Domina — Barbara Wood

IT IS 1881. THE CITY STREETS ARE TEEMING WITH DISEASE... LABOR PAINS ARE CONSIDERED A PUNISHMENT FOR SIN... LETHAL DRUGS ARE SOLD WITHOUT PRESCRIPTION ... AND MANY MEN WILL STOP AT NOTHING TO KEEP A WOMAN FROM BECOMING A DOCTOR ....

These are the harsh realities of the Victorian world into which Samantha Hargrave graduates from a New York medical school, earning the new title Domina, mistress of medicine. It is world in which a woman doctor who is also young and beautiful has virtually no chance of overcoming the odds against her. But talented, ambitious Samantha dares to invade the all-male sanctuary of medicine; she dares to dream of becoming a surgeon of recognition. And in an odyssey that takes her from London to New York to San Francisco, and into the arms of two very different--and extraordinary doctors who love and guide hey Samantha triumphs.

This magnificent novel, spanning two continents and all the changes that were part of medicine at the turn of the century gives a poignant portrayal of one woman's unbreakable courage and unshakable determination...