fortune—which include mill fires, strikes, police brutality, a diphtheria epidemic, and shocking family secrets—both sisters remain dedicated to freedom. Rachel reads Marx and declares, “I can feel my mind expanding... as fast as my stomach shrinks,” while Hester rails against the subordinate position of women: “So long as we go on breeding.... We are the slaves of the slaves, or the slaves of the bosses.” In jewel-like tones, the Rickards bring the early 20th-century setting to life, from grimy factories and back alleys to the lavish Arts and Crafts décor of Sanderson’s mansion. Both a thrilling historical drama and a timeless call for social justice, this spirited volume surges with revolutionary passion. (Oct.)