UNRULY HUMAN HEARTS

Southard offers a historical novel about the real-life Beecher-Tilton sex scandal, told from the perspective of the woman at its center.

The novel opens with Elizabeth Tilton on her deathbed in Brooklyn, New York, in 1897,reflecting on the defining moments of her life that still haunt her. In her infirmity, she struggles to recognize some of her children; she has no friends she can count on, as the choices she has made have turned her into a social pariah. In this state, she slips between the present and memories from about 30 years earlier. At the time, her husband, Theodore, was a prominent New York newspaper publisher and journalist who championed the rights of enslaved people and women and the doctrine of “free love.” Elizabeth was deeply involved in progressive reform and active in the liberal Plymouth Church, led by the renowned Rev. Henry Ward Beecher. Theodore and Elizabeth’s marriage was happy and collaborative; however, the death of their infant son, Paul, devastated them both. When Theodore confessed to a past affair, Elizabeth turned to Beecher for emotional comfort, which led to physical intimacy. Theodore, suspecting the liaison, began to publicly accuse Beecher of seducing his wife, throwing Elizabeth, Beecher, and himself into a scandal that stretched on for years, pushing them all to the brink of ruin. Over the course of this novel based on true events, Southard’s prose is gripping (“The glass feels icy cold to my fingers. Dry leaves are still swirling in the wind. Tears run down my cheeks, leaving droplets on the windowsill”), and the story is suitably elegiac, calling to mind many touchstonehistorical romances. The characters are well-defined and memorable, and include such prominent historical figures as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. Readers will find themselves engrossed in the drama while also learning about a peripheral but compelling piece of American history.

A superbly written story of love, betrayal, and resistance in the face of crisis.