Amelia S. reviewed on 10/17/2005 + 80 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 3

This book is not a mystery so much as a thick and satisfying historical fiction novel with my favorite focus: the upheavals of history through women's eyes. The midwife Hannah, though anachronistically feminist, with her short hair and refusal to share "her" daughter with her daughter's father, lives a life as chaotic as any in the time just after the Revolutionary War. She is strongly loved, not only by her daughter's father, but by her family and a few good friends, including her cousin Jonathan; she is also beaten by a mob, and she is the female witness to all of the district's autopsies, as well as caring for the dead and not just the living as a nurse-midwife. This book is one I'd recommend to fans of Sharyn McCrumb's historical mysteries. First in a trilogy; sequels include Blood Red Roses and The Burning Bride.

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