True As Steel

by Marion Harland

Violet Haynes and Hadassah Todd are prepared for a grand party at Riverview, the stately home of Judge Humphreys, to hail the return of his two collegiate sons, Shelby and Maxwell. But Shelby Humphreys alone returns home, bearing with him grave news of his younger brother.

373 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1872

About the author

Mary Virginia Terhune (née Hawes), also known by her penname Marion Harland, was an American author. At age twenty-three she won a $50 prize from the Southern Era periodical for her article on temperance. Encouraged, she published her first novel, Alone, to great acclaim. Despite giving birth to six children and running a household, she never stopped writing, eventually publishing twenty-five novels and three volumes of short stories, as well as numerous books on travel, biography, colonial history, and domestic guidance.

Despite her successful career, Terhune was generally unsupportive of the nascent feminism of her day. Ironically, according to Susan Koppelman in the Old Maids anthology (the source of this biographical note):

She has long been dismissed as an unimportant writer, partly because of her phenomenal output (I think many critics assume that such quantity can't be of high quality) and partly because of the fact that those who cherish the ideals she advocated do not ordinarily go looking for forgotten women writers.

Terhune's three surviving children also became authors.

Reviews

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have managed to find an original 1872 copy of this book. I have been searching everywhere to find information about it.

[Jeffrey M · Rating 4 out of 5]

For a Judge, the father’s harsh reaction to the news was difficult to understand, but for the fact that the information came from his elder son.

The author does well in clouding many background details so that the reader too remains suspicious regarding the leading characters until near to the end.