Book Beginning: The Story of Land and Sea by Katy Simpson Smith

The Friday 56: *Grab a book, turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader. Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grabs you. Post it. Add your (url) post in Linky at Freda's Voice.
Also, visit Book Beginning at Rose City Reader.

The Story of Land and Sea by Katy Simpson Smith, hardcover published 2014 by Harper
Genre: historical fiction
Source: ARC
Set in a small coastal town in North Carolina during the waning years of the American Revolution, this novel follows three generations of family—fathers and daughters, mother and son, master and slave, characters who yearn for redemption amidst a heady brew of war, kidnapping, slavery, and love. (publisher)

Book beginning:

On days in August when sea storms bite into the North Carolina coast, he drags a tick mattress into the hall and tells his daughter stories, true and false, about her mother. The wooden shutters clatter, and Tabitha folds blankets around them to build a softness for the storm. He always tells of their courting days, of her mother's shyness. She looked like a straight tall pine from a distance; only when he got close could he see her trembling. 

page 56:

Above decks he takes his plate of meat and bread and accepts the stares of the seamen, who know he carried the fever onto their ship. 

I haven't read many books on this time period, the days at the end of the American Revolution and right after, The writing captured my attention and I'm eager to read it though I got the ARC about a year ago.

What book are you sharing this week?