Review: Okay historical to pass the time
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 01 29, 2013
Sarah, a local girl whose father is the gamekeeper, is left alone for several weeks while her parents go to her dying grandfather's bedside.  She stumbles upon the injured Alan, Lord Mellington, and nurses him back to health.  There was a storm and she spent several days alone with him -- when the neighbors walk in on them, her reputation is in tatters.  Sarah is kicked out of her community (including by her father) and goes to Mellington Manor.  Eventually, she reunites with Lord Mellington as they develop a romance while working out who is trying to kill him.I read a lot of historical books. This one had several inaccuracies in it that bothered me (for example, Sarah's mother was referred to as "Lady Claire" as her father was a "Sir".  However, the only time that she would have kept the title of "Lady" was if she was a duke's or earl's daughter.The book did not have any grammar or typo issues. There was a LOT of telling us stuff versus giving us dialogue. My preference is for more action and dialogue versus the constant internal thoughts of the characters and descriptions of what they were doing. Also, I did NOT care for Lord Mellington's character much.  He told Sarah that he could never marry "beneath himself" and was very worried about his social standing.... even after he knew that the gossip about them was ruining her life. Maybe that was realistic of the time; however, if he really felt that way, then his flip of wanting to marry her didn't make sense.  That part of the story really bothered me.There is a Christian theme running through the novel about the evils of gossip and the redemptive power of forgiveness. Sarah's fellow churchgoers were big gossip people who kicked her out and wanted to shun her.  Her father agreed with them (I had a hard time with that; he knows his daughter and her morals and still went along with this?).  The whole aspect felt very "fake" in that it felt like a plot device to get Sarah to the point where she would move into the Manor with Lord Mellington.  I also never believed that Lord Mellington was this spiritual man who believed in forgiveness.I did make it all the way through the book without skipping around.  I wanted to know who was trying to kill Lord Mellington (I guessesd part of it correctly).  However, I'll be deleting this from my Kindle as it is not something I would reread (I reread a lot of great historical romance books like early Amanda Quick or Mary Balogh).