Review: Components I liked, some that flopped
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 05 29, 2012
There were parts of this book that I really liked, but overall, there were a few concerns that I had.  I enjoyed how this book wasn't just fluff.  It built in the dynamics of a family system, seeing them through the sorrows and the joys of difficult life in that time period.  I know that many women had to endure hardships and allow themselves to progress again, despite sometimes not wanting to do so.  I enjoyed the strength of character, and at times, pigheadedness that ruled the main characters unwilling to just give up to everything going on around them.  The author really created a dynamic between where they came from and where they were heading.My concerns about override the strengths of the book.  I'm not one to really know all the details of the time period or even the area, never having lived there.  However, I know enough that I was able to pick out questionable situations as cited by others.  I did like the main characters, but I felt that the love that is developed between them was so sudden and unexplainable.  This is strictly love at first sight, quite literally.  And not just once or twice, but for several of the characters more than once each.  I also found myself skipping ahead in the last part of the book, getting bogged down without much forward movement.  I wanted to just find out what happened, and move past the extra descriptions.  I liked the overall concept, it wasn't a bad read.  However, I would have liked it a lot better if there were a more concise version with both setting and brevity of language.