Open Case · Seeking evidence
The Missing Adult Portrait of Harriet Antoinette Tarn
Renée Vivien’s younger sister appears in the historical record. Can an authentic photograph of her as an adult be found?
Explore this mystery ↗HISTORICAL & CONTEMPORARY LITERARY FICTION
ANNA
TIMORA
Some women are remembered for the lives they made. Others are still trying to understand the lives they have.
In one novel, a young woman risks her place in the world for the freedom to love. In another, Rachel holds tight to a life whose meaning is changing beneath her. In the Appalachian South, a woman's understanding of herself begins to fracture. Three fictional worlds. Four books in the Natalie series.
Three worlds. Different kinds of danger.
A family can decide a daughter's future. Love can make the past difficult to leave alone. A familiar place can hold questions nobody has wanted to ask. These novels follow what people do when the lives they know no longer give them easy answers.
The novels
The novels.
Historical Paris and America. A private life shaped by memory. A rural Appalachian world where family and identity are not easily separated. Each book has its own terrain and its own consequences.
01 / HISTORICAL FICTIONTHE NATALIE SERIESThe Natalie Series
Four novels. One woman. A lifetime of beautiful disobedience.
Natalie Clifford Barney was born into a world that had already decided what a woman should want.
Discover the historical series ↗02 / PSYCHOLOGICAL FICTION
THE KEEPER
THE KEEPERThe Keeper
She is coming. I hear her take the stairs two at a time, not pausing at the landing.
There are things a woman can say in the privacy of a bedroom that she would never dare admit in daylight.
Explore Rachel’s story ↗03 / SOUTHERN PSYCHOLOGICAL FICTIONTHE HOLLAR
The Hollar
In the mountains of 1970s Appalachia, a family can know every bend in the road and still be unable to find its way out of its own history.
Life in the hollars is shaped by work, weather, kinship, and the practical knowledge passed from one generation to another. People know how to mend what breaks, how to make a little last, and how to recognize trouble long before it reaches the front porch.
Enter The Hollar ↗While the books are being written
Join Letters from Anna ↗Notes from the work.
I share research discoveries, occasional notes from the work, and publication news when there is news to give.
The Natalie series
Before Natalie became a legend.
Natalie Clifford Barney would become known for her writing, her relationships with women, and her Paris salon. But before any of that, she was a daughter whose future had been arranged around other people's expectations. Wild imagines the young Natalie discovering how much a refusal can cost.
Discover the Natalie seriesPARIS / 20 RUE JACOB
THE HISTORICAL NATALIE SERIES
THE HISTORICAL NATALIE SERIESThe Keeper
The Keeper.
She is coming. I hear her take the stairs two at a time, not pausing at the landing.
There are things a woman can say in the privacy of a bedroom that she would never dare admit in daylight.
The Hollar
The Hollar.
In the mountains of 1970s Appalachia, a family can know every bend in the road and still be unable to find its way out of its own history.
Life in the hollars is shaped by work, weather, kinship, and the practical knowledge passed from one generation to another. People know how to mend what breaks, how to make a little last, and how to recognize trouble long before it reaches the front porch.
About the author
Why I write these lives.
I am interested in what people know before they can say it, what families insist upon, and what a person does when an old explanation fails.
My stories move from the Appalachian South to the drawing rooms and private lives of Belle Époque Paris. Place changes what is possible. So do love, money, history, and the people we cannot easily leave.
About AnnaHistory / research / the fiction
The lives behind the fiction.
The historical archive follows the women and men around Natalie through their own work, relationships, places, and surviving records. The evidence is worth exploring even when it refuses to give a complete answer.
BIOGRAPHIES / PORTRAITS
PARIS / WASHINGTON / BAR HARBOR
PRIMARY RECORDS / ART
The People
Lives beyond their connection to Natalie.
The Places
Washington, Bar Harbor, Paris, and Lesbos.
The Records
Paintings, letters, books, photographs, and the limits of what they tell us.
Inside the historical atlas
Read the inspiration ↗From Sappho to The Chart
An ancient poet, a Paris garden, and a modern television chart helped shape a new way to follow historical relationships.
Artworks pictured: Romaine Brooks and Alice Pike Barney. Credits and collection records ↗
The Constellation / Open research cases
Help find what history has misplaced.
Two photographic mysteries lead our first public research challenges: an adult portrait of Renée Vivien’s sister, and a second original photograph of Violet Shillito. A family album or archival finding aid could change the record.
Open Case · Seeking evidence
A Second Photograph of Violet Shillito
One historical portrait is repeatedly reproduced. Did another image survive in a private album or unscanned archive?
Explore this mystery ↗The historical Constellation / An open invitation
Share a discovery Help recover their stories.
A letter in a family archive. An unidentified portrait. A woman missing from the record. If you have research that clarifies these lives and connections, your discovery belongs in the conversation. Every submission receives private editorial review.
A direct invitation · Readers first
Letters from Anna.
Notes from the manuscripts, discoveries from the archives, and publication news. Occasional letters when there is something worth sharing.