from bondage to becoming America's first couturière...

LIZZY is a sweeping novel of survival, artistry, and defiance, spanning the brutality of slavery in the Deep South to the opulence of 19th-century Washington, D.C.

Born into bondage, Lizzy wields her needle like a weapon, stitching her way toward the unthinkable—buying her freedom. But even as she steps into the world as a free woman, history clings to her. Drawn into the inner circle of First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, she became the most sought-after modiste in America. Within the White House, she is more than a dressmaker—she is a confidante, a witness to power, and a woman balancing survival with quiet rebellion.

As war consumes the nation, Lizzy is determined to help her people, risking everything, as she threads defiance into every creation.

But history is unkind to women like her. The years pass, and her name fades—until, decades later, during the Harlem Renaissance, amidst bootlegged gin, juke joints, and Jazz, a preacher from Buffalo, New York, uncovers a long-buried secret. What he finds could rewrite the past and resurrect the legacy of a woman the world tried to forget.