The Good Wife.

O’Nan, Stewart (author).

Incarceration can be a bum rap, not only for those serving time but also for the victim, the victim’s family, and, as depicted in this sensitive and provocative fictional account, for the spouse of the imprisoned. Life behind bars has more than its share of miseries; it is extremely dangerous, monotonous, and regimented. But for a loving and committed wife, it’s an entirely different kind of prison. Patty Dickerson, pregnant, is blindsided by the revelation that her husband, Tommy, has been involved in a number of robberies, and when a burglary goes terribly wrong and Tommy and his friend Gary are arrested and charged with murder, she is faced with the dilemma of having to figure out how to defend and support the man she loves as well as raise a child on her own. O’Nan’s treatment of this painful ordeal is detailed and sympathetic, depicting the experience entirely through Patty’s eyes, withholding any foreshadowing and passing no judgment. From the trial, through the various appeals process, the visits to the prison, the waiting, the hoping, the struggle to make ends meet, and the gradual resilience and self-sufficiency, O’Nan, with seldom a false beat, perceptively and compassionately depicts the bureaucratic insanities of the penal system and the hardships, fears, and frustrations of those left behind.