The sec­ond book in Jane Loeb Rubin’s A Gild­ed City series, this unique work of his­tor­i­cal fic­tion begins in the farm­lands of Harlem, New York in Octo­ber 1879 and ends in New York City in Feb­ru­ary 1892. The sto­ry is nar­rat­ed by Tillie, the eldest daugh­ter of her fam­i­ly, who is respon­si­ble and stu­dious and at the top of her eighth grade class. She dreams of going on to study in high school — a rare oppor­tu­ni­ty for girls at the time — but her family’s needs deter her plan. 

Each Sun­day, Tillie rides the wag­on with her papa to deliv­er prod­ucts to the butch­ers in busy down­town Man­hat­tan. When her mama gets sick, Tillie is called on to accom­pa­ny her to Belle­vue Hos­pi­tal as her trans­la­tor. All too quick­ly, Tillie becomes the care­tak­er of her broth­ers and baby sis­ter. When her papa remar­ries, teenage Tillie has two choic­es: to stay on the farm, mar­ry an une­d­u­cat­ed local boy, and con­tin­ue on her family’s path, or to accept a pro­pos­al from a charm­ing, old­er, wid­owed busi­ness­man who lives in the over­crowd­ed ten­e­ments down­town. He promis­es her a lov­ing mar­riage, a suc­cess­ful future, and a move out of the Low­er East Side.

Tillie deter­mines her new family’s future through untir­ing work, curios­i­ty, dreams, and ambi­tion. As a busi­ness­woman, she col­lab­o­rates with a female part­ner and work­ers, but they’re forced to pre­tend that her hus­band heads the busi­ness. With­out a male leader, Tillie would be ignored and fail before she could ever prove her­self as the savvy, edgy, risk-tak­ing, and inde­pen­dent thinker she is.

Full of research and fast-paced sto­ry­telling, Thread­bare explores many crit­i­cal, ever-rel­e­vant issues, includ­ing pover­ty, child­birth, repro­duc­tive free­dom, women’s place at home and in the busi­ness world, ram­pant dis­ease, immi­gra­tion, and the val­ue of com­mu­ni­ty. Rubin’s con­trast­ing depic­tions of rur­al Harlem and New York City dur­ing this peri­od are as vivid as her descrip­tion of Tillie’s frus­tra­tions, fail­ures, accom­plish­ments, and suc­cess­es as a daugh­ter, care­tak­er, wife, moth­er, part­ner, and businesswoman.