author’s note

A historical novel involves much more research than one set in contemporary times. KB Inglee, who writes not only historical mysteries but stories about Quakers, helped with several crucial details. Sam Sherman, Barb Bristol Weismann, Margie Walker, and Robert Schledwitz each gave me valuable input with respect to the culture and practice of the late 1800s. In addition, the Amesbury Whittier Home Association, the Amesbury Carriage Museum, and the Amesbury Library historic archives were important resources, as was the Lowell National Historic Park with its working textile mill and informative Mill Girls exhibit. Amesbury reference librarian Margie Walker’s book Legendary Locals of Amesbury also gave me ideas for real characters I slid into the story.

Quaker historian and author Chuck Fager contributed valuable comments on differences between Friends’ practices then and now. Any remaining errors are my own.

The Agatha Award–winning historical mystery author Kathy Lynn Emerson (aka Kaitlin Dunnett) generously shared her bibliography of resources for how life was in 1888. She also read this manuscript and offered an enthusiastic endorsement before it was accepted for publication. The twenty-four hours I spent living the life at the Washburn-Norlands Living History Center in Livermore, Maine, opened my eyes about the work of cooking and home life in the second half of the nineteenth century—right down to the chamberpot—and what school was like in the period. Any errors of detail are entirely of my own doing.

This book cites portions of Friend and abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier’s poems “The Christmas of 1888,” “Democracy,” and “This Still Room.” Whittier was on the building committee for the Friends Meetinghouse where my protagonist, Rose Carroll, and Whittier himself worshiped.

It has been a huge pleasure to stroll the streets of my town and imagine life almost a hundred and fifty years ago. The Bailey family lives in my house, built in 1880. I walk to worship every Sunday (or First Day, as Friends call it), as Friends have over the centuries, to the Meetinghouse portrayed in “This Still Room” and in this novel. Many of the original nineteenth-century buildings in Amesbury remain standing and in use, and the same noon whistle blows as did in 1888. I hope, as you read, that you feel that same sense of walking through history.