Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese (2022)

Hester will be of particular interest to fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter as it is the author’s imagining of the woman who inspired the main character, Hester Prynne. For those forced to read The Scarlet Letter and hated the novel, Hester will have you reconsidering your opinion.

The heroine, Isobel Gamble is a gifted needleworker, with a very special talent she keeps hidden from the world. She and her husband Edward, an apothecary with a fondness for opium, leave Scotland for Salem, Massachusetts in the early 1800s to escape Edward’s growing debts. But only days after their arrival, Isobel learns Edward has signed up to be a medic on a departing trade ship. Isobel finds herself penniless and alone in a strange country where she must rely on her needle and her inner strength to make a life for herself.

When Isobel meets a young Nathaniel Hathorne, the two are instantly drawn to one other. They have much in common, Hathorne is haunted by his ancestor’s role in the city’s witch trials and Isobel is troubled by her own special talents. Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer as it becomes doubtful that Edward will ever return from the sea. Like Hester Prynne, Isobel finds Hathorne will not stand by her when she needs him the most.

Lico Albanese’s Hester includes vivid descriptions of the Salem witch trails in the late 1600s and the beginnings of the Underground Railroad in the early 19^th century, as well as a look into how immigrants were treated at that time. I found the book impossible to put down after Isobel arrives in America.

4.0 stars on Goodreads, 4.3 on Amazon