The Simple Hand of Fate

June M. Blurton is a retired speech/language pathologist.

For women in the Canada of 1915, “there were two options: marriage or
spinsterhood.” Cantly’s older sister, Beth, is already married. Now
her father has chosen a suitor for Cantly, a widower named Ralph
Needham.

At a dance Cantly meets Bill Weiland, who has a reputation for being
fast and comes from a family that is ruled by his overbearing and bitter
mother, Martha. Martha is determined that her youngest son not be
involved with a spunky girl like Cantly. When Cantly discovers she is
pregnant, both her father and Martha conspire to make her think that
Bill has deserted her. In desperation she leaves home, and it is a long
time before she and Bill are reunited.

Subtlety is not this book’s strong suit. The (largely unsympathetic)
characters are portrayed in black-and-white terms and the story itself
is melodramatic. What makes the novel interesting is the picture it
paints of the social mores of a farming community in early 20th-century
Canada.