Hambly does an incredible job of keeping her characters true to their time period.

'If every woman killed every wench her husband had, there'd be dead women lying like a carpet from here to the moon.' Benjamin, a free man of color, later replies. 'If every woman killed every master who had her against her will, there'd be dead men lying like a carpet from here to the moon.' says Cora, a runaway slave. We see this fascinating, gracious, structured and genteel society, draped in a beautiful, gauzy cloth that flutters up to give us a peek at the ugly realities and customs needed to keep up the facade. There is an emphasis on the placage system, common law marriages between white Creoles and free colored women and their children. We get to walk the streets of pre Civil War New Orleans (1830's) experiencing relations between whites, blacks, Creoles, French, free colored and those uncouth Americans with their ugly, clunky language. Barbara Hambly depicts a time, place and society rarely covered, or even mentioned, in fiction. This one doesn't disappoint on any of those levels. It's like the cholera.'Īlthough this is a mystery series, I read them for the historical aspects and the characters. 'One thing I've learned,' January said with a smile, 'love is beyond comprehension.

In between you have the cruelty of the diseases, yellow fever and cholera, rampaging through the city, the accepted and challenged injustices based upon the color of ones skin or sex, poisoning, slavery, kidnapping, death, birth, friendship, the joys of learning and music, healing and renewal. From gut wrenching, almost stomach emptying scenes of human depravity and cruelty to the beautiful simplicity of one human taking the gigantic step of learning to trust another human. I just couldn't come up with any other words, my mind was still trying to filter through all of the things I had just experienced. Wow, my first impression upon closing this book, I was actually muttering the word over and over to myself until Ron asked me what I was doing.

Fever season barbara hambly