Into the Wilderness
It is December of 1792. Elizabeth Middleton leaves her comfortable English estate to join her family in a remote New York mountain village. It is a place unlike any she has ever experienced. And she meets a man unlike any she has ever encountered—a white man dressed like a Native American: Nathaniel Bonner, known to the Mohawk people as Between-Two-Lives. Determined to provide schooling for all the children of the village, Elizabeth soon finds herself locked in conflict with the local slave owners as well as with her own family. Interweaving the fate of the Mohawk Nation with the destiny of two lovers, Sara Donati’s compelling novel creates a complex, profound, passionate portait of an emerging America.
Review: Into the Wilderness is a historical fiction novel set in 1792 that follows the adventures of Elizabeth Middleton, who has traveled from her English estate to the remote world of New York, hoping to make a difference through teaching local children. Elizabeth is taken by surprise when she falls for Nathaniel Bonner, a white man raised by Mohawk and makes the decision to leave her long preferred spinster status behind.
I didn't love this book as much as I thought, but maybe that's because I had high expectations after being told that it was a lot like Outlander, one of my favorite books set in this time period and setting. In fact, Outlander characters are referenced in this novel, which I thought was a clever reference to another author who has created fictional characters that live in the same neck of the woods as your own. However, this book fell to live up to the glory that is Outlander and I did not think the plot or the characters were as appealing.
This book was severely lacking in true character development. I never fully got a sense of who anyone really was in this book or was able to see them as anything more than interchangeable prop figures. I think part of the problem is that much of the drama and plot tension rides on events that occur well before the book begins. I would have enjoyed seeing Elizabeth in England and the life she left so I could grasp how radically different her American life was. Furthermore, Elizabeth makes a big fuss about how she wants to be independent and will achieve that through staying single and make a difference through teaching. Yet she doesn't seem to hesitate to toss that to the side to run away with Nathaniel (after only a couple real conversations), a fairly bold social choice for the time, considering his Native American upbringing. I did enjoy that Donati was unapologetic about giving Elizabeth fairly horrible relatives in her father and brother, who she is clearly not close to. It felt more realistic and more true to the gender dynamics of the time.
Additionally, this novel felt excessively long, to the point where I felt that the author was scrambling to create over the top plot details as fillers. In particular the fire and dramatic rescue was a bit too soap opera for me. I did really like Nathaniel and Elizabeth as characters and their willingness to defy social convention. I do really love this time period and setting and I appreciated this book, despite it's inability to live up to one of my favorites.
Stars: 3
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