Benedict Hall (A Benedict Hall Novel)
–by Cate Campbell
Fiction / Historical
384 pages / 701 KB
5 Stars
The first in a series by Cate Campbell was, for me, a real
page burner. This story is set in Seattle of the 1920s and it was great fun
seeing what my old town used to look like through this author's eyes. As a
retired Boeing employee, it was also fun to see how she treated Bill Boeing and
The Boeing Company, at the time a small company building seaplanes.
The careful and thorough research by the author is
delightfully woven into a story of love, jealous hatred, and a bit of ancient
history through a magical stone the villain picked up while at war in Jerusalem
that used to belong to Roxelana.
The people of this book are alive, and their surroundings
given with such marvelous detail, I could almost reach out and touch them. I'm
positive Benedict Hall actually exists, somewhere, in Seattle, just under a
different name.
Margo Benedict is one of the few women physicians in
Seattle, indeed of the time. Her father is one of the wealthiest men in
Seattle, but she wants to do things her way, on her own without his help. Her
mother doesn't understand why she would want to be a doctor, and not only treat
the ill, but touch them. Her brother, Preston, has been jealous of her all his
life, hates her, and even as a child tried more than once to kill her, which no
one in the family saw or even believes.
Frank Parrish, a quiet man who served in Jerusalem with
Preston and lost his arm in a battle, comes to Seattle and through a chance
meeting with Preston on the street, is invited to Benedict Hall, where he meets
the rest of the family, and is befriended by Dickson, the Patriarch. And, of
course, falls in love with Margot.
Benedict Hall shows us the upheavals this highly thought-of
and prestigious family goes through as they come to grips with Preston and his
psychosis, and a strong-willed Margot who wants more than anything and against
all odds, to become a surgeon. While there is a romance that builds, I would
hesitate to call this a Romance novel. It is a history of Seattle and the
times, a history of how women, servants, and blacks were thought of and
treated.
I look forward to getting and reading the next books in this
series. My only concern is that I will read them faster than Cate. Campbell
will write them!
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