The Nature of Fragile Things

April 18,1906: A massive earthquake rocks San Francisco just before daybreakigniting a devouring inferno. Lives are lostlives are shatteredbut some rise from the ashes forever changed. Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a mail-order bride ad and agrees to marry a man she knows nothing about. San Francisco widower Martin Hocking proves to be as aloof as he is mesmerizingly handsome. Sophie quickly develops deep affection for KatMartin’s silent five-year-old daughterbut Martin’s odd behavior leaves her with the uneasy feeling that something about her newfound situation isn’t right. Then one early-spring eveninga stranger at the door sets in motion a transforming chain of events. Sophie discovers hidden ties to two other women. The firstpretty and pregnantis standing on her doorstep. The second is hundreds of miles away in the American Southwestgrieving the loss of everything she once loved. The fates of these three women intertwine on the eve of the devastating earthquakethrusting them onto a perilous journey that will test their resiliency and resolve andultimatelytheir belief that love can overcome fear. From the acclaimed author of The Last Year of the War and As Bright as Heaven comes a gripping novel about the bonds of friendship and mother loveand the power of female solidarity.