Simple Gifts: The Story of the Shakers

SIMPLE GIFTS: The Story of the Shakers

Illustrated by Betty Fraser

Viking 1976

ISBN# 0-670-64584-2 Viking hardcover

Editor Linda Zuckerman was on a trip through New England and came across several Shaker sites. On the way home, she stopped for tea and asked me if I’d be interested in doing a non-fiction book on the Shakers. As I’d always been fascinated by them, I readily agreed, and after a year’s worth of research, produced this book. Eventually I would write The Gift of Sarah Barker, a young adult novel, and the research was a good start for what I needed to do for that book. Smart readers will note that the round barn I found when researching this book and used in Gift, also found its way into my novel Dragon’s Blood. I call that a Writer’s Recycling Project.