Valerie Sokol's dramatic novel draws her readers quickly to center stage where Isabelle is confronted by a merciless Southerner who makes a high stakes wager against her. This dramatic narrative is played against the backdrop of mid-19th century New York City. With meticulous attention to setting and costume detail, Sokol transports us from the fetid alleys of the Bowery to a sumptuous Jenny Lind opera house benefit performance.

New to pre-Civil War New York Society, and married in name only to a wealthy older man, Isabelle is forced by the wager to assume control of a run-down canning company. She draws around her a cast of delightfully diverse characters as she encounters both impossible societal expectations and the malicious vandalism of an embittered ex-foreman.