Review: The Woman in the Photo: A Novel by Mary Hogan

Title: The Woman in the Photo: A Novel
Author: Mary Hogan
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
Publication Date: June 14, 2016
Edition: ebook (432 pages)

The Woman in the Photo by Mary Hogan

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


'The Woman in the Photo' combines past and present and the fictional lives of two young women--one, Lee Parker, eighteen years old, adopted, and wanting to know where she came from--and the other, Elizabeth Haberlin, a young girl of wealth and privilege, wanting to know how a disaster of epic proportion and loss of life could have been allowed to happen. Both are brought together in this fictional story with the historic Johnstown, Pennsylvania, flood of May 31, 1889, serving as the catalyst.

Mary Hogan alternates between past and present as she tells the stories of both young girls who undergo a metamorphosis from childhood to adulthood as a result of personal disaster in their lives. The characters are strong and imperfect; and I wanted to reach out and hug them.
This book is also rich with historical detail about the Johnstown flood, and carries with it an ongoing cautionary warning about present day excesses and the divide between rich and poor in our country. It was a great read.