Sarah's School Friend

"Sarah's School Friend" by May Baldwin is a story about a privileged young woman named Sarah Clay, living in the late 1800s, faced with the challenges of wealth, family expectations, and self-discovery. Sarah, raised in a wealthy manufacturing family, struggles with her feelings about class and identity, finding it difficult to reconcile her family's nouveau riche status with her own sense of self. Her relationship with her parents is strained, as she dislikes her father's common behavior while her mother tries in vain to climb the social ladder. As Sarah reflects on her family's wealth and the surrounding industrial town of mill-workers, growing tensions with her brother George and excitement about the visit of her aristocratic school friend, Horatia Cunningham, pushes her on a journey of growth through societal complexities.