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From Publishers Weekly
Chiaverini's fourth offering in her Elm Creek Quilts series weaves a modern-day family mystery around a pre-Civil War tale of bravery, deception and the Underground Railroad. Sylvia Bergstrom Compson, proprietress of Elm Creek Quilts and a quilter's retreat, is the sole heir and last descendant of Anneke and Hans Bergstrom, German immigrants who settled in Creek's Crossing, Pa., after Hans won Elm Creek Farm in a horse race. Or is Sylvia the only one left? After a speaking engagement at a quilter's guild in South Carolina, a woman named Margaret Alden shows Sylvia a family heirloom quilt with a map of Elm Creek Manor recreated in the stitches. Do Margaret and Sylvia share a distant relative (heretofore unknown to Sylvia) who moved to South Carolina? Or did a slave of one of Margaret's ancestors make it? This thought disturbs Sylvia deeply. She believes her forebears were staunch abolitionists who were active in the Underground Railroad, aiding escaping slaves in their journeys to Canada and freedom by using quilts as maps pointing the route to safe houses. A journal written by Hans's sister Gerda and discovered in an attic trunk reveals the family secrets and the story of Joanna, a pregnant runaway who is sheltered from slave catchers by the Bergstroms and who almost becomes their undoing. Readers unfamiliar with the series may be confused trying to keep the peripheral contemporary characters straight, but the story of Anneke, Hans and Gerda Bergstrom is compelling enough to warrant sticking with Sylvia as she ferrets out the true history of Elm Creek Farm. Chiaverini manages to impart a healthy dollop of history in a folksy style, while raising moral questions in a suspenseful narrative.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.From Booklist
The latest in the Elm Creek Quilt series explores the lore surrounding the use of quilts to signal runaway slaves traveling the Underground Railroad. Sylvia Compson, owner of Elm Creek Farm and the last of the Bergstrom family line, is intrigued when a quilting student shows her a quilt that complicates the family legend of her ancestors' involvement in the Underground Railroad. She finds old quilts hidden away in the attic, accompanied by a memoir written by Gerda, the spinster sister of the Bergstrom patriarch. The quilts and the memoir raise questions about the Bergstrom family's history that trouble and intrigue Sylvia. Chiaverini switches between passages in Gerda's memoir and current-day events at Elm Creek Farm, including genealogical and historical research, taking the reader back and forth between the present and the past to reveal a long-forgotten family secret. Fans of the three previous Elm Creek Quilts novels will enjoy this latest installment. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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First Sentence
When her sister, Claudia, died childless at the age of seventy-seven, Sylvia Bergstrom Compson became the last living descendant of Hans and Anneke Bergstrom and the sole heir to what remained of their fortune. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
When her sister, Claudia, died childless at the age of seventy-seven, Sylvia Bergstrom Compson became the last living descendant of Hans and Anneke Bergstrom and the sole heir to what remained of their fortune. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
An entertaining book that is sometimes implausible,
By M. C. Crammer (Decatur, GA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Elm Creek Quilts #4 Runaway Quilt (Paperback)
The mystery in this novel centers around antique quilts and a 100+ year old journal that may hold the key to these quilts. A stranger (Margaret) brings Sylvia (a quilter who lives at Elm Creek Manor in Pennsylvania) an antique quilt that has been in Margaret's Southern family for a long time -- as far back as the Civil War. What is odd is that the quilting pattern for the quilt is Elm Creek Manor, and Sylvia can't understand why someone in the South before the Civil War would depict her home. She fears that her ancestry may include some slaveowners, although she had always been told that her family were abolitionists who ran an underground railway station. Implausibly, Sylvia decides for the first time to go looking for a hope chest that her great aunt gave her the key for many decades ago, and in that chest she finds three quilts and a journal. The mystery thickens as she studies these quilts and reads the journal, but I won't spoil the story by saying any more. This author is a good story teller, although I enjoyed the "journal" part of the book more than the present day part (the book goes back and forth between the two time periods, although the action takes place at the same place, Elm Creek Manor). I found quite a bit of the story improbable, but if you can get around that, this is a good read. I couldn't quite get on board with Sylvia's concerns that some of her ancestors may have been slaveholders, since in my opinion no-one is responsible for what their ancestors did, nor can anyone claim credit for an ancestor's good deeds. Quilters will find it particularly interesting, but you don't have to be a quilter to follow the story.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Simply Wondrful Story!!,
By Lily (Bethel, ME. USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Elm Creek Quilts #4 Runaway Quilt (Paperback)
I began reading Jennifer Chiaverini's series of novels at the last book of the series whick is "The Quilters Legacy". I had to read the series out of sequence due to unavailabilty in our local library. There are apparently many people in our town who are also enjoying this wonderful series. I thought "The Quilters Legacy" was Chiaverini's greatest work until I read The Runaway Quilt! But of course I have not read the other three books in the series yet either. Once I started reading this book it was nearly impossible to put it down. She does a beautiful job of bringing the past family history into the future of Sylvia Compson's life using family quilts & Gerda's memoir. The story was very encaptivating even though I know absolutly nothing about quilting. It revolves around the Underground Railroad near the Civil War error which was extremely interesting. It is an amazing story whether you are interested history and quilting or not. Take the time to read it. I guarantee you won't be disappointed!
5.0 out of 5 stars
very interesting,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Runaway Quilt: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel (Hardcover)
In a time we are all into family trees ,finding an ancestor's diary is like a dream come true.....The story of this family interloks with the story of quilts and quilting in a beautifull way,you just want it to go on.
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