Harriet Klausner's Review Archive
Seven years after the Civil War ended mentally unbalanced former POW William Pearlman, a widower, commits suicide leaving behind his sixteen year old daughter Lydia, whom he failed to recognize once he came home to Grundy, West Virginia. Lydia, though shocked, has no time to grieve as she leaves immediately for St. Louis to live with her Aunt Almetta Boggs.
Almetta makes it clear from the start that her niece will earn her keep. Meanwhile the Gateway City seems initially a haven for the rural rube, but her naiveté leaves her heartbroken as people even family take advantage of her kindness. A betrayal leaves her bereft and feeling that she does not belong here. Deciding to leave the big city, Lydia heads west to the Dakotas seeking to find a place where she belongs; instead calamity and misfortune is all she seems to find. Although discouraged a bit, the intrepid young woman continues her journey to find happiness.
This is an interesting historical character study starring a determined woman not willing to allow hard knocks to keep her down as she believes she will find someone to cherish and someplace to call home. The story line contains twenty-five letters that Lydia writes to friends and teachers encouraging her to be all that she can be; the correspondence adds to the sense of time and place while also giving the insightful plot a Reconstruction Era biographical fictional feel. Kent Kamron pens LETTERS FROM LYDIA that fans of Americana tales will appreciate.