The Traitor's Wife

I haven’t done a book review in a while, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been reading. I’ve actually been re-reading a lot of my favorites. I’ve also been picking an Edgar Allen Poe short story here and there to give me the creeps just in time for Halloween.
I also picked up The Traitor’s Wife a few weeks ago at the BX. We were browsing and it caught my eye, then sounded interesting enough to buy.
Here’s a synopsis posted on Amazon:

In the harsh wilderness of colonial Massachusetts, Martha Allen works as a servant in her cousin’s household, taking charge and locking wills with everyone. Thomas Carrier labors for the family and is known both for his immense strength and size and mysterious past. The two begin a courtship that suits their independent natures, with Thomas slowly revealing the story of his part in the English Civil War. But in the rugged new world they inhabit, danger is ever present, whether it be from the assassins sent from London to kill the executioner of Charles I or the wolves-in many forms-who hunt for blood. A love story and a tale of courage, The Wolves of Andover confirms Kathleen Kent’s ability to craft powerful stories of family from colonial history.

The book was previously named The Wolves of Andover and has been re-named, apparently. It’s also a prequel to Kathleen Kent’s first novel The Heretic’s Daughter, which is now on my list of books to read in the future.

I really enjoyed the book. It’s a little slow to start, and confusing since the narrative jumps across the ocean from the colonies to England and back, and most of the characters are strangers until you get quite a few chapters in. I had trouble keeping up with who was who, but that doesn’t interrupt the narrative too badly.
I loved the way Kent weaved the narrative with historical glimpses of life in the wilderness of American colonies and life in London. You’d go from a description of a person and their thoughts and feelings to a depiction of the daily chores a woman must do to keep the house safe and running. It was really interesting to me. The love story might feel under-developed compared to most romantic novels, because there are very few words and intimate interactions between the two characters. It seems like nothing has happened and suddenly they’ve both decided to be together. She probably could’ve spent a bit more time on how their emotions develop, but it isn’t sparse either. It’s not like colonial men and women had a lot of time to sit and write love notes to each other or spend afternoons gazing into each other’s eyes anyways.
The connection to English political history is interesting as well. I don’t know extensive facts about that time in history, but I have studied it off and on in relation to literature I’ve studied and in basic history courses. The back room dealings to quietly and quickly dispose of political nightmares doesn’t seem stretched at all, and the depictions and stories of the assasins kept me reading. I think the network of connections through the colonies were accurate, especially for political refugees hiding from the king and his vengeance. I loved the quick stories of colonial men and women plotting and preventing the success of the assassins coming to aide England’s interests. It reminded me of the Underground Railroad decades later.

Overall, I really liked this one. It wasn’t a book I picked up and didn’t put down all night, as it was slow to start and somewhat dense to read for a long period of time, but I did finish it within a week. I loved the book enough to look up its predecessor and make a note of buying it in the future. It’s different enough to stick out on the shelf and it’s well put together, so the historical vignettes and the love story and the murder suspense work together instead of against each other. If you’re into colonial America at all, I think you’d enjoy this one