THE UNION QUILTERS by Jennifer Chiaverini

Photo from Amazon.com

My current novel project takes place in Camanche, Iowa, from 1859-1861. I heard Jennifer Chiaverini speak at a luncheon, but not being a quilter or even enjoying the act of pulling thread through fabric, I wasn't so much interested in her books as I was in her as a successful author. That changed on July 17th when I stumbled across her The Union Quilters novel on the bargain rack at my local Barnes and Noble.

The Union Quilters begins near the beginning of the American Civil War. The main story ends prior to its conclusion with an Epilogue dated 1868. The story was well-told; I read it in a little over a month so on a can't-put-it-down-scale of one for I couldn't even finish it to five for I was up until the wee morning hours, I would give it a three and a half.

The story provided a good history lesson of the Civil War. I enjoyed the letters that arrived home to the Elm Creek Valley from the enlisted men, although they got a bit a long at times. The story contains many characters and it took many pages before I could learn who they were enough to keep them straight. It seemed that Gerda was the main character.

Other than the typical plot lines one would expect to find in a book covering the Civil War of who lived and who died, other plot lines included the missing Joanna and the scandalous alleged love affair between Gerda and Jonathan, this last plot line being most intriguing to me. Gerda also seemed to be the character to experience the greatest character arc, coming to accept her situation by the end of the story and realizing the greatest internal change. The story seemed to divert its focus away from Gerda and her story at times, which disappointed me since I perceived her to be the main character.

I also found myself a bit bored occasionally with all of the battle descriptions, but perhaps that's because I've done so much research on the topic. I found myself wishing the story would've just stuck with the home front; there is already so much literature available about Civil War battles, but for the most part, it was interesting.

Overall, the book was well-written and free of typos as one would expect from Dutton. I found the pace, plot development, characters, enjoyability, and insightfulness above average. As a writer, I might have leaned more toward dialogue and scene-building than toward exposition. There was a lot of summary, but, overall, it was an easy read and beneficial to my studies.

Source: Chiaverini, Jennifer. 2011. The Union Quilters: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel. Dutton: New York.