Skip to main content
PBS logo
 
 

Book Review of This Side of Heaven

This Side of Heaven
This Side of Heaven
Author: Karen Robards
Genre: Romance
Book Type: Paperback
jjares avatar reviewed on + 3413 more book reviews


When her father dies, Caroline Wetherby sets out for the New World to live with her older sister and husband. However, Caroline used a worthless bit of jewelry for her passage and the captain went to Caroline's brother-in-law, Matt Mathieson for the money. Otherwise, she would have to be indentured to pay off the cost of the trip. Reluctantly, Matt pays it because his wife died two years before and he, his sons and his brothers have lived rather slovenly since then.

Thinking that Caroline was as bad as her sister, the boys and men did not warm up to her quickly. Caroline, however, is in the dark about what was wrong -- and why everyone disliked and avoided her sister.

I've never read anything by this author before and at the start the book was interesting. The author seemed to have a good grasp of colonial times and attitudes.

This book could have been condensed by 100 pages easily. This story seemed to meander a bit until the last 15 pages (or so). Then it ended rather abruptly. Other than sharing the speech patterns and attitudes of colonists, there was nothing special about this story.