In the early years of the 20th century, life on a farm in Massachusetts is not easy. The New England winters are hard; snow and ice cover the fields for months, and the nights are long and cold. For a poor farmer like Ethan Frome, life has few bright moments. He works his unproductive farm and struggles to maintain a bearable existence with his difficult, suspicious and hypochondriac wife, Zeena. But when Zeenas young and beautiful cousin Mattie Silver enters their household as a hired girl, Ethan finds himself obsessed with her and with the possibilities for happiness she comes to represent. Edith Whartons Ethan Frome is a classic of American Literature, with compelling characters trapped in circumstances from which they seem unable to escape.