Before she carried medicine into the mountains, Verna Mae Blankenship was a girl standing barefoot in the creeks of Eastern Kentucky — caught between the old ways of the granny women and a changing world that no longer trusted them.
Raised in Southern privilege by a French governess but shaped by the hard truths of Appalachia, Verna Mae grows into womanhood during a time when coal dust covered the hills, childbirth still happened by lamplight, and sickness often reached the mountains long before doctors ever did. As war, grief, and loss reshape her life, Verna Mae is drawn toward the evolving world of professional nursing — a calling that will carry her from Kentucky to Europe and back again.
But the mountains are not easily changed.
Torn between modern medicine and the wisdom of the granny women who came before her, Verna Mae must decide what kind of healer she intends to become — and how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice to serve a people the rest of the world has forgotten.
Set against the backdrop of early twentieth-century Appalachia, Nurse Woman: The Bruised Dawn is a gritty and emotionally rich historical novel about grief, endurance, womanhood, and the women who carried medicine into places nobody else would go. But can Verna Mae overcome the devastation of her own life before she sets out to serve the mountains she loves?
Perfect for readers of The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, The Giver of Stars, and Christy.
Genre: Inspirational
Raised in Southern privilege by a French governess but shaped by the hard truths of Appalachia, Verna Mae grows into womanhood during a time when coal dust covered the hills, childbirth still happened by lamplight, and sickness often reached the mountains long before doctors ever did. As war, grief, and loss reshape her life, Verna Mae is drawn toward the evolving world of professional nursing — a calling that will carry her from Kentucky to Europe and back again.
But the mountains are not easily changed.
Torn between modern medicine and the wisdom of the granny women who came before her, Verna Mae must decide what kind of healer she intends to become — and how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice to serve a people the rest of the world has forgotten.
Set against the backdrop of early twentieth-century Appalachia, Nurse Woman: The Bruised Dawn is a gritty and emotionally rich historical novel about grief, endurance, womanhood, and the women who carried medicine into places nobody else would go. But can Verna Mae overcome the devastation of her own life before she sets out to serve the mountains she loves?
Perfect for readers of The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, The Giver of Stars, and Christy.
Genre: Inspirational