Читать книгу American Quaker Romances. Building the Myth of the White Christian Nation онлайн

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The second group of romances I have identified is comprised by twenty-three novels published by Evangelical publishing houses or the Christian imprint of a publishing house. They are far more numerous, which raises a question about why Evangelical authors would wish to appropriate Quakerism and Quaker characters. Among this group one can find Mary Ellis’s The Quaker and the Rebel (2014) and Susanne Woods Fisher’s the Nantucket Legacy trilogy (2018), published by Harvest House Publishers and Revell, respectively. Barbour, another Evangelical publishing house, has published two four-in-one collections: A Quaker Christmas (2011) and The Quakers of New Garden (2012), both of which contain novellas that meet the criteria used in this book (with one exception: the fourth novella in The Quakers of New Garden, “New Garden’s Conversion,” by Susette Williams, has been left out, as it is contemporary, not historical). Anna Schmidt’s The Peacemakers trilogy (2013-2014) has been published by Barbour and Shiloh Run Press. This group also includes some of Lyn Cote’s works. Of all the writers of Quaker romances, Cote is, by far, the most prolific. To date, she has authored three series: the Gabriel Sisters trilogy (2008, 2009 and 2010), the Wilderness Brides trilogy (the second book in the series, The Baby Bequest, has been left out, as there are no Quaker protagonists in it, so only the first book, that came out in 2012, and the third one, published in 2014, are considered), and the Quaker Brides tetralogy (2014-2016). The first two series appeared with Steeple Hill, one of the Christian imprints of HarperCollins, but the latter was published by Tyndale House Publishers, an Evangelical publishing house. As will be proved, this group of romances is more prone to adhere to the features that typically characterize Christian romances, as for instance a preference for “clean” stories, with no explicit sex scenes, and they also seem to show a tendency to dilute Quakerism or to assimilate it to Evangelicalism.