To Slip the Bonds of Earth

In 1903 in Dayton, Ohio, 29-year-old Katherine Wright, a high school Latin teacher, is a dutiful and obedient daughter who has maintained her father’s household since her mother’s death 15 years ago. Though her brothers Orville and Wilbur’s initiative to create the first flying machine occasionally takes them far from home, they still reside there, and Katherine is intimately involved in their lives and ambitions.

When Wilbur and Orville keep their flying machine airborne for 57 seconds at Kitty Hawk, N.C., Katherine and her father are elated. However, when the brothers return home, they receive less than a stellar welcome by the press. A few days later at a Christmas party, Orville loses the diagrams of the flying machine, so essential to their acquiring a patent for their invention. As in the past, Katherine is called upon to help her brothers fix their problems.

As Katherine takes risks to find the drawings, she discovers that the man she suspected of stealing them has been murdered. She wonders, is there a connection between the missing drawings and the murdered man?

Katherine sets out to discover the truth. But, as observant, brilliant, and straightforward as she is, Katherine’s efforts are frustrated as she encounters numerous obstacles from the male-dominated community, where men consider single women who have opinions a nuisance and a threat.

Katherine, chafing beneath societal restrictions that seek to limit her resourcefulness, contributions, and career aspirations, nevertheless forges ahead—protecting the vulnerable, seeking justice, and learning that “sometimes doing the right thing is the wrong thing in the eyes of the law. That sometimes justice and mercy don’t coincide. That sometimes mercy is the better choice.”

This first book in author Amanda Flower’s new Katherine Wright Mystery series—her other mystery series include the Amish Candy Shop Mystery series and the Amish Matchmaker Mystery series—is a satisfying read and offers a worthy critique of the injustices that women face.

(Kensington Books)