Outskirts Press (November 21, 2006)
This was a wonderful lighter read for me in the midst of several very intense books. There is a good amount of serious subject matter and unpleasant events for the characters yet the story as a whole is much like a typical romance plot. Despite the somewhat stock storyline Colin and Eden are anything but stock characters especially considering the setting of this novel. Colin is of the landed gentry rather high in the ranks to boot. Eden is genteel but due to family circumstances following her father’s death must employ herself somehow to keep things afloat financially. Regardless of class structures and accepted etiquette Colin becomes more attached to his sister’s new governess than the child. The governess though educated and knowledgeable of proper decorum, due to being raised in a Vicar’s household, is also very straightforward and assertive. These traits while admirable in a female especially in this day and age were in the 1800’s often considered cheeky and out of place especially from a woman in Eden’s position.

The Earl, who is also her employer, as well as Eden herself find themselves in what they think is an untenable position of caring for someone that is already attached and does not return the same level of affection. They both skirt the issue for quite some time I suppose hoping that it will work itself out without their action. When they do finally acknowledge their situation to one another and discover the real truth about the interfering liaisons will it be the end or the beginning for them? Does the Earl succumb to the truths Eden so bluntly points out in conversation both with him and with his sister Diana that he then hears from the young girl? Or will Colin continue to deny the existence of anything he can’t justify intellectually?

Questions of morals and values as well as faith seem to inevitably come spilling out from Diana in conversation with her governess. Despite her brother’s insistence that God is just the invention of human imagination that needs something to hang onto, the young girl refuses to believe his answers are accurate. As she recounts the conversations with Eden to her brother he begins baiting her into dangerous territory and the conversations become face to face rather than through the intermediary of his sister. Read this book to discover what happens between the Vicar’s daughter turned governess and a young Earl thrust into a father’s role with his own sister. Eden’s personal testimony to them both through her behavior and choices is a powerful example of being Christ’s reflection to those around us. Will this example prove powerful enough to overturn the Earl’s misplaced trust and redirect it to the proper home or will it merely alienate him even more from both the bearer of the example and its source?(ISBN#9781598008869, 248pp, $11.95)

Check out the book or purchase a copy at Barnes and Noble by clicking the bookcover and check out my interview with the author and lots of other links in Sunday’s post.