Deepwater: A Novel of the Carolinas

Relating the story of four generations of an American family living in and around the Cape Fear Valley in North Carolina, Jekel ( Bayou ; Columbia ) gives primary attention to the strong Southern women who have been responsible for maintaining the ties of love among family members. From the birth of Virginia Dare in the first colonial settlement on Roanoke Island to the life of Quaker educator and abolitionist Laurel Chapman during and after the Civil War, this sweeping saga utilizes an impressive amount of well-documented historical material (there's a bibliography) emphasizing the role that the Carolinas have played in American history. Jekel counterpoints such public events as John Culpepper's defiance of the king's Duty Acts a century before the Boston Tea Party with her female characters' private meditations on sex, marriage, infidelity and family. While these emotional, personal perspectives on history sometimes border on the melodramatic, Jekel suggests that many of those situations (children hovering on the edge of mortal illness, for example) were frequent concerns in earlier times. Compelling characters, situations and settings make this Jekel's best book to date. ( Mar .)