The rebellion of Miss Lucy Ann Lobdell, by William Klaber

There are a number of accounts about women in the 19^th century disguising themselves as men or boys in order to fight in a war, head out for adventure, or escape from the constrictions of being female.  This fictional memoir is based on the story of the real-life Lucy Ann Lobdell, whose husband deserted her and her young daughter when she was in her early twenties.  Leaving her toddler daughter behind with her family, she runs away in her brother’s clothes and soon finds herself passing as a young man in a distant city.  Her father had taught her to shoot and hunt and she had always had an adventurous and rebellious spirit.  Once embarked on this cross-gendered journey however, she begins to doubt whether she is really a woman or a man.  In her first career as a young dance master, she falls in love with one of her female students.  Found out, she runs away again and this pattern repeats in other locations.  The novel is an interesting exploration of one person’s struggles with her own divided nature, her remorse at those she inadvertently hurts along the way, and her “marriage” to another women who does know that “Joseph” is not who he seems.  The author is connected to this story in part by living in the area where her story began and ended.  In some ways, his afterword and the explanation of how he came to write Lobdell’s “memoir” is even more fascinating that the book itself.  280 pp.