Caro Claire Burke | Yesteryear

The King's English is thrilled to welcome Caro Claire Burke to celebrate the release of her debut novel, Yesteryear. Caro will be in conversation with Bookish founder Amanda Warren. This is a ticketed event and will take place at The Grand Theatre, 1575 S State St, Salt Lake City, UT 84115. Your ticket includes a signed copy of Yesteryear.

Copies of the book will be available to purchase at the event. Signed copies may also be ordered from our website. If you cannot attend, any book included with a ticket must be picked up at The King's English Bookshop within 30 days of the event. We can ship that book for an additional charge of $7.99; please call the store to arrange shipping.

About the book:

A traditional American woman — a beautiful wife and mother who sells her pioneer lifestyle of raw milk and farm-fresh eggs to her millions of social media followers — suddenly awakens cold, filthy, and terrified in the brutal reality of 1855, where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister.

"A bold and biting satire, Yesteryear…will have you cackling and gasping right to the final page." — Nita Prose, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid series

My name was Natalie Heller Mills, and I was perfect at being alive.

Natalie lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the heir to a political dynasty? What Natalie's followers — all 8 million of them — don't know won't hurt them. And The Angry Women? The privileged, Ivy League, coastal elite haters who call her an antifeminist iconoclast? They're sick with jealousy. Because Natalie isn't simply living the good life, she's living the ideal — and just so happens to be building an empire from it.

Until one morning she wakes up in a life that isn't hers. Her home, her husband, her children — they're all familiar, but something's off. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Just yesterday Natalie was curating photos of homemade jam for her Instagram, and now she's expected to haul firewood and handwash clothes until her fingers bleed. Has she become the unwitting star of a ruthless reality show? Could it really be time travel? Is she being tested by God? By Satan? When Natalie suffers a brutal injury in the woods, she realizes two things: This is not her beautiful life, and she must escape by any means possible.

A gripping, electrifying novel that is as darkly funny as it is frightening, Yesteryear is a gimlet-eyed look at tradition, fame, faith, and the grand performance of womanhood.

About Caro Claire Burke:

Caro received her M.F.A. from the Bennington Writing Seminars. She is the co-host of Diabolical Lies, a politics and culture podcast. Yesteryear is her first novel.