As Our Mothers Made Us

Emily Hampstead and her mother Katherine have a reason for their phenomenal athletic ability and their supercharged immune systems. They are the direct descendants of a half-dozen women of the Bear totem who survived the epidemics of the seventeenth century, and hid in the Great Salt Marsh North during the Colonial era. European reporters gave 1633 as the date of the disappearance of the Pawtucket, but the six women organized themselves into an unrecognized band that successfully maintained their culture for four centuries while moving among the general population.

This collection of short stories follows the adventures of generations of brave Pawtucket women who chose not to be recognized and thus avoided having the patriarchal hierarchy of the English and the Americans imposed upon them.

Originally published between 2014 and 2023, the twenty stories are arranged chronologically, which makes for an entertaining read even for those who saw the stories come out individually.