About this item
Massachusetts, 1869. Margaret Maher has never been one to settle down. At twenty-seven, she's never met a man who has tempted her enough to relinquish her independence to a matrimonial fate, and she hasn't stayed in one place for long since her family fled the potato famine a decade ago.When Maggie accepts a temporary position at the illustrious Dickinson family home in Amherst, it's only to save money for her upcoming trip West to join her brothers in California. Maggie never imagines she will form a life-altering friendship with the eccentric, brilliant Miss Emily or that she'll stay at the Homestead for the next thirty years. In this richly drawn novel, Amy Belding Brown explores what it is to be an outsider looking in, and she sheds light on one of Dickinson's closest confidantes - perhaps the person who knew the mysterious poet best - whose quiet act changed history and continues to influence literature to this very day.
About the Author
Amy Belding Brown is the bestselling USA Today author of EMILY'S HOUSE, FLIGHT OF THE SPARROW and MR. EMERSON'S WIFE. A Vermonter and history nerd, she was infused at an early age with a New England outlook and values. She loves stone walls, sugar maples and old cemeteries, and her favorite hobby is nature photography. She's never happier than when she's reading a stack of 19th century letters or exploring old church records. She has taught composition and creative writing to college students and life-story writing to senior citizens, made quilts, raised four children, been a tour guide at Louisa May Alcott's Orchard House Museum in Concord, Massachusetts, taught pre-school, made cloth dolls, created wall hangings on a hand loom, baked homemade bread, written poetry, and painted New England landscapes. Oh, and she's also been a pastor's wife for 43 years. . A graduate of Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, she received her MFA from Vermont College and now lives in rural Vermont with her husband, a UCC minister and spiritual director.
