A Bride for Keeps
Melissa Jagears
Bethany House Publishers
October 1st 2013
Adult | Contemporary | Christian | Romance
Official Blurb -
A Tender Tale of Love on the Prairie Perfect for CBA Readers
Although Everett Cline can hardly keep up with the demands of his homestead, he won't humiliate himself by looking for a helpmate ever again--not after being jilted by three mail-order brides. When a well-meaning neighbor goes behind his back to bring yet another mail-order bride to town, he has good reason to doubt it will work, especially after getting a glimpse at the woman in question. She's the prettiest woman he's ever seen, and it's just not possible she's there to marry a simple homesteader like him.
Julia Lockwood has never been anything more than a pretty pawn for her father or a business acquisition for her former fiance. Having finally worked up the courage to leave her life in Massachusetts, she's determined to find a place where people will value her for more than her looks. Having run out of all other options, Julia resorts to a mail-order marriage in far-away Kansas.
Everett is skeptical a cultured woman like Julia could be happy in a life on the plains, while Julia, deeply wounded by a past relationship, is skittish at the idea of marriage at all. When, despite their hesitations, they agree to a marriage in name only, neither one is prepared for the feelings that soon arise to complicate their arrangement. Can two people accustomed to keeping their distance let the barricades around their hearts down long enough to fall in love?
This was probably more of a three and a half star book. It was very hard to put down and I easily neglected the house the day I read this. Probably what dropped the rating for me was that at times things felt a bit too dragged out. Sometimes I wished the characters would stop repeating the same thing and get somewhere else in the story. But it was adorable to watch the characters grow and change over the span of their new marriage. Julia was more difficult to like because she was so very set in her opinion of her value and wouldn't see any other possibility. The christian portion of the story went from non-existent to full blown by the end of the book. These characters aren't your perfect strong in the faith sort but eventually they turn in that direction.
Overall it was a cute read.
Content:
Clean
