The Price of Soup

By Caren Cross

A society wife lost everything. A mother would do anything to save her children.

Long Island, 1929. Elizabeth Morrow had it all: a life of glittering parties, sprawling estates, and effortless privilege. But when the stock market crashes, it sweeps her gilded world away. The savings vanish, the car is repossessed, and in 1931, a final, cruel blow-she loses her husband.

Now, with two children to feed and no skills to speak of, Elizabeth stands at the brink of despair. Faced with starvation, she makes a desperate choice. Armed with her late husband's phone book of former business associates, she enters the shadowy, masculine world of high-stakes commerce. No longer a socialite, she becomes a supplicant, a negotiator, and a survivor.

What follows is a harrowing two-year journey through the underbelly of the Great Depression. Elizabeth will sacrifice her pride, endure searing humiliation, and face brutal choices to put food on the table. Each transaction is a battle, each meal a victory paid for with a piece of her soul.

She emerges from the Depression not just a survivor, but a wealthy woman, having forged a new life from the ashes of the old. Yet her hard-won success comes with a devastating secret-a truth so haunting she has buried it deep within.
Now, as a new love offers her a chance at redemption, she must decide: can she build a future on a foundation of lies, or will the terrible price she paid for survival destroy her last chance at happiness?

The Price of Soup is a gripping and poignant novel about the lengths a mother will go for her children, the shadows cast by secrets, and the fragile line between a woman's past and her second chance.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0GKYDXSSX
• ISBN13: 9798246448755
• Release Date: February 2026
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 152 Pages
• Weight: 0.37 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.4" x 5.3"