Disguised as her late brother Cooper in the 19th Massachusetts Volunteers, Catherine Samson fights to quell the Confederate rebellion and preserve her nation’s unity. She believes the Constitution’s declarations of equality and freedom apply to everyone, and dreams that someday they will extend to her own pursuit of happiness with a woman.
Helping her father raise her siblings on their Gettysburg farm, Sophie Bauer likewise clings to hope for a woman to love, but when she serves as an army aid and meets Cooper, Sophie is confounded by her growing feelings for him. Catherine, meanwhile, wrestles with her deception and the disguise she must maintain. Disclosure could not only repulse Sophie but send Catherine home a social outcast.
When the battle of Gettysburg engulfs the Bauer farm, Catherine and Sophie learn far more about themselves than they ever expected. But first there’s a war—and hearts—to be won.
Dellab –
Historical fiction holds a certain fascination for me. I admire the ingenuity of authors to fine tune a well known event into a smaller and more intimate point of view from their characters. CF Frizzell has achieved this successfully with her earlier novels chronicling the prohibition years and does so again in Measure of Devotion. You can tell this story is special to Frizzell even without reading the chapter To the Reader. The attention to historical detail, no matter how gruesome, and the care she takes in describing the battle scenes is her best work to date. Measure of Devotion is a beautifully crafted story depicting the devotion of a sibling to their family, soldiers to fight for their cause, friendships formed in battle and two women falling in love. The Battle of Gettysburg displays the ultimate devotion of soldiers to their leaders no matter their personal cost.