Narrator Tavia Gilbert provides the shocking details of a crime that captured the public’s attention in the nineteenth century. While listeners know the outcome from the outset, Gilbert keeps us thoroughly engaged. Prosperous merchant Henry Ballard seduces an innocent young housemaid, Amanda Norman, keeping her as his mistress. After being abandoned and finding herself in dire circumstances, Norman pleads with Ballard to help her and their child. When he declines any assistance, Amanda stabs him in front of many witnesses. Gilbert artfully takes us through period morés, hypocrisies, class bias, and social injustices, highlighting social reformers, politicians, and journalists who supported Norman and who called for new laws designed to punish the “seducer.” A disturbing picture of how little women were esteemed in that historical period.—AudioFile Magazine