A DURABLE FIRE

by Virginia Bernhard ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 29, 1990

A captivating first novel--a romantic triangle set against the British colonizing of Jamestown--that combines Bernhard's expertise as an American history professor with a vivid, sure prose style to produce a rich tale of suffering and triumph in 1600's America. In 1609, Temperance Yardley, a spirited English redhead, and her new husband, George, an ambitious young bodyguard, set sail for America on separate ships to make their fortune in the new colony of Jamestown. When George's ship is wrecked at sea, Temperance arrives in America with only George's best friend, Will, to comfort her. The grieving widow throws herself into nursing the many sick and dying within Jamestown's pitiful collection of huts as the colonists are plunged into the terrible winter of 1609, better known as the ""Starving Time."" Near death, the colonists steal, murder and even eat one of their dead comrades for a chance at survival. Meanwhile, Temperance and Will, at this most incongruous of times, fall in love. Just when winter has ended and a supply ship has arrived from England, George reappears, having survived his shipwreck on Bermuda, and a lover's triangle ensues as Temperance vacillates from Will (until he is supposedly killed by the Indians) to George (as he becomes mayor of Jamestown) to Will (when he resurfaces dressed in Indian clothes) and back to George (when Will really does die in the Massacre of 1621). All this is expertly submerged beneath a wealth of vivid, riveting historical detail as the author wisely allows her re-creations of John Smith's first encounter with Pocahontas, the colonists' winter of starvation, Pocahontas' visit to England, etc., to drive the fictional plot. As Bernhard suggests in a prefacing note, truth is certainly, in this case, stranger than any fiction. An appendix providing first-person accounts by the actual colonists should make this even more satisfying for historical-saga aficionados.

Pub Date: March 29, 1990

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Morrow

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1990

Categories: FICTION