His life runs like clockwork. Hers is a spontaneous adventure. But God's timing is always perfect.
Anna Olsen knows it's time to leave her sister's increasingly crowded house and start a life of her own. Following her sisters' examples, she becomes a mail-order bride, and after a short correspondence with clock maker and jeweler Edward Parker, she moves to Denver to become his wife.
Almost immediately it's painfully apparent that Anna and Edward are very different. Anna is a free spirit who would rather be painting and enjoying the company of friends than cleaning house. Edward is a consummate perfectionist who, on their wedding day, hands Anna a list of chores that need to be done around the house daily.
Can this mismatched couple see past their differences to a harmonious future? Or will their disparate passions create obstacles neither is willing to surmount?
Perfectly Matched is the third book in
The Blue Willow Brides series and it is by far the one I most enjoyed - though that's not saying much, considering I only somewhat enjoyed the first one and strongly disliked the second.
I loved how this book begins right in the middle of Anna and Edward's wedding ceremony. Immediately both characters personalities and quirks were apparent which was great. I especially loved what Edward gives Anna when he takes her to their home for the first time - it made me laugh so much!
Anna is such a sweet character! I loved her heart for caring for stray animals and to stop animals from being abused. However, several times she referred to animals as both "dumb animals" & "God's dumb creatures" which I found to be both annoying and completely opposite of the way she behaved. I think she meant that they were helpless and we needed to take care of them, but the terminology wasn't one I would have ever used - it just sounds mean.
Edward is a great character too, even though at first I wasn't to sure about him. It becomes evident how much he cares for Anna and the lengths he is willing to go to make her feel happy and loved.
There is a bit of an age discrepancy for Anna between this book and
Deeply Devoted, the first book in the series.
Deeply Devoted takes place in the spring of 1887 and Anna is fifteen. However in
Perfectly Matched, which is set fall 1888, Anna is seventeen and turns eighteen towards the end of the story (around November the same year). I personally see no way for this to work, but this is just a small issue - it took away nothing from the story except that it made me check to see if I was mistaken about her age in the other book.
One of the things I didn't care for in the book was the constant repetitive sentences. A person would say something to someone then later that someone would say nearly the exact same thing to the original person and then the original person would behave as though they had never heard/thought of it before - even though chapters before they said it! Another thing I didn't care for was how characters would say something which, to me, came across as they were angry then the other character would say something snippy back and then they would both smile at each other as if nothing bad was said to each other - and they weren't acting, they meant it. Both of these thing were very annoying to say the least!
If you enjoy reading mail-order novels, you would probably find this one to be a nice read. The books in this series can be read out of order, in my opinion, and you wouldn't miss anything and the only things spoiled for you would be who ends up with whom but that's something you can usually figure out just by reading the back cover.
***I received a complimentary copy of this book to review. I was asked to give my honest opinion of the book - which I have done.***
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“Available October 2013 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”
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