His Family

His Family by American writer Ernest Poole was first published in 1917. It was the first book to receive the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1918. It tells the story of Roger Gale, a man living in New York - widowed and looking after his three adult daughters, Edith, Deborah, and Laura. He struggles to stay close to his daughters amidst the changing society around them. Conflicts arise in the shape of engagements, pregnancies, and the way his daughters spend their free time. Once the First World War happens, Rogers life is in even more upheaval as his business takes losses, creating more hardships for his daughters and grandchildren, and causing tensions between Deborah and Edith, who have very different ideas about family and womens rights. Essentially, as the title of the novel suggests, this is a book about a man trying to hold together his family in the face of what seems at times, overwhelming odds.