Sales of "1984" and other classic dystopic novels are climbing
Kerri Miller's Must-Read
"The Second Mrs. Hockaday"by Susan Rivers
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One of my bookish resolutions this year was to read more historical romance. I've been feeling left out, because a lot of you are reading romance — it outsells science fiction and fantasy — and one of my favorite book sites just put out a list of 100 must-read historical romances.
This book isn’t on it — yet. But picking up Susan Rivers’ novel for my first foray into romance was a stroke of luck.
Rivers is an accomplished playwright, and her debut novel has a kind of spare narrative drama about it. It’s set during and after the Civil War, and it's told in letters between a young bride, who is just 17, and her older Confederate officer husband. They meet at a stepsister’s wedding, and although there were many suitors buzzing around young Placidia Fincher, the major has had “the advantage on his rivals of speed,” as Dia’s aunt confides in a letter.
He spirits “his fair girl” off to his farm and then departs for the battlefield just two days later.
There are also diary entries in the book that allude to Placidia’s deceased child, apparently conceived while the major is at war, and a criminal hearing ordered by the major himself. That diary, discovered years later by Placidia’s son, Achilles, slowly reveals the secret that stains the marriage.
-K.M.
P.S. Next week I’ll be writing from a roaming and reading adventure to South America with some MPR travelers. I’m packing at least a dozen novels — list to come! Tell us what you're reading on Twitter @TheThreadMPR.
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