A Matter of Mercy

＂Seamlessly blending fascinating historical detail with a legal drama and a contemporary romance, Hugo exquisitely captures not only the wind-swept landscape of the outer Cape, but also the complicated landscape of the heart.＂ -- Karen Dukess, author of The Last Book Party

Award-winning novelist Lynne Hugo returns readers to the beloved shores and shallows of outer Cape Cod Bay in a riveting drama teeming with life and human truth.

Caroline Marcum thought she’d put the great mistake of her life behind her when she left Wellfleet, but is forced to face it when she returns to her childhood home on the bay to care for her dying mother. Ridley Neal thought he’d put his past--and his prison term--behind him when he returned home to take over his father’s oyster and clam farm in the harbor. Casual acquaintances long ago, they connect again during a fierce nor’easter.

But their suspicions are soon raised when a lawsuit threatens Rid’s livelihood, and a chance encounter with the woman Caroline most wronged results in threats and vandalism. Each burdened with separate guilts and struggling with mistrust of the other, can Caroline and Rid set aside their fears and take a chance on the possibility of forgiveness and love?

Inspired by a 1996 lawsuit, this 10th anniversary edition includes an Afterword with an update on the 2024 status of that lawsuit. A Matter Of Mercy takes readers deep into a life struggle for survival for oyster and clam farmers on theseashell-strewn shallows shallows of Cape Cod bay as Caroline and Rid battle over whether we ever find our real homes in the places and with the people we meant to leave behind.

Lynne Hugo is the author of over ten novels. She is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship recipient who has also received grants from the Ohio Arts Council and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. Where the Trail Grows Faint won the Riverteeth Literary Nonfiction Book Prize. Born and educated in New England, Lynne and her husband now live in Ohio with Scout, a yellow Lab best known for playing skillful shortstop with a tennis ball and terrorizing squirrels in multiple states.