Description: A Marriage of Convenience Turns Most Inconvenient in this Historical Charmer
Having fled a difficult home life, Civil War nurse Abigail Stuart feels like her only friend in the world is sweet but gravely wounded patient Jeremiah Calhoun. Fearing he won't survive, the Confederate soldier's last wish is that Abigail look after his sickly sister at home. Marry him, return to his horse farm, and it'll be hers.
Left with few choices, Abigail takes him up on his offer and moves to Missouri after his death, but just as the family learns to accept her, the real Jeremiah Calhoun appears--puzzled to find a confounding woman posing as his wife. Jeremiah is determined to have his life back to how it was before the war, but his own wounds limit what he can do on his own. Still not fully convinced Abigail isn't duping him, he's left with no choice but to let the woman stay and help--not admitting to himself she may provide the healing his entire family needs.
My Thoughts: I loved this book. There were somethings that did pull it down from 5 stars (which I will get to), however I found Jeremiah and Abigail to be truly compelling characters. Abigail's insistence that she would not except being someones second choice really got to me. Even needing a home and having been thrust from her first, she was still willing to deny second best. It was something that took real guts, especially with a broken heart to mend as well.
The first couple scenes with Jeremiah were an issue for me. While I knew who was the point of view character in both scenes, Jennings tried to make it seem like it wasn't him because he was dead. Yet having read the description of the book, I knew that was not true. The third scene with him as the point of view character seemed as though it tried to play as a grand reveal of his continued survival.
The villains of the story were not my favorite. They were only in a few scenes and always seemed to have an archvillain feel to them. I would have liked to at least seen a deeper motivation for their deeds.
That said, the backdrop characters really lived the plot. Though Laural seemed to lack much in the way of common sense, the rest of the characters where lovable and amusing. I especially enjoyed the Huckabee children and their pranks. I wish there would have been more of them.
I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
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