Frozen by Mary Casanova

The time is Prohibition. The setting is Minnesota Lakes, where a canoe can cross the States to Canada. The people vary between the stuck up upper class to whores and madams and just honest folk trying to make a living by delivering milk and ice.

Sadie Rose has been mute for eleven years. She was found frozen in a snow bank, almost dead. Something isn't quite right now, as she gets very bad headaches. She knows next to nothing of her past or where she comes from and just lives like a pet or a doll in the Worthingtons' house. They adopted her...sorta.


And then one day she finds some photos that jars something in her memory and suddenly she can speak again...but the Worthingtons don't want her talking. What's the point in having a voice if you can't use it? This and the questions arising about her past lead to Sadie Rose running away, to the very brothel where her mother once worked and she discovers she isn't just the daughter of a dead whore after all.

There's a murder mystery, political corruption, secrets, lies, surprises, a suicidal girl, the beginnings of a romance, and a girl coming of age during tumultuous times.

I liked the tone and the heroine. She starts weak and ends strong. I learned about Minnesota history while being entertained at the same time.

I feel the ending/resolution was too sudden and pit pat regarding the Worthingtons and I am really disappointed in the resolution regarding the murderer At the risk of revealing the ending, I'm not going to say more. I'm just unsatisfied. I also didn't quite see how certain secondary story lines were relevant, such as Trinity and her nuttiness. I was also hoping for more on suffrage as it was mentioned in the blurb.

But I was thoroughly engrossed in this, read it page by page in two days, so it is a very entertaining read and I was hooked. I'd say: perfect blend of historical events, young adult turmoil, and mystery.

Four bikes. I received this from Netgalley.