Many thanks to NetGalley and Doubleday for gifting me a digital ARC of the latest book by Chris Bohjalian - one of my favorites! 4.5 stars for a great historical fiction look into early views about women and witches!
Mary left London with her parents who settled in Boston in the mid-1600s. Mary is a very devout Puritan woman who marries an older man, Thomas Deerfield, and becomes his second wife. Thomas turns out to be a very angry, violent man especially when he drinks and Mary is on the receiving end of that violence. When he stabs a three-pronged fork through her hand, Mary decides she must divorce him. However, she then finds herself defending against allegations of witchcraft.
While a bit of a slower read, this is a very powerful look into how women were treated centuries ago. Men were allowed to discipline their wives and the wives were forced to live with that violence. Hmm, well, maybe we haven't come as far as we should have on that matter. Barren women were judged to be suspect because they didn't fulfill what they were created to do - be bearers of children. This book took place in Massachusetts before the Salem witch trials and people were looking everywhere for the signs of the Devil - even in forks! The trials that Mary underwent were quite eyeopening and led to a tense reading of this book - loved the ending!
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