Inspired by a teacher to do something and not just stand idly by, in 1860s, Mary Willis, a college educated young lady makes a choice to begin helping in an abolitionist cause, although that's not a popular stance or idea in her small community, in Town Line, New York. As the years pass by, Mary meets Joe Bell, a runaway slave and the two dare to fall in love. However, with Joe's master on his heels and with the town eventually seceding to the South, can their love withstand these calamities?

What I expected from THE HIDDEN LIGHT OF NORTHERN FIRES by Daren Wang is that the story will be more focused on romance and on the forbidden attraction between a male of African-American descent as well as a woman of European descent. I also expected for the story to explore the town of Town Line and the mindset that caused it to secede from the Union.

What I received instead is a story where too much happens in one book and with little to no exploration of the psychology as to what happened and why. THE HIDDEN LIGHT OF NORTHERN FIRES by Daren Wang is more action oriented than anything else, and with so many characters sharing the limelight, it became difficult for me to keep track of them and of their functions. Personally if the story was either longer or if it had less action during the Civil War period, then I imagine I would have liked it far more. Also, THE HIDDEN LIGHT OF NORTHERN FIRES by Daren Wang is a tale that doesn't shy away from gore, violence nor from killings be it people or animals. In other words, almost nothing is safe in the story.

If you are looking for an action oriented read, or if you are new to historical fiction genre and are frightened of the idea of reading GONE WITH THE WIND by Margaret Mitchell, then THE HIDDEN LIGHT OF NORTHERN FIRES by Daren Wang should be a good fit to fulfill those needs.

Book Summary

A novel rooted in the remarkable, but little-known, true history of the only secessionist town north of the Mason Dixon Line.

When escaped slave Joe Bell collapses in her father’s barn, Mary Willis must ward off Confederate guerrillas and spies, Joe’s vengeful owner, and even her own brother to help the handsome fugitive cross to freedom.

Mary has always been an outcast, an outspoken abolitionist woman in a town of bounty hunters and anti- Union farmers. Helping runaways is the only thing that makes her life in Town Line bearable. As the countryside is riled by the drumbeat of civil war and the promise of an extravagant bounty for the wounded fugitive, Mary finds herself drawn to the stranger in forbidden ways. When rebels cross from nearby Canada intent on killing him, they bring the devastation of the brutal war to the town and the farm, and threaten to destroy all that Mary loves.