Our story opens with the siege of Vicksburg bringing to conclusion the Civil War. Our heroine Abigail Stuart is forced to leave her Ohio home for reasons I will not disclose. Abigail moves near St. Louis, Missouri and finds employment nursing confederate prisoners at Gratiot Prison. One of her favorite patients is an arm amputee who is dying from gangrene. Because this soldier values the care and dedication of his nurse he makes an unusual proposal. He offers to marry Abigail leaving her financially secure with his farm, stock, prized horses and a family to love and be loved by. In return she is to care for his mother, ailing sister and the farm. Abigail accepts his proposal and becomes Mrs. Jeremiah Calhoun. At the death of Jeremiah, Abigail moves to his farm in the mountains of Missouri and that is when the story becomes intriguing. After two months living with the family, a soldier shows up claiming to be Jeremiah Calhoun. However it is not the man she married. So the story unfolds with Abigail struggling with remaining in a complete strangers home and unwrapping the mystery of who she married. Can she find the love and companionship that she is desiring?
The author Regina Jennings weaves in the poverty, unusual language and the colorful culture of the Ozark mountain people of the Missouri. Some of the charm is the women smoking pipes and the
slang vocabulary strange to anyone from outside of the area. The Hatfield's and McCoy's come to mind because of their distrust of anyone outside of their mountain hollow.
I enjoyed reading about the color and quirks of the local people and would recommend "A Most Inconvenient Marriage". The only negative comment that I would share is I feel sometimes the author jumps from one event to another without giving a good connection between the two events.
The opinions of this review are strictly my own of a free book that I received from Bethany Publishing House. I would give this book four stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment