Review: The Safe Room by Barbara A. Shapiro

24880139
Title: The Safe Room
Author: B.A. Shapiro
Pages: 256
Published: Feb. 1. 2015
Genre: Historical, mystery
Review: ebook via NetGalley and Open Road Media















From the bestselling author of The Art Forger

How long can murder haunt a family? Until the wrong is put right and the victim is able to rest in peace. Set in Lexington, Massachusetts, The Safe Room is a story of such a murder and such a haunting. A psychological thriller, the tale toggles between the eve of the Civil War and present day. It follows the doomed love affair of Silas Person, a runaway slave riding the Underground Railroad, and Sarah Harden, the daughter of a famous abolitionist. Sarah and Silas’s story is intertwined with that of Lee Seymour, a modern-day descendant of the Harden family who must suddenly grapple with a world in which murder and ghosts are all too real.

The Safe Room is a suspenseful tale that employs love and the paranormal to explore the ugliness of injustice and the beauty of human hope.


I received this book via NetGalley to give an honest review.

You know I am not too big on historical books or even this kind of genre, but when I was offered the chance to read it I figured why the hell not. Jump right on in and give it a chance the worst thing is that I don't enjoy it and I can always just put it to the side.
Instead I got into the book. I loved the back and forth P.O.V. from Sarah while writing in her diary to the present of Lee who lives in the house and is having it restored. 
Lee's grandmothers home is considered to be part of the Underground Railroad which I have always been fascinated with how it worked for people back in the day. Lee not only is trying to help get the home restored she also works at a place called SafeHaven that is for those that need the help because of drugs or alcohol sometimes it is the last stop for them before they end up in prison. 
While working at her job she told almost all the time or at least to her that race is a bit deal and being that she is white she doesn't understand how it works for black people. And this is done through out the whole book but it isn't something I agree with. 
As the house is being redone there seems to be a ghost of someone left behind when the house was used as a safe house. You have a good idea who it is as you read more of Sarah's diary. My heart was heavy for Sarah as she was a white woman who later fell in love with a black man and back then that was a no-no. You were not suppose to do that. 
We read as Sarah goes through heartbreak, grief and finally happiness which I thought was amazing.
I did enjoy the plot twist that was thrown in with the murder that occurred in the present. The person who committed this was something I didn't even think could have done it.
I was very glad to read something that was so touching and opens your eyes to the way things were back when slavery was around it is a topic most don't talk about as it is crazy it even happened. I enjoyed the way the author was able to get the past and present all together and make it come full circle.







AKA B. A. Shapiro and Barbara Shapiro.
I am the author of six novels (The Art Forger, The Safe Room, Blind Spot, See No Evil, Blameless and Shattered Echoes), four screenplays (Blind Spot, The Lost Coven, Borderline and Shattered Echoes) and the non-fiction book, The Big Squeeze. In my previous career incarnations, I have directed research projects for a residential substance abuse facility, worked as a systems analyst/statistician, headed the Boston office of a software development firm, and served as an adjunct professor teaching sociology at Tufts University and creative writing at Northeastern University. I like being a novelist the best.
I began my writing career when I quit my high-pressure job after the birth of my second child. Nervous about what to do next, I said to my mother, "If I'm not playing at being superwoman anymore, I don't know who I am." My mother answered with the question: "If you had one year to live, how would you want to spend it?" The answer: write a novel and spend more time with my children. And that's exactly what I did. Smart mother.
After writing six novels and raising my children, I now live in Boston with my husband Dan and my dog Sagan. And yes, I'm working on yet another novel but have no plans to raise any more children.

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