Beheld by TaraShea Nesbit
/Available March 17, 2020
978-1-63557-322-0
288 pages
From the Publisher:
Ten years after the Mayflower pilgrims arrived on rocky, unfamiliar soil, Plymouth is not the land its residents had imagined. Seemingly established on a dream of religious freedom, in reality the town is led by fervent puritans who prohibit the residents from living, trading, and worshipping as they choose. By the time an unfamiliar ship, bearing new colonists, appears on the horizon one summer morning, Anglican outsiders have had enough.
With gripping, immersive details and exquisite prose, TaraShea Nesbit reframes the story of the pilgrims in the previously unheard voices of two women of very different status and means. She evokes a vivid, ominous Plymouth, populated by famous and unknown characters alike, each with conflicting desires and questionable behavior.
Suspenseful and beautifully wrought, Beheld is about a murder and a trial, and the motivations-personal and political-that cause people to act in unsavory ways. It is also an intimate portrait of love, motherhood, and friendship that asks: Whose stories get told over time, who gets believed-and subsequently, who gets punished?
Reader Friends, this book is a gorgeously written account of the first murder to take place in Plymouth, Massachusettes. Told from the perspective of two women in the colony, it is a gripping tale of how social class influences the law and history of a land.
Alice Bradford, wife to the colony’s governor William Bradford, didn’t realize that her life would be this difficult. The New World wasn’t nearly as welcoming and bountiful as they were led to believe and the struggle to sustain the colony along with the everyday needs of running a household is mentally and emotionally draining.
Eleanor Billington, wife to John Billington, is tired of the constant criticism of her parenting, her husband, and their way of life. When a new resident of the colony begins to prepare his land for building a home, the lives of the two women will become intertwined in tragic ways.
TaraShea Nesbit is able to create a world where the character’s every thought and action feels profound. With a society that places religion and moral character in such high regard, the actions of those in power feel far more like a scandalous soap opera than those of a pure and just society.
I was utterly captivated by this story and had an incredible setting to enjoy it in. I was fortunate enough to read this last fall while I was on a cruise to Jamaica. Now, I don’t know if anyone else should have that exact same reading experience right now, I know that you will be just as intrigued by this story as I was while enjoying this lovely book from the safety of your couch.
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