Hardcover, 297 pages
English language
Published Nov. 24, 2007 by W. W. Norton & Co., Norton & Co.
3 stars
(1 review)
"An evocative panorama of America...on the cusp of enormous change" (Newsday) by the National Book Award-winning author ofShip Fever. In the fall of 1916, America prepares for war--but in the community of Tamarack Lake, the focus is on the sick. Wealthy tubercular patients live in private cure cottages; charity patients, mainly immigrants, fill the large public sanatorium. Prisoners of routine, they take solace in gossip, rumor, and--sometimes--secret attachments. But when the well-meaning efforts of one enterprising patient lead to a tragic accident and a terrible betrayal, the war comes home, bringing with it a surge of anti-immigrant prejudice and vigilante sentiment. Reading group guide included.
Subjects
- Tuberculosis -- Patients -- Fiction.
- Immigrants -- New York (State) -- History -- 20th century -- Fiction.
- Communicable diseases -- New York (State) -- New York -- Fiction.
- Adirondack Mountains (N.Y.) -- Fiction.