Digital ISBNs
EPUB 9780228612254
Kindle 9780228612261
WEB 9780228612278
Print ISBNs
Amazon Print 9780228612285
BWL Print 9780228612292
B&N Print 9780228612308
LSI Print 9780228612315
Copyright 2020 by Ann Birch
Cover Art Michelle Lee
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book
To Carolyn, friend and supporter in a thousand ways
In the many months of collecting material for this novel, I browsed through countless books and much Internet information, making notes as I came upon useful tidbits such as the meaning of “trimming the sails” or the food offered to steerage passengers on sailing ships. For information on my major characters, I got a wealth of detail from the Powell Papers in the Metropolitan Toronto Public Library and from the marvellously informative biography of the Powells by Katherine M. J. McKenna titled A Life of Propriety: Anne Murray Powell and Her Family, 1755-1849. Other useful books included the following: Toronto in 1810 by Eric W. Hounsom; The Town of York 1793-1815 by Edith Firth; Capital in Flames: The American Attack on York, 1813 by Robert Malcomson; Muddy York Mud: Scandal & Scurrility in Upper Canada by Chris Raible; Muddy York; A History of Toronto Until 1834 by Richard Fiennes-Clinton; Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything by Lydia Kang and Nate Pedersen; Nineteenth-Century Costume and Fashion by Herbert Norris and Oswald Curtis; and the informative sketches of many characters in this book found in The Dictionary of Canadian Biography.
I am grateful as well to the people who always stay with me and support me during the long creative process. Novelist and writing mentor Barbara Kyle offered wise advice and intensive editing. My sons Hugh and John gave ongoing support. Carolyn Thompson found every redundant comma or incorrect detail. Nora Wallner gave me a great idea for the final pages.
Finally, I am happy to publish again with BWL Publishing Inc. because of the amazing speed, skill, and wisdom with which publisher Judith Pittman, editor Nancy Bell, and designer Michelle Lee move through the process of getting a novel into the hands of the reading public.