Marti's February Pick

The Last Runaway by Tracy Chevalier 

This is a wonderful story of hope and determination! The setting is Ohio before the Civil War. The country is decisively divided by pro-slavery and anti-slavery. The Fugitive Slave Act has just been enacted.

Honor Bright has been jilted and feels that her life is unmoored. As a Quaker, she has always found comfort in her home, her quilting and her faith. She actually takes a chance and leaves England for a new home in America with her sister, who is moving to Ohio to marry Adam, a man from their village who left for new opportunities. Honor feels she is not a brave or outgoing person, but rather one who allows her sister and others to lead. Honor survives the voyage, but knows going back to England is not possible. Honor and her sister are on their journey to Ohio when tragedy strikes and Honor's sister dies. Now she is left alone to find a new life. 

Honor finds safety with a milliner, Belle, for a short time and ends up marrying Jack Haymaker, another Quaker. They live on his family's farm with his sister and mother. This is such a different world for Honor. She has always lived among people in a town with stores and friends nearby. Now she lives in a vast wilderness, on a farm, near a very small community, where life is totally new. Honor learns to care for the animals and her husband. However, she is upset when she starts to find run-away slaves hiding in the woods near the farm. She begins to leave out food and then slowly begins to help by hiding them or sending them on to the next station. Her new family finds this unacceptable. Honor, with her quiet determination, finds the stricture unacceptable.
     
I found Tracy Chevalier's book to be a slow journey of self-discovery and self worth. Her characters are well drawn and multidimensional. Honor is a person of integrity and is well named. You feel drawn to wanting to help the Underground Railroad and Honor. You can see the quilts Honor creates as surely as you can see the farm with its crops, animals and barn. This is a story that unfolds to its own rhythm and you are brought on its journey. This book is a keeper, one that leaves you sad the book has ended. This is a book I will highly recommend!!!

    ---- Marti