Helpful Score: 4
I highly recommend this book as a vivid, believable portrayal of the love of a mother for her young child. This--a skillful treatment of a rarely addressed topic--would be sufficient reason to read this marvelous book, but Youmans gives us more. Through the eyes and mind of her title character, a young woman embarking on a new marriage on a new continent, Youmans imagines the seventeenth century imagination. And still the book offers more: all of this is written in a poetic style that is nevertheless enjoyably easy to read.
Helpful Score: 3
This book was a fascinating, but quite disturbing read. If you only enjoy books with happy endings, this is not the one for you. But it is riveting and realistic and beautifully written.
