It's interesting to imagine what life must have been like for women in 1864 Washington, D.C. As a widow in Maryland, Mary Surratt moved her family to a house they already owned and took in boarders. Her own grown daughter Anna lived with her and a young woman named Nora Fitzpatrick. Mrs. Surratt's son, Isaac, was away in the Confederate Army and her son, Johnny, helped out in running finding boarders like Louis Weichmann.
This novel alternates chapters with the voices of Mary and Nora. It is organized chronologically with clear dates given at the beginning of chapters. The author does a good job of delineating between the older woman and the younger. She does a creditable job of showing how handsome John Wilkes Booth appeals to the younger women when he visits her house. Tragically, Mrs. Surratt tries to help her son and his friends and becomes wound up in what she imagines to be a plot to kidnap President Lincoln. Too late, she learns the President has been killed and is not only implicated, but actually tried and hanged for participating in the plot to assassinate Mr. Lincoln.
One of the most interesting parts of the part of the book is at the end when the author tells what happened to the characters in the novel. Of course, readers know what happened to Booth and the other conspirators. But, Anna and Nora and the Surratt sons are less well known. Some resources are shown in a bibliography. Things like the fact that the boardinghouse survives and has been renumbered at 604 H Street NW and houses a Chinese restaurant are fascinating. Certainly conspiracy followers may want to eat there and imagine themselves in Mrs. Surratt's dining room! But, readers will have to make up their own minds about whether Mary Surratt was truly just gullible or involved in history's most complicated murder.
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