Beginning when she was a teenager, Madeline had a decade-long affair with married politician Colonel William C.P. Breckinridge. After the death of his wife, Breckinridge asked for Pollard's hand—and then broke off the engagement to marry another woman. But as Patricia Miller details here, Pollard struck back, suing Breckinridge in 1893 for breach of promise in a shockingly public trial. Even as her reputation was being ruined, Pollard was asserting the unthinkable: that the sexual morality of men and women should be judged equally.

"Miller reaches back into the past to resurrect one woman's compelling odyssey from victim to victor…. A fascinating examination of a historical #MeToo episode."—Booklist