The Burning Bride Book

The aftermath of revolution is usually a time of disillusion, when hard- faced men turn out to have done well from betrayed promises and shattered dreams. The last of Margaret Lawrence's historical detection trilogy about midwife Hannah takes place in the hard winter of 1786--the financial crises of the new American republic are forcing poor farmers into debtors' prison and insurrection is in the air. Hannah is about to marry Daniel Josselyn, captain of the local militia, and finds herself charged with malpractice by Clinch, a doctor close to Daniel's political enemies. And then Clinch is found shot dead in the forest... Hannah, fond of her independence and worried for the future of her mute daughter Jennet, is a strong protagonist and Daniel, tormented by half- remembered tragedies of the Revolution, is almost equally attractive. Lawrence writes well and realistically about the lives of ordinary men and women in a period too often mythologized--murder takes place against a background of political business-as-usual, and among men and women driven to desperation. Weaver's patterns and apothecary's recipes take their place alongside account books and military strategies as clues in a complex web of deceit and betrayals; Lawrence wears her feminism and radicalism quietly, but intensely.--Roz KaveneyRead More