The Persian Pickle Club

by Sandra Dallas

Hennepin County Library paperback 196 pages

Published: 1995

Genre: realistic fiction, historical (1930s)

I don't remember where I heard about this book, but I really enjoyed it. I liked it enough to look up the author - she's written a lot of books! The quilting in this story is probably how it came to my attention.

Queenie Bean is a young farm wife in 1930s Harveyville, Kansas. The Dust Bowl following the Great Depression is making life hard for everyone. But getting together with the other women of the Persian Pickle Club helps her stay positive.

Page 4: "I'd never met a woman who didn't sew. None of us had, and we stared at her again, until Ceres Root said with a nice smile, 'You modern women have so many interesting things to do. In this day and age, there's no good reason to make thirteen quilt tops before you marry, like I had to when I was a girl.'"

I love that it's one of the elderly women who breaks the silence when Rita, Tom's wife, admits that she didn't sew.

Page 4: "There wasn't a quilt top turned out by a member of the Persian Pickle Club that didn't have fabrics from all of us in it. That made us all a part of one another's quilts, just like we were part of one another's lives."

I love that they share fabric scraps the way they share their lives as they sew. Camaraderie!

 

Page 13: "She'd start coming to club after she found a husband. It was marrying that made women appreciate other women."

 

That made me laugh. Not every woman wants to get married or have friendships with other women.

 

Page 31: "I'm the same. I look across the land, and all I see are quilts. I carry my scrap bag in the car so's I can go to patching while Blue drives. If I didn't have my quilting, I'd have gone crazy with all this moving around."

I loved the scene where Queenie and her husband Grover meet with Blue and Zepha and little Sonny. This was one of my favorite aspects of the story!

Page 42: "When he went to town one day, she asked him to bring her back a piece of fabric she'd admired. Instead of a length, he brought her the whole bolt of cloth. It was Persian pickle, what some call paisley."

It's fun to find out where the title of the book originates. In this case, Ceres' husband made a purchase that gave the group their title.

Page 132: "When there's trouble, women just naturally think of food, although there was no need for it this time."

Food is one of my love languages! I love offering nourishment to people. It was wonderful how the women reached out to one another in times of trouble.

Page 141: "You can stay locked up here feeling sorry for yourself like Lizzy Olive would have done, or you can put the bad time behind you like Ella did and thing about all the good things the Lord gave you. And He'll keep on giving them to you if you'll let Him. But how can you take advantage of His opportunities if you're sitting behind the kitchen door with the hook on?"

Mrs. Judd was so bossy, but she made things happen!

Page 150: "'Oh,' I said, wondering why women like Velma and Rita, who didn't want children, got pregnant, while God denied me a baby even though I wanted one more than anything in the world. He even gave five at one time to that Dionne family in Canada. Was that fair?"

Those are the kinds of questions to turn over in prayer! It is painful to see people who do not value children at all having them and neglecting or abusing them, while also being aware of people who struggle with infertility.

Page 168: "I took the bundle from Grover and untied the string, putting it into my apron pocket to save."

This caught my attention because those frugal 1930s habits (like saving a piece of string) is what I grew up with! It's hard to not save every little thing when that's what you've known.

I am definitely interested in reading more of this author's work!