The Civil War is grinding through its last stages when Ethan Walsh refuses a request to turn spy for the Union. He's a doctor, and he's not willing to leave the Union hospital in Pennsylvania when suffering men are being brought in every day. Ethan's brother Mikey however accepts the intelligence work and his talents could prove useful. Ethan spots lovely, demure Annabeth Phelan working with the wounded and has her assigned as his nurse, an unheard-of request as most women were good for hand-holding and letter-writing.

AN OUTLAW IN WONDERLAND depicts with horrible clarity the work of a field hospital, treating filthy, stinking, bleeding soldiers with basic instruments and rudimentary sterilisation techniques. Ethan admires Annabeth's looks, wits and nerve, but he cannot become familiar with her. The girl has her own worries. A man she used to know while growing up arrives and tells her that the doctor is feeding information from Southern captives to the generals. Her own brother is on the Southern side with Mosley's Rangers. Annabeth is in a quandary, for she can't help noticing that Ethan is attracted to her. As a test she plants a scrap of information and waits to see if it will be transmitted. She almost doesn't want to know the outcome....

This grittily detailed book by Lori Austin is her second western, following Beauty And The Bounty Hunter. After the war has ended she shows us life among outlaws in a frontier town. Annabeth has hardened up and learnt unusual skills such as lockpicking, and wears men's clothes for convenience though in some towns it could get her arrested; the contrast with her initial modest upbringing is humorous and keeps us reading. Now Annabeth doesn't hesitate to pick up an axe or a Colt as the need arises. She's become a good solid heroine from necessity and adaptation, surviving as best she knows how. Betrayal however poisons the air between her and Ethan and may prove insurmountable; the reader is kept guessing right to the end in this adult romance. AN OUTLAW IN WONDERLAND is a good introduction to this author and to reality-dense historical westerns.

Book Summary

Saving soldiers' lives at the Confederate army hospital Chimborazo, Annabeth Phelan is no ordinary Southern belle. She's never known work more exhausting or rewarding. And she's never known a man like Dr. Ethan Walsh, with his disarming gray eyes and peculiar ways. But now the Confederacy is charging her with another service: find the Union spy at Chimborazo.

Ethan's one passion is saving lives, and if he can do that by helping to end the war, he will—even if it means spying for the North. He's gotten used to fooling Confederates, but he can't bear lying to Annabeth. And together, they are about to discover a new passion—one that could even transcend the chaos of war.

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