After all, Daphne just moved back to Natchez and is trying to get her all-female jazz and blues group off the ground. Sim is trying to wrap up the Audubon coffee table book and get another project done. Yet they keep running into their attraction for each other. Plus Daphne starts having flash backs to 1793 and the life of the ancestor she's named for. A man with Sim's name is in these flash backs, too.
Southern books are perhaps one of the toughest subgenres to write.
The reason being that the setting is not just the setting but in order to be true to the South must be a character in the story. Ms. Ware balanced her characters just right. She didn't just throw in an accent and some old houses, she brought the South to life but didn't neglect Daphne and Sim either. Daphne and Sim are the type of complex characters that readers who prefer character driven books pray for each night. When a new obstacle crops up, although they do occasionally retreat or snipe at each other, mostly they face it with grace and maturity.