The Tailor's Daughter by Janice Graham

The Tailor's Daughter

I picked up this book because I was searching up books for sign language and the word "deaf" made this book pop up on the catalogue.
The story is of Veda, the daughter of a tailor, who is talented in his father's art but is destined only for marriage due to the restrictions of society at the time. By a twist of fate, she lost her hearing due to illness in her teens. Not marketable for marriage any longer, she got to work at her father's workshop. Throughout the book, Veda had a  few suitors, each with their pros and cons.
I loved the book in the beginning because Veda was a strong, female character and was opposed to marriage just so she can keep her family's business running. (One of the tailors who worked for her father pursued her and left with most of the workers after she turned him down). Veda's personality would probably be of a typical female protagonist in a book that's set in today's time, but set in (I think) the Victorian times, she was a huge feminist. Her father was also very supportive of her, which I'm glad. I can totally imagine the author purposefully creating more societal restrains on her, but she didn't. The story could easily have been transferred to the twentieth century and it would still work.
My only disappointment was the ending. Veda was a strong character up until she meets this broody, rich guy with a mysterious past (cue eye roll please). The infatuation was cute in the beginning because she was deaf by then and wasn't really thinking of marriage any more. But the latter half of the book, oh my goodness, had me cringing. I almost didn't make it through the book. Veda started getting a little obsessive of her boyfriend whom I don't even remember the name of (after losing her son at birth) and I hate how the author creates a whole story about a women struggling against societal restrictions just to have her happily married in the end. I would accept it if she had struggled and failed, but no. She happily accepted marriage and secretly tailors clothes for her husband and son. She doesn't even get credit for her work. Society thinks that her father tailors for the family. I was looking forward to her continuing to run her father's tailoring business, or at least get recognition for being a talented tailor (not seamstress, but a tailor!) But nooooooo, she happily settles in her role as an invisible housewife -- a role she had rejected for 1/4 of the book. Disappointing, to say the least.