Nancy Pickard is one of those masterful story tellers who can, in the first 11 pages, tell you the life-defining tragedy of the central character, then flash back to (some of) the events leading up to that tragedy, and keep the reader eagerly turning pages for the next half of the book. The final revelation is, while not a total shock, still surprising enough to be satisfying.

I found this book very well written - the characters are lifelike and compelling and I was intrigued to find out what would happen. Mitchell's prose is lovely but not distracting, and her details of day-to-day life made the story very convincing. All of this said, these characters lead lives of incredible hardship. This is a really fine book, but not a "feel good" read - it's much too true to the life of that time and place to be light-hearted.