Years of Grace

Fourteen-year-old Jane Ward walks to school past the Water Works Tower, hoping to catch sight of André, the French boy who reads plays and dreams of Paris. When family and circumstance break that first love apart, Jane follows the expected path: college, marriage, children, a comfortable life. Decades later, when she meets Jimmy, the old question surfaces: has she ever lived her own life, or only someone else's? Years of Grace traces Jane from 1890s Chicago into middle age, asking what a woman owes to love, to duty, and to herself.

1931 Pulitzer Prize-winner for Best Novel.