The Spy on the Tennessee Walker

September 28, 2015
At the start of Peterson’s intriguing third novel featuring San Francisco magazine writer and editor Maggie Fiori (after 2013’s The Devil’s Interval), a relative in Oxford, Miss., sends Maggie a 19th-century daguerreotype showing a woman on horseback who bears a striking resemblance to Maggie herself. Maggie learns that this woman is her great-great-great-grandmother, Victoria Alma Cardworthy, who served as a nurse during the Civil War. Linking the generations is Maggie’s Grandmama Alma, who served as a nurse during WWII. Was Victoria loyal to the Confederate cause, Maggie wonders, or did she transfer her loyalty to the Union—or did she serve both sides as a double or even triple agent? Maggie seeks answers in Oxford, where she delves through the family archives and finds a volume by poet Walt Whitman inscribed to Victoria. Readers will finish this engaging book wishing that it had gone on for many more pages. Agent: Amy Rennert, Amy Rennert Agency.

October 1, 2015
San Francisco magazine editor Maggie Fiori turns her investigative talents inward when an old photo suggests a mystery surrounding her great-great-great-grandmother. Was this Civil War nurse actually imprisoned for bigamy and espionage? This third in the series takes Maggie back to her roots in Mississippi, where her uncle helps to unlock the family secrets. First-person diary entries and letters bring this nineteenth-century ancestor to life and let the reader discover her hidden story in real time with Maggie. The novel is less a crime tale than were the earlier volumes in the series, but it will appeal to historical-fiction readers and Civil War buffs.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)