The Heiress of Winterwood by Sarah Ladd

The year is 1814; the setting, Darbury England.  Amelia Barrett is a capable woman.  She is strong-willed, determined, and keen to keep the promise she made to her friend Katherine shortly before her death: to raise the woman’s baby.  She takes the task seriously and even takes steps to secure the child’s future by proposing to its father, a sea captain named Captain Sterling.  Together, they plan to raise the baby.  However, the child goes missing and only a ransom note is left hinting at her whereabouts.  Amelia and Captain Sterling must listen to God and give up personal control in order to succeed in finding the one thing they both love the most.

As a historical fiction, The Heiress of Winterwood by Sarah Ladd caught my attention right away.  I knew from the first few pages that it was going to be a good book, and I was right.  It was a fairly easy read and kept the story clipping along at a good pace, so I read through it pretty fast.  I thought the plot was good, but it could have been a little more complex.  I was able to predict what would happen, but there were a few little twists thrown in here and there that kept me on my toes.  Overall I was pleased with the development of some characters and the consistency of some.  There were some great lessons in forgiveness and mercy shown by one of the characters towards another, and that made me happy.  The bad guy was also very well done.  I can’t say too much without giving the plot away, but in my opinion they had a good motivation that drove them.  I recommend the book to those who like historical romances.  Although I feel it didn’t have a lot of historical references aside from the time period it was set in, the author did a good enough job of convincing the reader of the setting.  It was a happy ending, but I have a sense that there will be a sequel coming in the future.  (No spoilers, I promise.)

Thanks to BookSneeze.com for providing me with a free copy of the book in exchange for my review.

A Cast of Stones by Patrick W. Carr

In the backwater village of Callowford, roustabout Errol Stone is enlisted by a church messenger arriving with urgent missives for the hermit priest in the hills.  Eager for coin, Errol agrees to what he thinks will be an easy task, but soon finds himself hunted by deadly assassins.  Forced to flee with the priest and a small band of travelers, Errol soon learns he’s joined a quest that could change the fate of his kingdom.  Protected for millennia by the heirs of the first king, the kingdom’s dynasty nears it end and the selection of the new king begins--but in secret and shadow.  As danger mounts, Errol must leave behind the stains and griefs of the past, learn to fight, and discover who is hunting him and his companions and how far they will go to stop the reading of the stones.

Phenomenal.  That is the only word I can think of to describe A Cast of Stones.  Right from the first chapter I was hooked, and it wasn’t long before danger and intrigue ran rife throughout the plotline.  There was never a boring chapter of this book.  Boring paragraphs, yes, but that was the extent of it.  Patrick Carr did an amazing job of developing his characters.  They were so real that I could live through them.  I appreciated his advanced vocabulary and sentence structures, and the plotline was so thick that I practically had to shovel my way out.  That wasn’t a bad thing however, it just means that there was so much dimension to the story that I can hardly believe it’s a first novel.  Carr included mountains of description, and it’s obvious he has developed his fantasy world to the point that the reader begins to believe it’s real.  I believe it takes a talented author to do that.

One of the things that I enjoyed most about the book was the relationship of government and church.  The kingdom of Illustra where the story takes place is very similar to a medieval style society.  They have a king, nobles, peasants, knights, and all of the Arthurian type of characteristics, while still managing to seem human.  God has a presence among the lives of those in the book, but Carr developed it in a way that wasn’t so blatant as other Christian books can be.  The relationship worked naturally within the novel, and the message was just as clear as if it was set on Earth.

I would recommend this book to anyone who loves fantasy or medieval fiction, or those who love getting wrapped up in a good story.  A Cast of Stones was quite the adventure story with hardly a dull moment, and I must say I couldn’t put it down for more than 12 hours at a time.  It is not an airplane book, as I would call it, for the characters and plot were not shallow or one sided.  They had many dimensions, and I found myself racing to untangle the plot before they could.  I won’t say anything to spoil the reading experience for anyone else, but being an author myself, I appreciate the ending.  As a reader, however, I am holding my breath waiting for the next book to come out.

Thanks to Bethany House Publishing for a free copy of the book in exchange for my review.