[.ca] This Side of Heaven: Determining the Donnelly Murders, 1880 (ISBN 0802044867)

More than Meets the Eye:
This is a remarkably well researched and crafted book. Mr. Feltes takes the legendary murder of Donnelly family, by a group of men, seeking to act out a personal vendetta, and approaches it in an expanded way. Very carefully he presents the circumstances of the second half of the 19th century, and traces the political, economic and ideological conditions that prepared the situation in Biddulph Township for this brutal murder in February, 1880. These circumstances were the underpinnings of the history of the area, creating a stage for the web that caught up the residents of this southwestern Ontario township. Mr. Feltes makes a convincing case, with close attention to detail and interesting treatment of the history of a developing section of Canada. He convinces the reader that there are consequences, beyond one's control that are set up by choices that are made in all areas of society.