In The Last Twelve Miles that goes on sale today, Erika Robuck begins with the true story of two women on opposite sides of the Prohibition Rum Wars in the early twentieth century and weaves a compelling novel around them. The “Bahama Queen,” Cleo Lythogoe, announces her rumrunner retirement with Marie Waite chomping at the bit to take her place and make her own name at the top of the heap. On the opposite side of the prohibition wars, Elizebeth Smith Friedman masterminds a codebreaking operation to help the Coast Guard put a stop to the illegal activity.
Chapters rotate between Marie and Elizebeth. The two women have much in common including their family roles as wives and mothers and their struggle to be taken seriously as women in a man’s world. Differences come in their relationships and interactions with their families. In one chapter, tension comes as Marie builds ways to hide her alcohol business, a fleet of vessels, and signal codes for her partners in crime. In the next chapter, Elizebeth works on breaking the codes in time for law enforcement partners in the Coast Guard to intercept the illegal shipments. The law enforcers are not helped by the fact that public opinion is often on the side of the bootleggers.
Ultimately, the challenge becomes personal between the two women. I found the suspense kept me reading, no more able to leave Marie at the end of her chapter than Elizebeth at the end of hers. There is an author’s note at the end giving explanations for a few liberties she has taken with reality, the completion of the story for both women, and a bibliography for further reading if the topic intrigues you, which it may.