In Mercy Street Jennifer Haigh excels at providing a slice of life picture of a women's clinic in Boston and the characters that intersect with Claudia, who works at the clinic. These are not fancy educated people, but rather people who have problems, are down on luck and life, but who are plodding along and have dreams of their own. People who want to survive and are looking perhaps in all the wrong places to do so. It's a timely book and would be a great book to read and discuss in many a book group.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book.

Mercy Street is a women's health clinic in Boston, in a section of the city where the Combat Zone existed. Combat still reigns on Mercy Street over the ABs (abortions), which occur at the facility. Claudia is an empathetic counselor there, and Mary Fahey makes the center run. We meet diverse women at the center: bewildered teenagers, hardened drug addicts and prostitutes, and everything in between. The author also introduces us to the protestors who stand outside Mercy Street and attempt to dissuade women from entering. We become familiar with their fundamentalist views, simplistic beliefs, and they become more human. Jennifer Haigh has again written a book with real characters, encountering divisive issues, and does it with literary style.

Jennifer Haigh has written a masterful novel that is a social document for our time. Mercy Street is about a woman’s health center that confronts issues of abortion, privacy rights, gun control, as well as the personal needs of clients and staff.

I cannot think of a better novel for book groups and college seminars to read. The material lends itself to rich,, thoughtful discussion.

The novel revolves around the life of Claudia, a pragmatic and depressed heroine. Haigh describes her backstory and inability to find satisfaction in her life. She has an unlikely relationship with her weed dealer. She is such a sympathetic character that I feared for her emotional and physical safety as I read this novel.

Haigh manages to bring closure to this novel, with interconnected characters and situations, in a very satisfactory manner. I often find it hard to relate to characters when there are too many plot lines to follow, but Haigh managed to engage me in the complicated lives of all the characters.

Having enjoyed her previous novels, this did not disappoint me. I applaud her ability to weave so many social issues into a throughly engaging book.

Thank you Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read another novel by one of my favorites.