A few weeks ago, a friend sent me this photo along with the text “I think you would love this — unless you are someone who told me to read it LOL”
It made me giggle, but it also made me smile because it’s really nice to be thought of like that. This particular friend has yet to recommend a book that I haven’t flown through, so I knew I’d likely enjoy this one.
Even though I hadn’t heard of “The Frozen River” before, I added it to my queue. The description on Goodreads said that it was “a gripping historical mystery inspired by the life and diary of Martha Ballard, a renowned 18th-century midwife who defied the legal system and wrote herself into American history.”
I’ll be honest, I wasn’t immediately wowed by the description alone, especially when I noticed it was 432 pages (with the audiobook clocking in at just over 15 hours). But at 4.47 stars with over 66,000 reviews, I figured it was definitely worth a shot.
I started the book on a Friday and finished it 8 days later — while working full-time and raising a litter of toddlers — because it was SO GOOD. (It helps that I was listening to the audiobook version, so I can multitask!) The Goodreads blurb was right: it was definitely gripping.
While I likely would’ve never sought out a book about anyone in the 1790s, I probably would’ve given a book about a midwife a second look for the sheer fact that I just love a powerful woman. The fact that it’s a mystery is probably what got my attention, but Martha herself is what held it.
Unlike most main characters, Martha was middle-aged. Unlike most women of her time, Martha could read and write. And unlike most mothers I know, Martha had NINE children. Martha lived a lot of life, so to speak.
“God only knows what they would do with the power of pen and ink at their disposal.”
While Martha Ballard was a real person and the book is inspired by the contents of the very detailed diaries she kept for 30+ years, the author Ariel Lawhon does say she took a lot of liberties for the sake of the storyline. But this bit is very true: Martha Ballard delivered over one thousand babies and never once lost a mother. That’s an extraordinarily impressive record, especially in a time where infections like diphtheria were rampant.
Martha’s diary practically becomes a character in the book. As a midwife, Martha did more than just deliver babies, as evidenced by the fact that the book opens with her performing an autopsy. She was a healer and a keeper of the secrets she was privy to in her line of work. Martha believed her position as a midwife as well as her literacy obligated her to keep a record of the goings on of her small Maine town. To quote the book: “Memory is a wicked thing that warps and twists. But paper and ink receive the truth without emotion, and they read it back without partiality. That, I believe, is why so few women are taught to read and write. God only knows what they would do with the power of pen and ink at their disposal.”
One of the most fascinating bits of history the author shares at the very end of the book is how Martha’s diaries were preserved in the first place. It was through the foresight and generosity of literal generations of women that Lawhon was even able to learn of Martha Ballard at all. It seemed very fitting to me that so many women carried on Martha’s legacy the way Martha carried all of the women in her charge: with respect and care.
“Mothers find a different way to get their work done.”
Though more than two centuries separate Martha and myself, so much of her story resonated with me. She often refers to having been “buried in small children and endless chores” — something I could’ve written as a mother of 3 under 5. At one point, she writes “I am never guaranteed the certainty of quiet, much less a solid length of time to chase my thoughts and bind them together. That is a luxury of men with libraries, butlers, and wives. Mothers find a different way to get their work done.”
This line made me smile so wide as I was listening to the audio version of this book during car rides to and from daycare pickups and while I was cooking dinner and folding laundry. Mothers have always been superheroes when it comes to multitasking.
At her heart, she was an adoring wife and mother who juggled her home life, a successful career, and a desire to better the community around her. She saw the injustices, corruption, and prejudices around her — and pressed on anyway. And she still found time to flirt with her husband! I absolutely loved the playful relationship between Martha and her husband throughout the book, showing how crazy they still were about each other after 35 years of marriage. It’ll definitely have you smiling to yourself.
There is so much more I want to share with you about why Martha Ballard was so compelling a person, but I’d hate to give anymore away. I hope you’ll put “The Frozen River” on your to be read list — even if you’re super busy with work and kids and the house and cannot imagine adding another thing to your plate.
Here’s to finding different ways to getting our work done. Like Martha would.
