It is New York City and the Civil War is brewing. Norah McCabe, an Irish immigrant who escaped the Famine as a child, is now a young widow with a daughter. A milliner, struggling to survive in tumultuous times, Norah meets Abraham Lincoln, befriends the extraordinary African-American woman Elizabeth…

I desire silence. I want to be free from the noise that humans make. I fear I will never be free from this noise. I'm often in the woods and I still hear a car that is miles away or a plane flying overhead. And even my own sighing and thoughts can become too noisy. The sounds of…