fuonlyknew

I’ve always been fascinated about Lizzie Borden. People are divided on whether she did the crimes or not. I’m no expert so I cant decide either. It took place so long ago we’ll never know. That’s why I grab books about her whenever I come across them. I immediately snatched this up without even reading the synopsis. If I had, I might have realized this was more of a fictional character study on the Borden family than much to do with the crime itself and the trial.

It got off to a slow start and I pushed on to see where the author was taking the story. What I got was a peek through the keyhole to what the Borden’s family dynamics might have been like. Dark and disturbing indeed.

The story may have been different from what I was expecting, but I did enjoy reading about Lizzie and her family from a different angle.

A hundred years ago, it was the Trial of the Century. A young woman
stood accused of brutally murdering her father and stepmother in a
crime so heinous that it became a benchmark in human tragedy.

A hundred years later, the Lizzie Borden case still resounds in the
imagination. There are those who staunchly defend Lizzie’s
innocence while others vehemently declare that she did it, and that
the murder was justified.

In Elizabeth Engstrom’s brilliant novel, the dark psychology of the
Borden household is laid bare. Lizzie, her sister Emma and their
parents Andrew and Abby Borden, are sharply illuminated—as are the
paranoia and concealed hatred that secretly ruled the family.
Domestic violence and dysfunctional families are not inventions of
modern times.

After eight years on Oahu, she moved to Maui, found a business partner and
opened an advertising agency. One husband, two children and five
years later, she sold the agency to her partner and had enough seed
money to try her hand at full time fiction writing, her lifelong
dream. With the help of her mentor, science fiction great Theodore
Sturgeon, When Darkness Loves Us was published.

Engstrom moved to Eugene, Oregon in 1986, where she lives with her husband Al
Cratty, the legendary muskie fisherman, and their Duck Tolling
Retriever, Jook. Liz holds a BA in English Literature and Creative
Writing and a Master of Arts in Applied Theology, both from
Marylhurst University. A recluse at heart, she still emerges into
public occasionally to speak at a writers conference, or to teach a
class on various aspects of writing the novel, essay, article or
short story. An avid knitter and gardener, she is on faculty at the
University of Phoenix and is always working on the next book.