First published 2002
Henry Shaw sits at his computer screen, scrolling through email messages that were never meant for his eyes. The seventeen year old has stumbled onto his mother's passionate correspondence with her lover. Each message destroys another piece of his image of her, yet he cannot stop reading. Electronic surveillance leaves no fingerprints, makes no sound. Meanwhile, his younger sister Elvira lives in an entirely different century. She has thrown herself into Civil War reenactment with such intensity that 1862 feels more real than present day Chicago. Their historian father takes pride in Elvira's dedication to the past. Their mother watches with growing concern as her daughter retreats from modern life. The Shaw family has relocated from Vermont to Chicago, where each member struggles to make sense of their displaced lives. Henry's digital spying reveals how love and betrayal reshape a family. Hamilton crafts a story about the secrets that divide us and the loyalties that might save us.
Genres: literary-fiction, contemporary, 21st-century, family-drama
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Chicago, Vermont
Period: 1862, Present Day
345 pages · Paperback · Black Swan
Content warnings: emotional-abuse