The heroine of My Name is Mary Sutter drives a wedge into convention, opening for herself the door of undaunted, faithful service to the ill and injured solders she treats.
Mary Sutter is a woman you won't soon forget after you turn the last page of Robin Oliveira's book.
A woman with a dream that wouldn't die, her persistence, intelligence and candor drove her undeterred from a relatively safe career as a midwife in Albany to the throws of the battlefield hospitals during the Civil War.
Knowing full well that people thought her odd and difficult, Mary rises above because she seeks a more important mission than conforming to conventionality.
The scholarship of Robin Oliveira's research into mid 19th century medical practice and procedures is admirable.
The book spans 1861 to 1863 from Mary's home in Albany to Washington, D.
C.
Vignettes of the surgical practices, the filth of army hospitals and the desperation of doctors fully aware that they didn't have knowledge necessary to save their patients, fill the novel.
The sanitary measures we take daily in modern medicine were not even heard of in the 19th century.
I found the love stories in the novel of secondary interest to the characterization of Mary.
Descriptive snippets of her personality from wounded soldiers, President Lincoln, Dorothea Dix, Mary herself and the men who love her weave into a vividly drawn female protagonist.
"She balanced pain with anger and so was able to survive.
" Mary Sutter was not a doctor, not a nurse, but a driven, capable healer.