The Slow Awakening

In the middle of the last century the prospects for an orphan or an unwanted child could be grim indeed. Such a child was Kirsten MacGregor, for-her parents had died suddenly of a fever while travelling in Northumberland, and there were no relatives or friends to claim her. She fell, therefore, into the hands of Ma Bradley, a baby farmer, who in time used her to tend the younger boys and girls who were the mainstay of a profitable and sinister trade. In this service she grew to womanhood, her good looks marred by a cast in one eye. Though this was so slight as to be noticeable only in times of tension or fear, it was to force upon Kirsten a still meaner fate; for the superstitious fishermen of the area regarded it as a cause of bad luck, and in time their prejudices reached so high a pitch that she had to be got rid of. She was made over to Hop Fuller, a travelling tinker and a hard, even vicious master who proceeded to make her pregnant. But then a great storm and flood changed everything. Kirsten was rescued from the raging waters to bear her child in the stables of a nearby mansion and there to find herself in a dangerously passionate relationship with its owners, the wealthy Knutsson family. How Kirsten and her son survived the intrigues, jealousies and hatreds which threatened to tear the Knutssons apart and how they ultimately, after a "slow awakening," found warmth, security and love complete the substance of this enticing and masterful novel.