Join us at Kepler’s to celebrate the phenomenal new novel by bestselling authors Kate Quinn and Janie Chang, The Phoenix Crown. Set in San Francisco in 1906, the book is a thrilling and unforgettable narrative about the intertwined lives of two wronged women, spanning from the chaos of the San Francisco earthquake to the glittering palaces of Versailles.
Kate and Janie will be joined in conversation with Meg Waite Clayton and Alka Joshi. This quartet of historical fiction authors will discuss why historical fiction matters, and how to breathe life into forgotten moments, lost voices, and the timeless human experience.
About The Phoenix Crown
April 1906. Opera singer Gemma arrives in San Francisco to meet up with her friend Nellie, who has already ensconced herself in the city’s bohemian circles. Meanwhile, globe-trotting botanist Alice has secured a curatorial post at the Academy of Sciences, while seamstress Suling desperately looks for an escape from her looming arranged marriage.
The four women cross paths when they are all pulled into the orbit of Henry Thornton, a railroad magnate with an extraordinary collection of Chinese antiques—and nefarious secrets. Thornton’s mysterious disappearance sets off a chain of events spanning from California to Versailles as Gemma, Nellie, Alice, and Suling pursue justice in the wake of the city’s deadly earthquake and fire.
About the Authors
Kate Quinn is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of historical fiction. A native of southern California, she attended Boston University where she earned a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Classical Voice. She has written four novels in the Empress of Rome Saga, and two books in the Italian Renaissance, before turning to the 20th century with The Alice Network, The Huntress, The Rose Code, and The Diamond Eye. All have been translated into multiple languages. Kate and her husband now live in San Diego with three rescue dogs.
Born in Taiwan, Janie Chang has lived in the Philippines, Iran, Thailand, New Zealand, and Canada. She writes historical fiction with a personal connection, drawing from family history and ancestral stories. Chang has a degree in computer science and is a graduate of the Writer’s Studio Program at Simon Fraser University. She is the author of Three Souls and Dragon Springs Road.
Meg Waite Clayton is the author of eight novels, most recently the international bestseller The Postmistress of Paris — a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, and Good Morning America, People Magazine, IndieNext booksellers, Costco Book Club, LoanStar librarians, USA Today, Amazon Editors, and Book of the Month add on picks — and the international bestseller and Jewish Book Award finalist The Last Train to London. Her The Wednesday Sisters, set in 1960s Palo Alto, is one of Entertainment Weekly’s 25 Essential Best Friend Books of all time.
Alka Joshi is the internationally bestselling author of the Jaipur Trilogy: The Henna Artist, The Secret Keeper of Jaipur and The Perfumist of Paris. Her debut novel, The Henna Artist, immediately became a New York Times bestseller, a Reese Witherspoon Pick, and was longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. It has been translated into 29 languages and is currently in development at Netflix as a TV series. Joshi was born in India and came to the US with her family at the age of nine. She has a BA from Stanford University and an MFA from the California College of Arts. She lives on the Monterey Peninsula with her husband and a happy terrier.
