Hysteria

By Eva Gale

England, 1860, and by her mother’s orders Constance is in treatment for Hysteria. She never complains. Until a new doctor takes over and threatens the only pleasure she knows in life.18 and over please.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eva Gale
• Release date: Jan 27, 2009

Eva Gale

Eva Gale loves white cupcakes with bitter chocolate frosting, lots of dark roast coffee and six-foot piles of books. She would prefer them all at once, but she takes what she can get. She lives in the farmlands of NJ, with her husband and seven children whom they homeschool. They have one doofus Doberman, a Yellow Naped Amazon named Gizmo, two cats and two Blackberry Hamsters named Mac and PC but are looking to add chickens, guinea hens, bees and Lancashire Heelers to their collection. When she’s not guiding school, she’s writing, weeding the garden or doing endless loads of dishes and laundry.

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HYSTERIA

by

Eva Gale

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Eva Gale on Smashwords

Hysteria

Copyright © 2009 by Eva Gale

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

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HYSTERIA

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England, 1860

Mother tied my corset too tight again today. I try to blow out my stomach like a horse getting cinched, but she knows my trick and hoists her skirts up to dig her knobbled knee into my back while she pulls my laces taut.

She must get me ready for my Doctor appointment, and I cannot dare let my excitement show. So I lie abed and refuse my tea and only when she pinches my arms so tight that tears come to my eyes do I promise I’ll be good and do as she bids. But I dawdle and fuss until she swears that I’m the most horrid child and that she should have let Leery take me to the trolls.

I’m not a child, though I act it. I am five and twenty this December past.

I should be married at this advanced age but no man would have me for they all know madness runs deep in my family. My father speaks to specters like they were corporeal and his brother and their father before them. But my mother’s father did not care she would give him demented grandchildren. He did