The Third Child

Under her mother's constant scrutiny and lost in the shadow of her famous senator father, Melissa is the third child in the politically prominent Dickenson family, where ambition comes first and Melissa often comes last. In college, she meets Blake, a man of mixed race and apparently unknown parentage. His adoptive parents are lawyers whose defense of death-row cases in the past brought them head-to-head with Melissa's father when he was the governor of Pennsylvania. While Melissa and Blake's attraction is immediate and fiery, a dangerous secret lurks beneath their relationship -- one that could destroy them ... and their families. Provocative and beautifully written, and dealing with themes of love, honesty, identity, and the consequences of ambition, The Third Child is a remarkable page-turner.

Marge Piercy is the author of fifteen novels, including Gone to Soldiers, The Longings of Women, and Woman on the Edge of Time, as well as fifteen books of poetry, including The Art of Blessing the Day, The Moon Is Always Female, and Circle on the Water. She lives on Cape Cod with her husband, Ira Wood, the novelist and publisher of Leapfrog Press