Everything She Didn’t Say by Jane Kirkpatrick is a fictionalized autobiography of Carrie Strahorn.  Strahorn documented her many travels by stagecoach which helped open up the west for railroads and settlers. 

The story is slow-paced and not especially spine-tingling.  It is written in such a way as to bring the reader along on all of the adventures recorded by Carrie Strahorn.  Many emotionally and personal situations are discussed. 

Jane Kirkpatrick has clearly done a lot of research in preparing to write this story.  It is truly a talent to extrapolate deep emotions and thoughts from limited recordings of a person long since passed.  Reading of Strahorn’s adventures really illustrates just how isolated and brave early settlers were.

The book was enjoyable, but the ending felt not quite finished.  Perhaps a little more details or information would have helped.  It really just fell flat.  Maybe there was not a lot of documentation and Kirkpatrick was trying her best to stay true to the writings of her character.

This book was sent to Compass Book Ratings for review by Revell

Content Analysis:

Profanity/Language:  None 

Violence/Gore:  Reports of Native Americans shooting and killing settlers and burning their property; character jokingly threatens to beat a spouse with a stick. 

Sex/Nudity:  Implication that married people are having sex, no details; a character says she was raped, but no details mentioned; a man indicates his bathing suit has come off when he fell in the water; married people kiss, hold hands and embrace.

Mature Subject Matter:

Gender bias, infertility, death of a spouse, death of a friend.

Alcohol / Drug Use:

None