Book Review: The Mapmaker's Children by Sarah McCoy

I received this book for free from Blogging For Books in exchange for my honest review.

Overall I really enjoyed The Mapmaker's Children by Sarah McCoy. The author masterfully told two stories set in two very different time periods, and I think those perspectives really made the storytelling superb and engaging.

The story alternates between two main characters: Civil War-era Sarah Brown and 21st Century Eden Anderson. Sarah Brown is the daughter of the infamous John Brown, a high-profile abolitionist who led — and was later hanged — for leading the slave uprising at Harper’s Ferry in the days leading up to the Civil War. In the 21st Century, Eden Anderson is a woman trying to reconcile her “personal failure” at her inability to conceive a child. She moves into a Civil War-era home and finds artifacts tied directly to the time period of Sarah Brown. While the two women appear to have nothing in common, they share the burden of their inability to conceive children and the heartache their infertilities cause.

Without giving too much more of the plot away, I will say that the characters are complex, with winning personalities, and McCoy paints such vivid world pictures that I would not hesitate to recommend that book to others. It's not the most favorite historical fiction I've ever read, but it is a fine piece of writing.

On a personal note, Sarah McCoy seems to be a lovely person who takes the time to engage with her fans. I posted a photo of myself reading The Mapmaker's Children and she later took the time to respond to it!