title: Accessories to Modernity: Fashion and the Feminine in Nineteenth-Century France
author:  Susan Hiner 
description: By reclaiming accessories from the margins of the realist novel, Hiner has written the most ingenious kind of fashion history, documenting not the whats, whos, and whens, but the elusive hows and whys. Dr. Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell, Worn Through (September 2010)<br /><br />This book is a pleasure to read: extremely well-written, elegant, clear, fascinating, and witty. Hiner admirably weaves together disparate texts and illustrations into a coherent and cogent argument. Dorothy Kelly, Boston University, H-France, 11: 68 (March 2011)<br /><br />Hiner's important observation that fashion accessories helped women "perform" femininity implies that women could use fashion for their own ends [...] As with all excellent monographs, Hiner's work leaves the reader wanting to know more. Victoria E. Thompson, Arizona State University, American Historical Review, 116: 3 (June 2011)<br /><br />Winner, 2011 Millia Davenport Publication Award. [M]embers of the committee [...] praised the author's depth of analysis and impressive breadth of research [...] They noted that the author's creative approach [...] went beyond obvious and accepted interpretations of French nineteenth-century culture. Costume Society of America, June 2011<br /><br />Persuasive and well written, [Hiner's] book shows that items we might tend to overlook have the capacity to illuminate important questions about nineteenth-century society and women's roles in it. Carol Rifelj, Middlebury College, Nineteenth-Century French Studies, 39: 3 (Spring-Summer 2011)
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  #  Hatter’s Heart
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  #  Chapter 1
  
  
  If you are reading this, you do not have the most up to date version of
  Hatter’s Heart. Please contact Kindle to get an updated version or email the
  author at [erin@erinbedford.com](mailto:erin@erinbedford.com).
  
  
  My mother would have adored Mrs. Tara McAllister. She was everything she
  expected a woman to be in the nineteenth century. Besides the fact that the
  human sitting across from my desk wore a pantsuit instead of a gown. Pantsuits
  were the equivalent to dresses for well-to-do women in the twenty-first
  century. She was articulated, gossipy, but in a hushed way, and overly
  concerned by anyone not abiding by the rules.
  
  
  As my friend Kat would say, "Fuck the rules."
  
  
  I hated to think I would have been an exact replica of Mrs. McAllister had I
  stayed in the nineteenth century. God forbid, if I had actually married Lewis.
  
  
  Suppressing a shudder, I shifted in my chair, hoping she hadn't noticed my
  drifting 