Beneath the Wind

by Cordelia Frances Biddle

In the tradition of Rosamund Pilcher and Belva Plain, Cordelia Frances Biddle has crafted a saga of wealth and adventure, a tale of love and trust betrayed, a story at once romantic and startlingly realistic. Beneath the Wind is a stunning debut by a remarkable writer. Tragedy had no place in Eugenia’s life. As the wife of the youngest son of Philadelphia’s wealthiest family, she had been granted everything any young woman could desire. Her husband was devoted, her children adoring, her life one of ease and comfort. There was an orderliness to her days that by its very nature seemed to deny tragedy’s existence. But only a few years into her marriage, Eugenia’s storybook life has become a memory. Her husband, George, depends more on alcohol and less on wits when pitted against his aristocratic, tyrannical father, “the Turk.” When her father-in-law presents the couple with the beautiful yacht Alcedo for a trip around the world, Eugenia has no idea that before her sojourn is half over she will betray and be betrayed in turn by the very love that has shaped her will-ordered life. The Alcedo’s maiden voyage carries Eugenia, George and their children to the Far East, where the Turk’s agents ostensibly plan to establish a mining operation. Unaware of the dark secrets that lie hidden within the magnificent yacht, Eugenia finds herself drawn to the mysterious and intriguing Lt. Brown, a man whose real identity she must never discover. Only when tragedy strikes, so suddenly, so irrationally, does Eugenia find the strength to free herself and to face the truths once concealed from her.

478 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1993

About the author

Cordelia Frances Biddle is a feminist and historian. Fiction: Listen to Me: The Women of the Bible Speak Out; They Believed They Were Safe; the Martha Beale series set in 1840's Philadelphia, and Beneath the Wind. Nonfiction: Biddle, Jackson and a Nation in Turmoil, and Saint Katharine: the Life of Katharine Drexel.
The River Was Waiting will be published January 2026

With her husband, Steve Zettler, she wrote the Nero Blanc crossword puzzle series.

She would love hearing from you, and would be happy to meet with your book club or reading group.
Please contact her through her website: www.CordeliaFrancesBiddle.net