5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
terrific read!, September 1, 2009
This review is from: The Widow's War (Mass Market Paperback)
Mary Mackey is the reigning master of the historical novel in which a strong, sensitive woman confronts and overcomes the challenges of social ferment. The Widow's War takes the reader to Bleeding Kansas and the conflict between slave owners and emancipators that presages the War Between the States. Carrie Vinton rides and shoots like a man, but is every bit a sensual woman and caring mother. The righteous triumph and the scoundrels are smitten in this, beautifully written, meticulously researched, lively, fast paced novel.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Vs Evil, Underground Railroad, And A Very Angry Woman, October 4, 2009
This review is from: The Widow's War (Mass Market Paperback)
I enjoyed this.. I really like Mark MacKey's writing style. I do think
The Notorious Mrs. Winston is a bit better than this one tho. Whereas Mrs. Winston takes place during the Civil War, Widow's War occurs in just before the war in a much divided Kansas. The book starts in Brazil where the heroine, Carrie thinks her lover has died of disease and being left with child and unmarried, she accepts the most appealing option available to her and marries Deacon, her lover's stepbrother and travels back to the States. What Carries doesn't realize is the States is on the verge of a civil war, the main topic being slavery and she has unknowingly married into a pro-slavery family. Carrie and her former lover, William, are both abolitionists. However, that is the not the only surprise awaiting her stateside arrival. Carries soon discovers that she has been duped. William is very much alive out there somewhere, her new husband is a liar and con artist, and she is now broke to boot. Not a woman to be easily deterred, a pregnant Carrie holds a gun to her husband's head, threatens him, and runs off to Kansas to find William.
She not only finds William, but gets involved in an underground railroad movement. As tensions mount as to whether or not Kansas is going to be a slave or free state and abolotionists face constant attacks from slave holders, Deacon is hunting her down and intends to take his child away from her. Can she outrun him, protect her child, and keep her lover in the process?
The battle of good and evil is fought between two men. John Brown, an abolotionist and Henry Clark, a loose model of William Quantrill. Both of these men are portrayed as somewhat psychotic. Their characterizations were a bit extreme, causing the loss of half a star in my opinion. The other half of the star is missing due to the story being a bit rushed at times. Too much story is summed up too quickly in at least two locations. When Carrie loses a baby on the ship to America, the situation is quickly told to reader via letters she is writing to her dead mother. Later, at her Kansas home, traumatizing raids are briefly mentioned, but Carrie's own experiences with them are summed up in two sentences saying she has bad dreams and cannot remember what they are.
Good book. Great historical detail about Kansas and pre civil war tensions. I didn't realize till now how big of a role Kansas played in it. Recommended.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
great 1850s historical thriller, September 5, 2009
This review is from: The Widow's War (Mass Market Paperback)
In 1853 in Rio de Janeiro, Carolyn "Carrie" Vinton knows she cannot grieve the loss of her fiancé, abolitionist Dr. William Saylor, as she carries his child although she is not sure what to do. That is until William's stepbrother, Deacon Presgrove, arrives in Brazil from the United States and proposes marriage; insisting it is a family matter of honor. Feeling she has no choice with her being pregnant, she accepts. They return to Kansas as husband and wife only for her to find out that she has fallen for a ruse; as William is alive and Deacon's family are slavery sympathizers.
Bleeding Kansas continues unabated and deadly. Carrie disregards her safety to find William. As the battle on the Plains remains heated and deadly, Carrie finds her beloved, but he and their and their child are kidnapped by pro-slavers. Carrie recruits the help of an African-American cavalry unit to free her beloved and their son
This is a great 1850s historical thriller that showcases how in the territory on the Great Plains the prime issue was whether a new state entered on the Free or Slavery Side of the debate. The story line is loaded with action while providing a powerful look through fully developed protagonists of Bleeding Kansas where many believe the Civil War first began rather than at Fort Sumter. Mary Mackey provides a strong Americana saga as the decade leading to the war is bloody.
Harriet Klausner
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