The Emancipator's Wife: A Novel of Mary Todd Lincoln is one of the most engaging and enjoyable novels that I have read for some time. While its focus is on the life of Mary Todd Lincoln - from her childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood in a large Kentucky family with a beloved father who figured prominently in local politics -- there are other characters who serve to round out and enrich the novel by virtue of the roles they played - both directly and indirectly - in Mary Todd Lincoln's life. They are:

1. Mary Todd Lincoln's stepmother Betsy whom she resented and hated.
2. Abraham Lincoln, her beloved husband, with whom she had at times a turbulent marriage given her own highly strung disposition and the demands of his career in the law, his one term in Congress, political ambitions, and on to his tenure as President striving mightily to win a bloody, civil war and reunify the nation.

3. The Lincoln sons: the eldest Robert (with whom Mary Todd would have a difficult relationship as he grew to adulthood), Edward, Willie, and Tad. Of the 4 sons, only Robert would live a long life.

4. John Wilamet, an escaped slave with whom Mary Todd Lincoln became acquainted during the Civil War, when Wilamet and his family were staying in a camp for escaped slaves in Washington DC.

And there was also ---

5. Myra Bradwell, a lawyer by training (but not profession because in that time, women were not permitted to become lawyers) with whom Mary Todd Lincoln struck up a close relationship during the Civil War through their mutual interest in spiritualism and attendance at seances in Washington (which Mary Todd Lincoln regularly attended, seeking re-connections with her beloved son Willie whose death at age 12 in 1862 from typhoid fever nigh well shattered her. She would grieve for her lost sons for the rest of her life.

The chapters that deal with Mary Todd Lincoln's postwar life and her being declared in court insane which led to her being placed in an Illinois asylum for several months in 1875 were especially moving. They also highlighted for me the increasingly bitter and acrimonious relationship she had with Robert, who didn't think his mother capable of caring for herself, and was therefore better off in an asylum. Robert didn't seem to have the balanced temperament of his father and was avidly ambitious, a young husband and parent intent on carving out a successful career in the law.

I also enjoyed learning about John Wilamet's postwar life in which he worked as an aide in the Illinois asylum in which he renewed his acquaintance with Mary Todd Lincoln. He, like many African Americans of his time who were struggling to gain recognition and respect as citizens from their fellow white Americans (many of whom held very low opinions of African Americans and sought to keep them in marginalized positions in society), had a very challenging life, living in one of the most impoverished Chicago neighborhoods near the stockyards (where hogs were slaughtered and quartered for the local and national meat markets), saloons, and high crime areas of the city.

Though Wilamet was a fictional character in the novel, his life typified what was often the lot of African American men in the early decades after the Civil War.

The Emancipator's Wife I could read again and again, because it's richly layered and tells a fascinating story that makes history LIVE. I recommend it to anyone with a love for history and compelling human interest stories.