Queen of Hearts by Martha Brooks. Published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2011.
In World War II Canada, Marie-Claire is a typical teenager. She gets annoyed with her little brother, does chores and wants to go to dances. Her excitement when Oncle Gerard moves in with the family is tempered by concern for him when he gets sick with tuberculosis. When she and her brothers are also diagnosed with TB, life changes. Her days are now contained in the walls of a sanitorium. Fearful about her illness and becoming weaker every day, she misses her family desperately. Unlike her roommate Signy, Marie-Claire cannot pretend that everything will be all right.
Marie-Claire is a strong young woman who is determined to overcome her illness, resume a normal life and find love. Most people today know very little about treatments of TB in the 1940s, making this an unusual historical setting.
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