Review: Poetic, Sensual, Spunky
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 24, 2012
This one had me hooked from the very first sentence/paragraph:"Elizabeth Douglas couldn't think of a better incentive that a husband who wanted her dead. Thus inspired, she'd packed a bag, changed her name, and now gripped the handrail of the Northstar as it shimmied up the Ohio. Despite the warm air, she shivered. Abe would look for her as certain as the glistening blades of the paddlewheel churned the muddied water. When a man loses his greatest possession, he himself becomes possessed."As you can see the narrative is told with the perfect amount of description, telling 'n showing, information, and poetism. This does not read like a first-time author.The heroine is spunky and strong. She fends off attackers, helps others in need, opens a printing press despite the men of the town and vandals hindering her at every step. She has to lie to protect herself, but feels guilty about it. She has a strong conscience. Even when love is just within her grasp, she turns it away, rather than dishonor the rules she's been taught to live by. After all, she's still technically married.The book throws an incredible amount of harshness at this woman, but it fit with the times back then. Women didn't have it easy. People didn't have the healthcare they have now. So it's not implausible, the things that occur. She arrives in the town to find her cousin is dead, but this leads to her just standing taller, stronger."Why is it always men against women? Is there some secret society where all men get together and plan how to keep women in "their place"--that is to say the place men decide is proper for them?"LOVED this heroine. Loved the hero too. He's a perfect blend of alpha and nice guy. He wants to protect the woman, but at the same time, respects her enough to let her protect herself. Only when absolutely necessary, does he swoop in.My only quibble: For such a smart woman, Eliza is a bit dumb in one aspect. I mean, after a horrid man tells her "your husband is on his way," she thinks she may be safe? Did she really think going to her cousin's and merely changing her last name to another similar one would be enough? I mean, really, her cousin's? Like her husband wouldn't think of that?Something else I want to mention that I loved: the history about the German immigrants. This really appealed to me and showed me the author did her homework. My grandfather was a German immigrant to Minnesota, so this had a great deal of truth and appeal to me though it was a small part of the town life.