Kathleen Cambor

The novel deals with the Johnstown flood. It's in interesting historical setting and our book club spent some time discussing the class differences (and how / whether they still exist in today's America).

It is a love story of sorts, set in the time leading to the Johnstown flood of 1889. A privileged girl comes to love the son of the steel works foreman. But, of course, their relationship is doomed. Some insight into the historical figures of Carnegie, Mellon and Frick.

I did not like the epilogue.… (mehr)

In chapters alternating between the story of Edmund, a retired fire fighter, and Anne, his daughter, The Book of Mercy by Kathleen Cambor tells the story of estrangement, as Edmund, the bravest fire fighter in his day tries to capture his lost love, mother of his children, Paul and Annie, Fanny, who has run off. Fanny's passion is dance, and she proves to be harder to capture than flames, Edmund's other passion. His love for flames and Fanny deepens into an interest in alchemy, and as Edmund cannot catch or keep hold of Fanny, he believes only the flames can. The lack of passion and caring in the family, leads to Paul and Anne to develop very different careers. Anne studies medicine, after which she spends a life long at home, caring for her father. Paul, whose life is hidden throughout the novel, only to resurface at the end has been educated at a seminary to become a priest, bestows his love on the needy in Africa, where, as a gay man he becomes infected with AIDS, which brings him home, to die.

The Book of Mercy is a book of passion, which consumes each of the main protagonists in its own way.… (mehr)