Richie’s Picks: THE UNEXPECTED LIVES OF ORDINARY GIRLS
Richie Partington
Richie’s Picks: THE UNEXPECTED LIVES OF ORDINARY GIRLS by J. Anderson Coats, Simon & Schuster//Atheneum, September 2025, 272p., ISBN: 978-1-66596861-4
“A smelter is either a factory or machine for smelting, which is the process of extracting metal from its ore by heating it to a very high temperature. Smelters use a reducing agent, like carbon, to separate the desired metal from other impurities in the ore, producing a more pure metal product.”
– Google AI
“You’ve come a long way, Baby.”
– 1968 cigarette ad, aimed at women
Cold Creek, Colorado, 1910
“‘Father. Mother. I have news.’ Stina glances between them. I…I met someone. A young man. ‘
My eyes leap up from the quad. Stina doesn’t have boyfriends. She barely has friends.
‘Things are getting serious.’ Her voice trembles. ‘Father, you can expect him to come on Sunday to ask for my hand in marriage.’
It’s serious enough for talk of marriage–and Stina didn’t say a word to me?
Mother pulls in a delighted breath, and both hands fly to her heart, where she presses hard enough to dimple the calico. I haven’t seen her smile so big and genuine since we got a new range.
But Stina is the color of a worn-out tablecloth. She looks like she’s about to be sick everywhere, when getting married is one of the happiest things you can do in Bohunk Town.
‘This is sudden.’ Father doesn’t sound upset, just surprised. You’re not…?
“No!’ Stina flinches. ‘No! Nothing like that. We just want to be married before winter sets in.’
Father nods, looking relieved, but I’m not sure Mother would have minded much if Stina were already expecting a baby. Plenty of kids in Bohunk Town are born premature, as Father Ignatz says in that mild, kind way of his, and he pretends not to notice as long as everyone is safely married when the baby comes.
‘This is a blessed, blessed day,’ Mother squeals. ‘I can finally stop worrying about you. It’s Luka Novak, isn’t it? You were so unkind to him when you were younger. He must be delighted that you’ve finally come around.’
‘No.’ Stina twists her hands tighter in her apron. ‘It’s not Luka. I wasn’t unkind, either. Saying no to someone isn’t unkind.’
‘Oh.’ Mother frowns, clearly stymied. Then Frederick Bund? Vasily Tenner?’
Stina must realize that Mother is going to name every eligible bachelor in Bohunk Town one by one, starting with her favorites, or at least those whose mothers she likes, because my sister pulls in a long, long breath, and then lets it out in a whistle.
‘His name is Paul.’
What she means is, there aren’t any boys named Paul who live in Bohunk Town, who attend Mass at Saint Joseph’s, who work at the smelter with the rest of the bohunks.
‘He’s a mine geologist,’ Stina’s voice takes on a pleading edge. ‘He’s been to college. He’s got a degree.’
I sit up straighter. I only heard of Paul two minutes ago, but I like him already. He doubles the number of people I know who’ve been to college, and he’s going to be my new brother-in-law.”
THE UNEXPECTED LIVES OF ORDINARY GIRLS vividly illustrates that while the egregious attitudes and policies of the current administration toward immigrants may be particularly extreme, the contempt and prejudice is by no means unique to our nation’s history. It also illustrates how nightmarish a young woman’s existence and lack of opportunities could be a mere hundred-plus years ago.
Thirteen-year-old Stanislava Razpotnik is the daughter of Slovenian immigrants, and the fourth of six siblings. Her two older brothers, who work along with Father at the smelter, are in their early-twenties Her elder sister Stina is twenty-three. Stina was required to leave school at a young age to care for Stanislava, when Stanislava was a baby. Her workload increased with the now-four-year-old boy Domen and one-year-old Mari.
When the conversation about marriage continues, and their parents learn that Paul not only isn’t Slovenian but isn't even Catholic, Father informs Stina that the marriage will not take place, and that Father will accompany Stina the next day to say goodbye forever to Paul.
But, instead, the next day, Stina and Paul depart town for parts unknown, which means that Mother and Father require Stanislava to immediately quit school and assume the punishing dawn-to-dusk cleaning-cooking-babysitting tasks that Stina has had to take care of since back when she was younger than Stanislava.
And Stanislava, who is a diligent student, and has just recently learned what college is, has been developing big, newfound dreams of becoming a then-rare, educated woman with a career.
The details of Stanislava’s immediate immersion into that grueling dawn-to-dusk routine her elder sister has escaped (while Mother hides out in her bedroom all day) sounds an awful lot like the Middle Ages and not anything most of us can imagine engaging in today.
Stanislava sees the writing on the wall and subsequently pulls her own disappearing act. It will turn out that a public library and some female librarians will become the salvation for this talented young teen on her own.
But it’s not just the women who lead such a hardscrabble life in 1910 Colorado. Stanislava talks of her father and brothers having knuckles the size of walnuts from their long, endless days at the smelter.
The steel that Stanislava’s dad and so many other immigrants helped produce became the bones of the skyscrapers that we marvel at a century later. They wore out their bodies doing the work that built America. Immigrants still do so much of the work that nobody else wants to do. I believe that we should be grateful, not contemptuous of them.
THE UNEXPECTED LIVES OF ORDINARY GIRLS is unquestionably one of the best books for tweens and teens published in 2025. I have no doubts that I will long remember the gritty details of this historical fiction gem long after the rest of 2025 fades in my memory.
And, when, if ever, one must ask, will American women experience a true lack of gender-based disadvantages? They have come so far in my lifetime (Thank you, Title IX!), but there is still so much farther to go.
Richie Partington, MLIS
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