In 1869 America was recovering from the devastation of the Civil War. But a love story and its violent outcome in New York upstaged all else in newspapers across the country. Abby Sage, a beautiful actress, suffered through and finally escaped from an abusive marriage when her jealous ex-husband murdered her alleged lover - acclaimed Civil War journalist Albert Deane Richardsonin the lobby of the New York Tribune. The ensuing trial captivated the imagination of America and began a fiery debate about the sanctity of marriage and the rights of women. Lost Love brings this celebrated but forgotten case to life. With the eye of a journalist and the heart of a novelist, George Cooper weaves newspaper accounts, trial transcripts, period illustrations, and letters written by the lovers into an irresistible narrative. The story sweeps from the war-torn South to the new Western frontier, from small-town New England to the drawing rooms of New York's aristocracy. Cooper also introduces us to some of the most notable figures of the day - Horace Greeley, Edwin Booth, and Henry Ward Beecher among them - for Abby and Albert's lives and the tragedy of their love touched people far and wide. Lost Love vividly rekindles the passion of a love affair more than a century old as it captures the smoldering fervor of America's "age of innocence" - when marriage was still held sacred but the flames of free love and the rise of feminism could be seen just over the horizon.
