Thursday, March 24, 2011

Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Book Review!

I was sent, Journey of Honor, and asked to give it a review. I LOVE doing this, as reading and writing are my favorite past times. Thank you, Tristi, for giving me the opportunity.
 
Synopsis: From the back of Journey of Honor by Jaclyn M. Hawkes:

Disowned, she came to America anyway. Attacked and left pregnant by a vicious mob, she still pressed on. Finally, in spite of being accused of theft by the vilest of her attackers, Giselle tries to remain as upbeat and uncomplaining as a prairie wildflower as she travels on to Zion.
Thoroughly disillusioned with the ugliness and cruelty of slavery in the South, Trace Grayson leaves his young medical career to go west, hoping to leave bigotry and hatred behind. He begins taking goods by teamster train to sell in the territories. However, this fourth time across, in July of 1848, he’s stuck in St. Joseph, Missouri, waiting for enough wagons to join the train so that they can leave.

Knowing that if they don’t start west soon, they’ll be caught by snow in the mountains, Trace is thrilled when the final wagon signs on. Then, when the beautiful, young Dutch girl traveling with the last wagon is falsely accused of stealing and is detained, the whole trip is jeopardized. Thrown together by circumstance, Trace and Giselle team up to begin to figure out just how to make this epic journey across a continent a success.
With a deep sense of honor and an equally strong sense of humor, together they learn to deal with everything except the one trial that neither of them can overcome.

What I thought: This book was a quick, fun read. I enjoyed the story, and the twists and turns of the romance that developed between Trace and Giselle. I would have liked a bit more development with the characters and thought it strange that the two would sleep next to one another on the trail if they were only being married in name only. The plan was to have the marriage annulled once Giselle safely reached SLC. During that time period, propriety was everything, especially to a young LDS girl. But I still got caught up in the drama of it all.

The thing that bothered me was the poor editing. I don't blame this on the author AT ALL. An editor, or the publisher, at very least, should taken more pride in perfecting the manuscript before it published.

If you want a fun, clean romance though, this is a great story of triumph.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Yes, always a problem with me, when self-publishing, and exhausted at the end of the process, it is so easy to miss a typing error. This time I have Neil Fein, and excellent editor to catch those faults, and he's contributing so much more.

Lisa said...

Hey Melissa,
It was great to meet (or re-meet you if we hooked up in the NICU) you today at the spring conference. I just posted a picture of my future home at sea at my blog. Let's stay in touch. Lisa www.fotozbylisa.blogspot.com

kbrebes said...

Hi, Melissa. I agree with you regarding the lack of edit and the lack of propriety. Good review!

Elizabeth Mueller said...

Hi! Great review! Poor editing drives me nuts since I'm a maniac at it right now. *sigh* But it sounds like a wonderful story anyway!

♥.•*¨ Elizabeth ¨*•.♥

Kim Mullican said...

Great review - and I loved that you pointed out lack of editing - but made sure to note the positive.