The Inconvenient Marriage of Charlotte Beck Review

What's up with book reviews all of a sudden? Good question...and one I shall answer.

I was contacted via email [I have no idea how this person found me] to see if I would be interested in doing reviews of books from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group. Free books and I get to decide which books from the book list provided? Um, yeah. And, I am not require to give a positive review if the book doesn't 'float my boat'. This is the third book from the program and I'm loving it so far. If you'd like to check into this program, go here.

Now...on to the review.

The latest book I chose was The Inconvenient Marriage of Charlotte Beck by Kathleen Y'Barbo. It is a fun book. Although it didn't make me laugh out loud like some other books I've read, I found myself smiling at Charlotte antics. Her Grandfather had a few one liners as well.

Charlotte is anything but a conventional woman of the late 1800s. She reminds me of our one year old puppy--always getting into mischief. Charlotte wants to go to college and study business so she can work for the family business. Her step-mother tries to tame Charlotte through etiquette classes. Her father wants her married.

The Beck family, from the west, and the Hambly family, from England, have a long history of not getting along. And lo and behold, the two families are at the same social event when the mischievous Charlotte climbs out of a window and Alex Hambly needs to rescue her. Thus, Charlotte and Alex's lives are turned upside down...literally.

Y'Barbo does a great job of weaving a plot. However, there were times I was confused as other characters came in and out of the story. Then, I discovered this is the third and final book in a series. That would account for the characters comings and goings. Because of this, I got a little frustrated. I thought perhaps I missed something as I was reading.

Early in the story, Charlotte's biological mothers is brought up. The reader is lead to believe this theme will flow throughout the story. It didn't until toward the end chapters. I was a little disappointed.

The dislike/romance between main characters Charlotte and Alex is fabulous. And, the ending is not to disappoint.

Even though I became confused and frustrated with figuring out who was who and why they were mentioned, I give this book three and a half out of five stars. I believe if you start the series at the beginning, The Confidential Life of Eugenia Cooper, and Anna Finch and the Hired Gun, you won't be disappointed and may give this book a higher rating than I.

“I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review”