Review: Interesting Despite Minor Plot Problems
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 28, 2013
Sarah Montgomery is pleased her parents trust her enough to leave her at their house when they are called away for three weeks, even though the town busybody agrees to check on her. When she goes for wood, she finds a man unconscious, shot twice, and takes him home just before a fierce blizzard hits. Unable to go for more wood, she lies beside him to keep them warm. The nosey neighbor bursts in and pronounces her a harlot. The man turns out to be none other than Lord Alan Mellington. The vicar bans Sarah from the church and forces her father to kick her out. She's finally taken in to work at Mellington Hall, where she finds someone trying to kill Alan again, and she can't let that happen.I've had a hard time rating this book. There's things I loved about it, and things I didn't. I question that her parents would leave a single female home alone in 1838. They had no servants, and that just wasn't done. After Sarah's disgrace, it made no sense to me that she didn't go to her mother's titled family, who had just agreed to acknowledge Sarah. Later on, there would have been room for Sarah and Alan at her family's house, since they had the Montgomery's bedroom, Sarah's bedroom, and the guest room mentioned when Sarah couldn't get Alan up to it when he was injured. The fact that Alan left Sarah without seeing her when she'd fallen down the steps was inexcusable no matter who insisted he couldn't. He was forceful at other times. He was also a huge snob, but I could deal with that, considering the time period and the fact that he did become more tolerant as the story progressed. Phillip was the estate game-keeper for most of the book, but he suddenly became the estate manager at one place long before the end. No one boiled medical instruments to sterilize them in 1838, because they didn't know to.Besides some snags in the plot, I did like the story. For a Christian romance, however, faith didn't play much of a role, except in a negative, slandering way. Alan was reported to be a Christian, but I never saw him pray or do anything except attend church and talk with the reverend at the New Church. Sarah didn't even do that much, although she would have liked to attend her old church but couldn't. I knew who the culprit was as soon as he/she was introduced to the story, but I thought there were two people involved, and it turned out to be only one. Still, it was an interesting, clean, easy, fast read. I definitely liked it.