Singer/songwriter Louise Taylor's latest is a sensitively performed and written affirmation of womanly strength and wisdom — about as delicate as the steel strings she confidently plies, and as resilient as the "Cherry Tree" (RealAudio excerpt) of which she seductively sings in the opening song.

Like supportive colleague Chris Smither, this blues-rooted troubadour builds her songs on melodic, fingerpicked guitar patterns that give her music a distinctive sonic imprint. Her introspective lyrics grapple directly with meaty existential issues of need, philosophy, social justice and displacement, and characters who understand the metaphysical value of burdens. On ballads like "Meet You Here" and the stirring, lightly jazzy title tune, "Written in Red" (RealAudio excerpt), the matter-of-fact intimacy of her delivery bares the strength behind true vulnerability.

She demonstrates a poet's grasp of symbolic detail, as in the gorgeous, harmonica-accented "His Hands" ("It was his hands she fell in love with/ The slow twist of his supple wrist") and "Miriam Bell" ("The gun she fixed in his own hand/ And leaned to kiss his forehead/ The gun she fixed in his own hand/ And wiped her lips and fled").

The gently weary tone of her voice in "My Dove" is evocative of a less jagged Marianne Faithfull. Likewise with the bluesy "Two Bends in the Road" (RealAudio excerpt), a drowsily comforting number written by guitarist Ray Bonneville.

Percussionist Dean Sharp adroitly accents the music's vital pulse, particularly on "Over the Mountain," "Miriam Bell" and "Gunny Hole," the latter's grooves fleshed out by David Tronzo's resonant dobro and slide guitar.

Taylor sings in conversational tones, in an honestly sensual voice that's dusky, burnished and whiskey-warm. With such compact, carefully worded verses and melody lines so clearly enhancing what she has to say, it's hard to imagine her encountering a situation too daunting to confront.