HESTER by Laurie Lico Albanese

 

MY THOUGHTS

This is one of those books that is kind of like a book within a book. Like two stories are being told at once. There is Isobel's story and Nathaniel's story. There is also Isobel's husband Edward whom I totally did not like. But then again I didn't care for Nathaniel that much either. I did love Isobel and Captain Darling. 

This story is centered around the Salem witch trials. The Hawthorn's role in putting innocent women, children and even some men to death. They were declared witches at the drop of a word. A child or children could cause a woman to be deemed a witch and then imprisoned and hanged. A man could rape a woman and claim she put a spell on him and there she was a witch. Women mostly had it bad back then. So many were sentenced to death because of what society deemed inappropriate behavior. 

Isobel had a gift. She saw colors and that scared people. She could sew beautiful things and used the colors she saw to make things that were meant for certain people. She married Edward and after a few things happened they had to leave Scotland and go to the United States. They settled in Salem and that is where Isobel's life really starts. Edward leaves on a ship and that is ultimately the end of their marriage. Isobel meets Nathaniel and they have a connection. She confides things to him that maybe she should not have. He also is very ashamed of the things that his ancestors did during the witch trials. Their love was not meant to be. He could not give up his life or his wealth for her. He moved on.

This book is truly told in a beautiful prose. Told in a way that hooks you from the start. The things that happened and that will happen are so horrific yet so interesting you will want to know more. This book has a lot of history in it. Things based on actual events. This author did a great job of describing what people felt. What so called "witches" went through. What their families went through. Even how some family members turned against them. You travel across the ocean with Isobel and Edward and Captain Darling. You see Edward at his worse. As he causes Isobel to become someone she never thought she would. It's a story of love and loss. Love found in other ways that will bring tears to your eyes. Hope to your heart. It's just a beautifully written story of so much tragedy and so much love. 

Thank you #NetGalley, #LaurieLicoAlbanese, #StMartinsPress for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.

5 stars and a very high recommendation. This was out of my usual genre and I'm so glad I read it. It's great.

SYNOPSIS

Isobel Gamble is a young seamstress carrying generations of secrets when she sets sail from Scotland in the early 1800s with her husband, Edward. An apothecary who has fallen under the spell of opium, his pile of debts have forced them to flee Glasgow for a fresh start in the New World. But only days after they've arrived in Salem, Edward abruptly joins a departing ship as a medic––leaving Isobel penniless and alone in a strange country, forced to make her way by any means possible.

When she meets a young Nathaniel Hawthorne, the two are instantly drawn to each other: he is a man haunted by his ancestors, who sent innocent women to the gallows––while she is an unusually gifted needleworker, troubled by her own strange talents. As the weeks pass and Edward's safe return grows increasingly unlikely, Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer. Together, they are a muse and a dark storyteller; the enchanter and the enchanted. But which is which?

In this sensuous and hypnotizing tale, a young immigrant woman grapples with our country's complicated past, and learns that America's ideas of freedom and liberty often fall short of their promise. Interwoven with Isobel and Nathaniel's story is a vivid interrogation of who gets to be a "real" American in the first half of the 19th century, a depiction of the early days of the Underground Railroad in New England, and atmospheric interstitials that capture the long history of "unusual" women being accused of witchcraft. Meticulously researched yet evocatively imagined, Laurie Lico Albanese's Hester is a timeless tale of art, ambition, and desire that examines the roots of female creative power and the men who try to shut it down.