DIVINING WOMEN

Gibbons reads her seventh novel with a graceful, hypnotic rhythm reminiscent of its North Carolina setting. Her painful story, however, is anything but hypnotic--it seethes with volcanic intensity. In autumn, 1918, at the emotionally strangling confluence of a flu epidemic and rumors of imminent peace, Maureen Ross makes two important discoveries: She is married to an emotionally frozen tyrant, and she is pregnant with his child. When her 22-year-old niece, Mary, comes to her rescue, Troop Ross appears bent on ripping apart any sense his wife has of her own worth. Can Mary's youthful fire spark renewed self-esteem in her aunt, or is it too late? Gibbons's wise restraint as a reader in some sense prepares us for the novel's ultimate explosion. P.E.F. (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/ SEP 04]