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Sandra Dallas

Author of The Persian Pickle Club

32+ Works 7,664 Members 422 Reviews 22 Favorited

About the Author

Sandra Dallas graduated from the University of Denver with a degree in journalism and began her writing career as a reporter with Business Week. While a reporter, she began writing nonfiction which include Sacred Paint, which won the National Cowboy Hall of Fame Western Heritage Wrangler Award, and show more The Quilt That Walked to Golden, recipient of the Independent Publishers Association Benjamin Franklin Award. Turning to fiction in 1990, Sandra has published a number of novels including Buster Midnight's Cafe, Alice's Tulips, and Prayers For Sale. She is the recipient of the Women Writing the West Willa Award for New Mercies, and two-time winner of the Western Writers of America Spur Award, for The Chili Queen and Tallgrass. In addition, she was a finalist for the Colorado Book Award, the Mountain and Plains Booksellers Association Award, and a four-time finalist for the Women Writing the West Willa Award. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Includes the name: Sandra Dallas

Image credit: Photo by Povy Kendal Atchison

Works by Sandra Dallas

The Persian Pickle Club (1995) 1,186 copies
Prayers for Sale (2009) 937 copies
Tallgrass (2007) 908 copies
The Diary of Mattie Spenser (1997) 746 copies
Alice's Tulips (2001) 492 copies
The Chili Queen (2002) 374 copies
Buster Midnight's Cafe (1990) 342 copies
Whiter Than Snow (2010) 332 copies
New Mercies (2005) 281 copies
True Sisters (2012) 238 copies
The Bride's House (2011) 235 copies
Fallen Women (2013) 200 copies
The Last Midwife (2015) 186 copies
A Quilt for Christmas (2014) 175 copies

Associated Works

Tagged

1930s (32) 19th century (37) 2011 (24) adult (27) adult fiction (29) American (23) American West (39) audiobook (30) book club (31) Civil War (54) Colorado (257) Colorado author (27) family (42) fiction (723) friendship (108) Great Depression (61) historical (89) historical fiction (555) history (57) internment camps (33) Iowa (22) Japanese Americans (30) Japanese internment (24) Kansas (63) Kindle (24) library (28) mining (48) murder (47) mystery (107) novel (59) own (33) quilting (161) quilts (35) read (80) romance (27) sandra dallas (34) to-read (470) western (36) women (77) WWII (109)

Common Knowledge

Other names
Atchison, Sandra Dallas
Birthdate
1939-06-11
Gender
female
Nationality
USA
Places of residence
Denver, Colorado, USA
Washington, D.C., USA
Education
University of Denver
Occupations
journalist
Organizations
BusinessWeek
Short biography
Although her novels aren't strictly a series, the characters from one book often make appearances in other novels, and so in a sense all her novels are set in the same fictitious world.

Members

Reviews

Historical fiction about a relocation camp for Japanese families during WW II in Ellis, Colorado called Tallgrass. Kirkus: Colorado beet farmer and his family are sorely tried by events of WWII.When the U.S. government establishes a Japanese-American relocation camp in Ellis, Colo., in 1942, Loyal Stroud takes a view apart from most other townsfolk. Having ?the enemy in their midst? riles the locals, but Loyal believes the whole thing is plain wrong. Why not round up all the German-Americans, too, while they?re at it? Aside from civic issues, Loyal has to figure out how to harvest his beets, what with Buddy, his son, enlisted, along with his farm hands. Against prevailing sentiment, Loyal hires three young men from the camp. And although Rennie, 14, the last child home, worries about her father?s decision, she and her mother, Mary, come to love the boys, who are from California farm country. And when Mary?s heart ailment finally gets bad enough for her to take the rest cure the doctor advised, the Strouds hire Daisy, the sister of one of the boys. Daisy works hard and speaks in a Hollywood tabloid lingo that charms the whole family. Their domestic harmony is rocked by news that Buddy is missing in action andĄshockinglyĂ‚ÂĄthat Rennie?s school friend Sally is found raped and murdered. Everyone except the Strouds and the sheriff believes ?the Japs? did it, and the tension in town builds to the point of near-anarchy, when the local bigots get liquored up and try to take the law into their own hands. Throughout all this drama, as in most of Dallas?s work (Alice?s Tulips, 2000, etc.), a community of quilters, known here as the Jolly Stitchers, come and go, bringing cakes, covered casseroles and gossip to the sick and grieving. The parallels of a country at war then and now give this story a layer of poignancy, but otherwise, as is obvious from the start, the good guys win and the bad guys lose, and Buddy comes marching home.A well-spun but familiar tale.… (more)
 
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bentstoker | 64 other reviews | Jan 26, 2024 |
Basehor Library recommended read. Story of 80 yr old women in fictious mining community in Colo in the late 1800?s. Full of her stories of her life and those in the community.
 
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bentstoker | 61 other reviews | Jan 26, 2024 |
A Quilt for Christmas by Sandra Dallas is the story of Eliza, a strong woman who is overseeing her family and farm in Kansas as her husband is off soldiering in the American Civil War. As the book opens she has just finished and sent off to her husband a special quilt meant to keep him warm and sheltered while he is away from his family. While she and her family are staunch believers in freeing the slaves, she is a little off-put by the hatred toward Southerners expressed by her husband in his letters and also that her son seems to be absorbing this hatred.

Sh opens her home to a neighbour widow who needs to escape from the bad treatment she is receiving at the hands of her in-laws and then when the war is over and she learns that she, too, is a widow, she allows an ex-Confederate soldier to stay on her farm as a hired man. She and this man develop feelings for each other much to her son’s disapproval.

A Quilt for Christmas beautifully illustrates the courage and commitment of the women left behind as their men went to fight in the War. As a border state, Kansas had people of both persuasion living side by side and bad feelings toward each other and hiding slaves and moving them along was a decision that each individual needed to make. Family, friendship, loyalty, and tolerance are all important themes in this short but well written account of life in the 1860s.
… (more)
 
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DeltaQueen50 | 11 other reviews | Dec 8, 2023 |
Addie meets Emma on a train going to New Mexico. Emma is going to become a mail order bride. Addie is a madam, although she pretends to Emma that she is a refined lady. Emma's marriage fall through and she ends up at Addie's "boardinghouse" or what she thinks is a boardinghouse. Addie is tired of Emma after several weeks of her staying there. It's bad for business, so Addie gets her lover, Ned to take her out for a ride. Ned and Emma hatch a plan to rob a bank. Not everyone is in favor of this plan, but Ned and Emma agree to split the money with Addie and her housemaid, Welcome. On the day of the robbery things do not go as planned. By the end of book, everything you thought you knew is different than your thoughts at the beginning of the book. If you enjoy stories of the old west and outlaws you will enjoy this story.… (more)
 
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dara85 | 15 other reviews | Nov 19, 2023 |

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Statistics

Works
32
Also by
4
Members
7,664
Popularity
#3,183
Rating
3.8
Reviews
422
ISBNs
251
Languages
5
Favorited
22

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