The Great Mrs. Elias

Barbara Chase-Riboud is the bestselling author one biography and six historical novels, including the internationally celebrated Sally Hemings. A distinguished poet who has published three collections, she won the Carl Sandburg Poetry Prize for Best American Poet for her second collection, Portrait of a Nude Women as Cleopatra, and her first collection, Memphis & Peking was edited by Toni Morrison and released to critical acclaim. She is also a celebrated artist, and the recipient of many fellowships and prizes. She was the first African American graduate of the School of Design and Architecture at Yale University in 1960, and received a knighthood in Arts and Letters from the French government in 1996. She lives in Paris, Rome, and New York.

"There's a temptation to think that a life like Hannah Bessie Elias's writes itself. She was born poor, pretty and so light skinned she could (and eventually would sometimes) pass for White, in an era when Black people were figuring out how to live free in a post-Civil War America. And she rose to become one of the wealthiest Black women of her day, leveraging her earnings as a sex worker to make wise real estate investments. Sex (!), race, gender, and class are all separate lenses, the author could have chosen to filter Elias's story through, and any of them would have been powerful. But in her riveting novelization of this fascinating historic figure, Chase-Riboud chooses to widen the aperture and let all the darkness and light in. The result is a stunning portrait, developed with artistry, compassion and depth, of a woman and a society you don't want to stop staring at--one that offers a new revelation every time you look." - Nana Brew-Hammond, author of Powder Necklace

"Peppered with such historical figures as Lillian Russell, Granville Woods, and J.P. Morgan, and enlivened with a showstopping courtroom debacle, Chase-Riboud's biographical novel is a randy, rollicking tour of Gilded Age excess, racism, and misogyny." - Booklist (starred review)

"In all her writing, Barbara Chase-Riboud displays an extraordinary talent for reclaiming history, passionately bringing to life characters in scenarios that readers will never forget." - Margaret Busby, editor of New Daughters of Africa

"Hannah Elias-one of Barbara Chase-Riboud's five historical but invisible women of color-emerges from this page-turning novel with a burning ambition propelling her from oblivion to capitalist-level wealth. Chase-Riboud dresses every single character meticulously, practically endowing clothing its own rewarding role in this intriguing novel." -