The Nature of Fragile Things
Book Feature - The Nature of Fragile Things by Susan Meissner
HBL Note: Susan Meissner is one of those authors whose books I eager anticipate each year. I’ve read and reviewed Stars over Sunset Boulevard, As Bright as Heaven, Secrets of a Charmed Life, and The Last Year of the War. That may be a Hasty Book List record for the most number of books reviewed by a single author. Needless to say, I’m a huge fan. Susan managers to teach the reader about history under the guise of a compelling, beautiful story. Scroll down to read all about her latest novel, The Nature of Fragile Things.
Book Feature - The Nature of Fragile Things by Susan Meissner
From the publisher:
April 18, 1906: A massive earthquake rocks San Francisco just before daybreak, igniting a devouring inferno. Lives are lost, lives are shattered, but some rise from the ashes forever changed.
Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a mail-order bride ad and agrees to marry a man she knows nothing about. San Francisco widower Martin Hocking proves to be as aloof as he is mesmerizingly handsome. Sophie quickly develops deep affection for Kat, Martin's silent five-year-old daughter, but Martin's odd behavior leaves her with the uneasy feeling that something about her newfound situation isn't right.
Then one early-spring evening, a stranger at the door sets in motion a transforming chain of events. Sophie discovers hidden ties to two other women. The first, pretty and pregnant, is standing on her doorstep. The second is hundreds of miles away in the American Southwest, grieving the loss of everything she once loved.
The fates of these three women intertwine on the eve of the devastating earthquake, thrusting them onto a perilous journey that will test their resiliency and resolve and, ultimately, their belief that love can overcome fear.
