The Covert Buccaneer

Lucia, you inspire me.

— Min Jin Lee, author of Pachinko and American Hagwon, to the author (2026)

Editor’s Pick (BookLife, PUBLISHERS WEEKLY); Recommended on
KIRKUS Reviews
fiction alongside The Nightingale and The Women; Featured in the
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

San Francisco. Two women. Two Centuries. One hidden diary with explosive truths.

1867–1919: Theodora “Teddy” Ellis is anything but ordinary. A pioneering miner, suffragist, and San Francisco real estate developer, she infiltrates male-dominated spaces in disguise, stakes claims in the ruthless Klondike, and fights for women’s rights and healthcare alongside her Miwok best friend. She survives the 1871 Chicago Fire and later helps rebuild San Francisco post-1906 earthquake and fire, reshaping the city’s future. But Teddy’s personal life is as unconventional as her ambitions—her relationships defy expectation, with the truth of her legacy lost to time.

2019–2020: Georgina “Ellie” Benvenuto is a divorced climate migrant attorney and single mother to a child with disabilities, struggling in a low-paying public interest job with a derailed legal career. As she wrestles with impossible personal and professional demands, she discovers her great-great-grandmother’s hidden diaries—revealing uncanny parallels to her own life. A long-forgotten heirloom of Teddy’s holds the key to a pivotal legal case—bringing the past crashing into the present and forcing Ellie to reconsider everything she understood about identity, love, and the cost of reinvention.

For readers who love intergenerational mysteries woven with family secrets, lost heirlooms, and women who get retribution—much like recent bestsellers that blend past and present narratives with a feminist lens, such as The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, The Personal Librarian, and Winter Garden—this is a must-read.

Compared to Lessons in Chemistry, this richly atmospheric, meticulously researched novel explores resilience, reinvention, and the defiant women history tried to erase. Like The Alice Network and other Reese’s Book Club picks, it's sure to rivet listeners and spark discussion—perfect for fans of Jo Piazza and other GMA Book Club authors.