The Jackal's Mistress by Chris Bohjalian
Virginia, 1864—Libby Steadman’s husband has been away for so long that she can barely conjure his voice in her dreams. While she longs for him in the night, fearing him dead in a Union prison camp, her days are spent running a gristmill with her teenage niece, a hired hand, and his wife, all the grain they can produce requisitioned by the Confederate Army. It’s an uneasy life in the Shenandoah Valley, the territory frequently changing hands, control swinging back and forth like a pendulum between North and South, and Libby awakens every morning expecting to see her land a battlefield.
And then she finds a gravely injured Union officer left for dead in a neighbor’s house, the bones of his hand and leg shattered. Captain Jonathan Weybridge of the Vermont Brigade is her enemy – but he’s also a human being, and Libby must make a terrible decision: Does she leave him to die alone? Or does she risk treason and try to nurse him back to health? And if she succeeds, does she try to secretly bring him across Union lines, where she might negotiate a trade for news of her own husband?
A vivid and sweeping story of two people navigating the boundaries of love and humanity in a landscape of brutal violence, The Jackal’s Mistress is a heart-stopping new novel, based on a largely unknown piece of American history, from one of our greatest storytellers.
Review: Set in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia in 1864, this novel follows Libby Steadman, whose husband left for the war not long after their marriage. She has been left behind and is struggling to survive and run a gristmill with the help of a hired man and his wife and her teenage niece. All the grain they can produce is immediately requisitioned by the Confederate Army. When Libby finds a severely injured Union officer left for dead in a neighbor's house, she decides to risk her own safety to try to save his life.
There was a lot I liked about this book:
- Loved the historical setting and that the story took place in the Shenandoah Valley, since I just spent a week there last summer.
- I really liked Libby herself and the quiet partnership she has with the freed man Joseph that works on her property. I appreciated that Libby is willing to take a risk to save Jonathan's life.
- There was a lot of tension in this. I was so scared that Jonathan would be discovered in Libby's home. And there was the constant wonder whether Libby's husband was dead or alive and what would become of them all.
- Loved the author's note at the end of this! I really appreciated that this was loosely inspired on a true story and that the author took the name Libby Steadman from a woman he knew. It is a great name.
- I never really believed that either Libby or Jonathan missed or loved their spouses. They're both very much only referred to in passing. Maybe more memories or even flashbacks would have helped but mostly the two felt emotionally free to be interested in the other.
- Libby's niece was extremely annoying. I think she's meant to be plucky and precocious but given the time period and her personal circumstances, her constant sarcastic asides seemed unlikely.
- I did think all the Confederate soldiers they encounter in this book are all too starkly bad. You're telling me that not a single one of those men was a good person and one willing to take pity on a fellow Confederate soldier's wife? I would have liked to see more nuance in the way they were depicted.
Stars: 3.5
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- Hour of the Witch by Chris Bohjalian
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