Winner of the 1998 Golden Owl award for nonfiction, Bitter Bonds: A Colonial Divorce Drama Of The Seventeenth Century by Leonard Blusse (Professor of History of European-Asian Relations, University of Leiden) is the compelling story of Cornelia van Nijenroode, the strong-willed daughter of a Dutch merchant and a Japanese geisha. Cornelia married a Dutch lawyer for social reasons, yet was soon betrayed by her husband, who sought to plunder all her personal wealth. Cornelia strove to obtain a divorce in an era when the law and customs were especially stacked against women, after a grueling fifteen-year-struggle, Cornelia emerged with only a partial success, and in the process, became a footnote to the history of women's rights. An emotional, turbulent true story of betrayal and the quest for independence, Bitter Bonds is ably translated into English by Diane Webb and a highly recommended contribution to academic Women's History reference collections and supplemental reading lists.