Download Where the Girls Were by Kate Schatz PDF

Set in 1968 San Francisco, Kate Schatz’s historical coming-of-age novel follows seventeen-year-old Elizabeth “Baker,” a high-school valedictorian with a place at Stanford and ambitions to become a journalist. After falling in love, Baker becomes pregnant and is sent to a home for unwed mothers, where she faces a changed future and society’s expectations of women.

Among other pregnant girls who share her fear and shame, Baker finds a sense of community as she reckons with womanhood, agency, and her uncertain path ahead. The novel connects one young woman’s experience with a broader moment in American history, when the sexual revolution and feminist movement met the limits of reproductive rights. It may appeal to readers of historical and literary fiction, coming-of-age stories, and books about feminism and reproductive history.