Review: Intriguing, original story
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 13, 2011
This ghost/time travel story felt original, fresh. The story takes place in two time periods: the modern era and the slave era. Two women, one named Christina and one named Christy, are set to marry on the same day in the same location (but centuries apart) to decent but personally unsuitable men. A crisis in the earlier era sends the pre-Civil War Christy through a time portal into the future Christina's life, and the modern Christina back in time to Christy's life. The women trade bodies completely. Only their minds shift. 75% of the story is really devoted to Christina's experiences back during the time of slavery. The more limited story time spent on Christy's experience in 2009 tends to support and explain Christina's experiences (for example, the magic seems to stem from Christy's latent supernatural abilities).The story is not handled as masterly as a reader might like, and some story questions are ignored by the writer, which can be frustrating. Yet, there is real charm here. The modern Christina is the more compelling of the two women with her modern confidence and intelligence. Her placement into an era in which women were property is interesting and imaginative. She is gutsy and sometimes barrels ahead foolishly into dangerous situations. But generally, she is effective. Awaking into the body of a slave owner's daughter is jarring for the young lawyer, who sets about trying to correct the wrongs of the period with little finesse or patience. Fortunately, she is helped by Christy's fiance who is much better matched to her assertive nature than he ever was to Christy's retiring, submissive nature.Christy's experience in the modern era is more problematic as she too happily and easily becomes the stay-at-home wife and dutiful daughter Christina's men (father and fiance) long for. She does develop some assertiveness; but in the end, as readers, we quickly pack her away into her gentle life as the future wife and mother she is eager to be. We wish her well, but turn with more pleasure to the promising excitement and intellectual interplay that will define Christina and her new husband's life together fighting for the rights of slaves in the South.Nice love scenes, courting scenes, relationship development between the two couples. Recommended.