My Rating: 4 StarsDescription: Will the mistakes of their past cost them a chance at love?
Determined to find her lost younger sister, Marianne Neumann takes a job as a placing agent with the Children's Aid Society in 1858 New York. She not only hopes to offer children a better life, but prays she'll be able to discover whether Sophie ended up leaving the city on an orphan train so they can finally be reunited.
Andrew Brady, her fellow agent on her first placing-out trip, is a former schoolteacher who has an easy way with children, firm but tender and friendly. Underneath his charm and handsome looks, though, he seems to linger a grief that won't go away--and a secret from his past that he keeps hidden.
As the two team up, placing orphans in the small railroad towns of Illinois, they find themselves growing ever closer . . . until a shocking tragedy threatens to upend all their work and change one of their lives forever.
My Thoughts: I thought this book was fun, despite some of the darker aspects. Drew was a man who knew that he was interested in Marianne and wasn't afraid to show it. And those are the kind of heroes I like, men who are confident in themselves and who make the heroine feel confident in his affection for her. That said, I wasn't a huge fan of his continuing to flirt with her even after he determined that he wasn't worthy of her and that theirs could never be more than a friendship. However, since she had also determined that she wasn't worthy of him and had flirted right back, it didn't feel as much like either used the other, but that they were too people fighting a mutual interest.
And this interest was the fun part. It kept me turning pages despite the unbelievablity of a certain portion of the plot <spoiler> when they got engaged because they both dared the other to prove they were the marrying type </spoiler>, and a moment of selfishness <spoiler> when they called this dare as a way to show a boy that he was wanted and that they would adopt him, even though both intended to wiggle their way out of the dare at first </spoiler>, up until both finally pulled through and did the right thing.
As I mentioned, there were some dark parts. Though there is a lot of humor with Drew and Marianne's banter, there are also some difficult moments to read regarding the orphans they work with. Since these draw on the actual horrors many kids did, and still do, go through especially as orphans, it was grounding for an otherwise lighthearted read. Yet I thought these moments were handled well and am interested in where Hedlund takes this series from here.
I have provided an honest review after having received a copy of the book from the publisher.
No comments:
Post a Comment