Other Media

Sally Gunning Interview in the Boston Globe.

You Must Read This - History Made Real in 'April Morning' NPR Website.

An interview for the University of California WUCI "Writers on Writing" radio program.

Reviews for The Rebellion of Jane Clarke

"Gunning's blazing third historical (after Bound) takes readers into the heart of Revolutionary War-era Boston, where young Jane Clarke has been sent to care for her great-aunt Gill after refusing to marry the man her loyalist father has chosen for her. Not long after settling into her aunt's house near the British Custom House, Jane is thrust into the milieu of violence and intrigue that eventually leads to a declaration of independence by the American colonists. She befriends the bookseller Henry Knox and meets John Adams, who employs her brother as a clerk. As tensions mount, Jane watches the men around her grow more aggressive in their aversion to British rule, and less concerned with truth. When she is caught up in the Boston Massacre, she must come to terms with the importance of honesty over personal and political passions. There's a history textbook's worth of well-done cameos, but it's Gunning's fluid writing and attention to the larger issues of human nature that really make this move. Good historical fiction offers new perspectives on old stories. This book succeeds handily at the task."

Publisher's Weekly Starred Review

An IndieNext (American Booksellers Association) "notable book" selection.


A well-told tale, packed with historic details.

Boston Globe [Pick of the Week]

This well-researched and lively novel captures the mood of those turbulent [pre-revolutionary] times.

Library Journal

[A] masterpiece of historical fiction.

Patriot Ledger

Gunning paints period atmosphere in multiple shades of gray and exposes the realities behind the popular mythology of the American Revolution . . .  A historical novel of integrity and substance, The Rebellion of Jane Clarke is a fitting showcase for a heroine of similar mettle.

Reading the Past

Gunning fills her novel with believable and complex characters . . . best of all she's created an intriguing and admirable witness to history in Jane Clarke.

Bookpage.com

As always Gunning offers just the proper amount of detail to make her fiction feel like fact . . . There are no false notes.

Barnstable Patriot

A wonderful writer . . . Gunning's attention to historical detail and riveting storytelling make for a compelling and intelligent read.

Cape Cod Times

Nobody brings the Cape's history alive like Sally Gunning.

Cape Codder

An engaging narrative that showcases what life was like for a young woman [in pre-revolutionary America] caught in the crossfires of social and political change.

Living Read Girl

A super historical thriller . . .Sally Gunning's terrific tale brings to life the prime time players, their impact on others, and life in Boston as rebellion is on the minds of every citizen; with families divided between for, against, and neutral.

Wordpress.com

Reviews for Bound

"Historical fiction at its very best . . . Impeccably researched, this story is spellbinding, giving a realistic view of life in 18th-century coastal New England."

"Pick of the Week" — The Boston Globe

"[Gunning] painstakingly re-creates colonial Cape Cod, from its clapboard houses, busy wharves, and fresh salty air to the growing political stirrings among its residents. As a standalone novel, Bound will transport you 250 years into the past and immerse you in a dramatic storyline that exposes the injustice of indentured servitude. As a sequel to The Widow's War, it not only continues but enhances the experience of the original. Beautifully done, and strongly recommended."

Historical Novels Review - Editor's Choice

"Bound, Gunning's latest brilliant recreation of Revolutionary-era Cape Cod can be enjoyed without seeking out the Widow's War first, but it's hard to imagine any who won't do exactly that when they finish this wonderful new work."

The Barnstable Patriot

"Gunning's exquisite use of language and imaginative scene-setting in times past will keep readers riveted . . . Anyone who loves history, storytelling, and Cape Cod will want to settle in for a long weekend of pleasurable escape."

Cape Cod Life

"Sally Gunning demonstrates an ability to research events, customs and situations in an earlier time and meld them into a dandy work of historical fiction . . . A very satisfying read."

TCM Reviews

"Gunning has a sure and steady hand with her prose, keeping things simple but not plain. Her down to earth style suits the salt of the earth people on the pages to perfection. If you are looking for a smartly written historical novel that feels as real as today's headlines, your quest is done."

Living Read Girl

"[A] page-turner . . . Gunning weaves a horrifying, spellbinding story of colonial indenture's cruelties and a meditation on the meaning of freedom."

Publisher's Weekly

"[A] suspenseful and engaging look at the New England colonies in the decades immediately preceding the American Revolution. Richly detailed and impeccably researched, the novel . . . grapple[s] with what it means to pursue personal freedom, [and] the era's sexual politics and religious and political fervor come alive. The result is moving, compelling, and beautifully wrought; highly recommended for historical fiction collections."

Library Journal

"If The Widow's War identified Sally Gunning as a masterful new voice in historical fiction, Bound confirms her place as one of the very best in the field. Beautifully researched and ardently imagined, Gunning's writing is so vivid you can taste the salt in the Cape Cod air. She has a special gift for rendering the spare, constrained dialogue of the colonial Puritans and at the same time giving her characters emotional lives that are rich, moving and utterly convincing. Her Satucket novels are destined to become classics."

— Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Year of Wonders and March

"Two hundred years ago, Cape Cod was not a haven for visitors in sun hats with boxes of fudge. It was an unforgiving spit of sand, where women's lives were as harsh as those of the men who went down to the sea in ships and came back in shrouds. In her novel of pitiless beauty, Bound, author Sally Gunning demonstrates again what she did in The Widow's War. Unlike many historical novelists, Gunning makes the long-ago feel like this very day. Elegantly, she tells bitter truths —that dignity and grace and even abiding love can flourish where it seems nothing can grow."

—Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean and Still Summer

"BOUND is an insightful look back at the horrors of the late colonial period's indentured servant system . . . Sally Gunning provides a well written thought provoking mid-eighteenth century thriller."

Midwest Book Review

"A captivating read, written by an author well-trained in taut storytelling and well-versed in the pre-Revolutionary War period of Britain's Massachusetts Bay colony, including Cape Cod. The book's gemstone, however, is Ms. Gunning's wonderfully intense description of Alice's struggle of spirit, without benefit of Prozac and group therapy, to risk being trustful, to choose good, to remain based in reality and to find happiness in a war of literal personal survival."

The Vineyard Gazette

"Sally Gunning tells an extraordinary story that explodes with a young girl facing harsh conditions and gathering enough strength to find something better in life. Alice never gives up, and I commend her determination in this noteworthy read that comes highly recommended &mdash 5 [stars]. "

Coffee Time Romance

"Author Sally Gunning is like a dog with a bone, and lately she's been chewing on the subject of young people sold into indentured servitude during the early years of our nation. The resulting novel [is] Bound. When Gunning finds a fascinating story idea, she grabs hold and won't let go until she's spun it into a compelling yarn filled with drama, passion and always a heaping helping of history. Her stories are so memorable that if she had been your history teacher, you would have made an A."

Provincetown Banner

"A page-turner of a great novel."

Cape Cod Times

"This book, eloquently written and exhaustively researched, is a warning along the lines of The Handmaid's Tale, and just as necessary a read."

Feminist Review

"Richly evocative . . . a page-turner that will especially please readers of good historical fiction."

— Jo Manning for Writers Are Readers

"Bound is a fascinating book, relating as it does not only the winds of change blowing through the colonies but also the day-to-day lives of the residents of Satucket. This is a tale well-told with credible characters for that time in the past - well-rounded, hardworking folk who believed in themselves. An interesting note is that the author considers the indentured to be the first slaves brought to America, saying also: 'There are more people living today in indentured servitude, or debt bondage, than in any time in history, it being the most common form of slavery worldwide, including the United States. Currently, there are an estimated twenty-seven million people living in slavery."

Book Loons

"Sally Gunning weaves a powerful, brooding story. Based on life in 1775, the historical flavor and research done by Ms. Gunning brings forth the feeling of being there and witnessing Alice's harsh and bitter life.  Alice is a simple girl, yet her struggles and strength will win the reader's heart. . . . Mesmerizing."

Romance Reviews Today

"The gritty sometimes ugly truth of early American life is told through the eyes of a young indentured girl whose courage and determination are her only liberation. Excellent character development makes these characters real enough to step out of the pages, and their emotional ups and downs are impossible not to share. The author has created more than just a wonderful historically based account of indenture. She's fashioned a heartfelt story of love and hope that will captivate readers from beginning to end."

—Affaire de Coeur 

"[Indentured servant Alice Cole], fleeing abuse, runs away to Boston where she meets a widow and a lawyer— from the absolutely stellar The Widow's War. Gunning wrote good mysteries, but she's really found her voice in this colonial New England series."

The Poisoned Pen

Reviews for The Widow's War

"Skillfully employing the language, imagination and character that literary fiction demands, [Gunning] illuminates a fascinating moment in our past: the years just prior to the War of Independence, when ideas of rebellion — for men and women — were fomenting . . . Gunning chooses her facts and details with care, allowing the strong-willed Lyddie to command our attention . . . [T]he grief, struggle and courage of this ordinary woman are what finally resonate. Many historical novels die on the page, the characters never having drawn breath. In Gunning's capable hands, a novel of history is allowed to be as vivid as the smell of a man: "Tobacco and sweat, but a different sweat, and something like sassafras but not sassafras.""
 —  Washington Book World

"Heartrending . . . Gunning's storytelling captures the paradox at the heart of colonial women's lives: managing a household, indeed survival itself, required ability and toughness, yet women were denied the basic rights befitting adulthood . . . For all her steeliness, Lyddie is not a one-dimensional heroine; in private, she wrestles with loneliness, anxiety, sexual desire, the fatigue of struggling by herself . . . Gunning's vibrant portrayal of Lyddie's journey shows that the pursuit of happiness is not for the faint of heart." —  Boston Globe

"By merging historical fact with riveting fiction, [Gunning] offers readers an intimate peek into the daily life of pre-Revolutionary War Satucket, MA. Along the way, they'll get a vivid sense of the race, gender, and class dynamics of America's foreparents while enjoying a wonderful story. This is historical fiction at its best; highly recommended." —  Library Journal (starred review)

"Readers will be swiftly turning the pages, eagerly cheering for the strong-willed widow. The crisp prose is flavored with the stinging salty atmosphere of a New England community witnessing one individual's war for independence. A good choice for book groups." —  Booklist

"Provocative . . . Gunning infuses the story with suspense and intrigue [and] resists easy generalizations and stereotypes . . . She makes Lyddie's struggle to remake her life credible and the world she inhabits complex." —  Publishers Weekly

"[B]eautifully written . . . Gripping, romantic, historically sound, and completely satisfying, THE WIDOW'S WAR is a standout. I'll be surprised if I read a better historical novel this year."
 —  Historical Novels Review (The Historical Novel Society); "Editor's Choice"

"A vivid, artful portrait of pre-Revolutionary America. . . . A triumph of a novel."  —  Jeffrey Lent, author of In the Fall and Lost Nation

"Sally Gunning is a gifted story-teller adept at layering time, place and character and revealing conflicts of the heart. With prose that sings in perfect pitch, she has given us a deeply affecting tale of a woman caught between the irresistible currents of her inner truth and the equally powerful strictures of her times."
 —  Anne LeClaire, author of The Law of Bound Hearts and Entering Normal

"Quietly compelling . . . . Gunning paints the ethical, emotional, and financial dilemmas of her refreshingly adult characters in surprisingly lively shades of gray."  —  Kirkus Reviews


I thoroughly enjoyed The Widow's War.  Lyddie Berry is a splendidly sympathetic heroine.  Her fight to keep her home resonates beautifully with the first rumbles of the American Revolution, and the ending is perfect, deeply satisfying and utterly unexpected. With The Widow's War, Sally Gunning has outdone herself.
— Sarah Smith, author of The Vanished Child and Knowledge of Water


First Look Reviews for The Widow's War

"This was a great read and obviously well researched. Gunning really bought to life colonial Cape Cod. An excellent read for history buffs and soft hearts alike." — Jessica (Peoria, AZ)

"Although I do not typically seek out books within this genre, I was drawn into The Widow's War from the very beginning. The temporal and societal setting in which the story takes place is both fascinating and believable. Seen through modern eyes, the beliefs and habits of the people are close-minded, stiltifying and unfair. However, the author cleverly avoids value judgments and condemnation. At the same time, the protagonist, Lyddie Berry manages to subtlely challenge these beliefs, both within the society and, more importantly, within her own mind. Change occurs for Lyddie not as a political statement or a cry to societal reform but rather as a means of finding a place of her own choosing in a society where a woman's place is chosen by the men in her life." — Tracee (Turtle Creek, PA)

"History buffs will delight in the vivid descriptions of the hardships and challenges of everyday life on pre-Revolutionary War Cape Cod. Readers quickly develop a warm compassion for widowed Lyddie as she defies her cruel son-in-law and struggles to make her own life in a rigid, rule-driven society where women could not own property. We find ourselves wishing for more pages at the story's end to learn more about Lyddie's fate." — June (Lansdale, PA)

"The Widow's War is an empowering and daring tale, and a true delight to read. Lyddie Berry is a strong and realistic character, pushing the limits to maintain what she believes in. Her journey to self discovery will touch female readers of any age, transcending time to be just as poignant now as two hundred years ago." — Brianna (Naperville, IL)

"An excellent historical novel set in the early Massachusetts colony. The widowed heroine's fight for independence and survival mirrors the unrest of the time. Lyddie is spunky and brave, a woman who knows her own mind and soul, and fights for survival against society, the elements, and even her own family, seeking out an existence that is true to herself." — Pamela (Virginia Beach, VA)

"The Widow's War is one of those rare and beautiful books that leave you unsettled — haunted by a story and characters, a time and a place so far removed from present-day reality, and yet so compelling... You find yourself at the last page long before you are ready to return to the 21st century. With the subtle skill and stark (almost Puritan) writing style of Anita Shreve (Fortune's Rocks) and Sena Jeter Naslund (Ahab's Wife), Sally Gunning, heretofore a mystery writer, could emerge as a masterful voice in historical fiction. It is a rare triumph to allow readers to so strongly identify with a character so far removed by time and circumstance. The Widow's War is the story of this 39-year-old widow, a woman at war with her own independent spirit, at complete odds with the confining social expectations and customs of her time. The result is a breathtaking story of love, relationships, community, and independence; most of all independence." — Sherri (Atlanta, GA)

"The Widow's War is a powerful novel about a strong woman's fight to retain her independence. I loved every page of the book." — Robin (Manassas, VA)

"This book is a keeper. I want my daughters to read it when they are old enough. If I were a teacher I'd have my class read it. I will definitely recommend this book to my friends."
— Joanne (San Francisco, CA)

"This book is exciting, extremely well-written, and very thoroughly researched. I look forward to reading more books by Sally Gunning." — Tanya (Los Angeles, CA)

"Dare we hope for a sequel?" — Lyndal (Kankakee, IL)

"The Widow's War is an incredibly uplifting, fortifying read which I devoured in one sitting. A truly inspirational and empowering book." — Carolyn (Montgomery, AL)

"The Widow's War — so appropriately titled — is a delectable piece of literary dessert, meant to be savored and cherished from page to page. It is sure to become a classic and is one that I will highly recommend to family, friends and book groups. This story is a definite not to be missed read!" — April (Brighton, IA)

"What a powerful novel about a wonderfully resilient woman! The story is full of details that bring her to life. I was enchanted by this book. I literally couldn't put it down — the pull of Lyddie was just too powerful. I enthusiastically give this five stars!" — Sue (Saint Charles, MO)



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