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Friday, April 23, 2010

Book Review and Giveaway: The Bridegrooms by Allison Pittman

The Bridegrooms
The Bridegrooms by Allison Pittman is a family tale set in late 1890’s Ohio.  The story revolves around elder sister Vada Allenhouse, who takes on the mothering role for her three younger sisters when their mother leaves the family for another man.  Their father, “Doc” Allenhouse, struggles with much pain with his wife’s vanishing and does his best to rear his daughters to be upstanding women.

The novel covers nine days in the lives of Vada and her sisters, mostly chronicling some abrupt turns that happen in their love lives.  Vada faces temptations and decisions regarding her long term relationship with Garrison Walker, a local musician and lawyer.  Hazel yearns to be married and is developing a long-distance relationship with a glorified pen pal.  Althea, who hasn’t spoken since the day her mother left 17 years ago, pines away for a man who remains speechless for most of the story.  Lisette, the flirtatious youngest daughter who has always had more than one boy on her trail, finally seems to be taking a firm interest in one young man. In the lives of these women, changes and decisions are made that could change things forever.

I found The Bridegrooms to be a pleasant Christian novel with four interesting love stories intertwined within the Allenhouse family.  Their lives are not cookie cutter perfect and they struggle with many of the same things that we struggle with today.  Loneliness, temptation, loss, insecurity and deception were themes that came up often.  The girls frequently turned to their relationships with God for strength and guidance.  The story ambles its way along until a pleasant conclusion.

I can’t find much to criticize in Pittman’s book.  The characters were real and recognizable, the romantic story lines were enticing yet chaste, and the fate of these characters kept me guessing.  At the same time, I find this book to be fairly unremarkable, forgettable and almost vanilla-like.  I’m not sure how I would change it, but Bridegrooms left me feeling blasé and a little bored.  It’s a pleasant enough story, but I doubt I’ll remember much of it a year from now.

Some of you may disagree with my assessment of this novel, so I’d like to offer up my copy for one of my readers to try.  It’s a quick read, and maybe your experience with it will prove to be different than mine.  If you’d like to win my copy, here’s what to do:



**CONTEST RULES**

  • Leave a comment below; this counts as your entry.
  • Entries accepted until 11:59pm on Saturday, May1st
  • Open to U.S. addresses only.
  • Make sure at least one posted comment includes your email address. If you'd rather not have your email posted here, you may contact me directly to give me that information after you've entered here.
  • I will compile the entries and the winner will be chosen by Random.org, so even one entry can make you a winner!
  • Should you win, I will contact you on Sunday the 2nd for your mailing information.  Please take measures to ensure that my email will make it past your spam filters, lest you miss my message! (CalicoCritic@gmail.com) You'll have 72 hours to respond before I pick another winner.
  • More information on the giveaway policies can be found on the Contact / Policies page.

Bonus Entries

Please make note of all your bonus entries in your comment(s).  You may post separate comments or a single large comment.  Here are your bonus entry options:
  • Follow The Calico Critic by clicking on the Google "Follow" button on my sidebar (old or new followers both get the bonus entry, just let me know you're following).
  • Follow me (@LHartness) on Twitter (Please tell me your @UserName).
  • Tweet about this book's giveaway on Twitter.com; be sure to use an URL linking back to this blog posting in your tweet. You may do this as frequently as every 8 hours between now and May 1st at 11:59pm EST.  For each tweet, please come back and post the direct URL link to that specific tweet, not just your @Username.

That's it!  Thanks for stopping by, and good luck to all the entrants!



This title was provided to me by  WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group's Blogging for Books program. No obligation other than an honest review was required.

22 comments:

  1. Thank you! Long time follower, Google and Twitter,

    Bill ;-)

    billsmith2003 (at) gmail (dot) com

    Hope you'll check out my book giveaway:
    http://drbillsbookbazaar.blogspot.com/2010/04/book-giveaway-moonlight-falls.html
    http://thehomeplaceseries.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm a new google follower.

    hewella1@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  3. This sounds really good!!

    hewella1@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks for the giveaway!

    I am a blog follower.

    I follow on Twitter. Username: Door2Wonderland.

    Kelsey
    krae991 at yahoo dot com

    ReplyDelete
  5. This book sounds interesting! I'd love to win it.

    k8thebookbuff@yahoo.com

    ReplyDelete
  6. Posted at literarylitter.blogspot.com

    Thanks :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. I would love to read this!
    I follow google friend
    I am a twitter follower @bangersis
    I tweeted http://twitter.com/bangersis/status/12776921015
    Thanks!
    email bangersis(at)msn(dot)com

    ReplyDelete
  8. i'm interested in reading this book...thanks for the chance :)

    karenk
    kmkuka at yahoo dot com

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks for the giveaway!

    I am a follower.
    Elise at caliblue7@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  10. Would appreciate being counted in for this giveaway. Thank you for hosting.

    mystica123athotmaildotcom

    ReplyDelete
  11. I would love to win this book
    Please enter me

    I follow on google

    mamat2730(at)charter(dot)net

    ReplyDelete
  12. OH this sounds like a good one. With me being from Ohio is even better.
    binthenow@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  13. I follow by google friend or whatever you call it : )
    Kathryn C

    ReplyDelete
  14. Did a tweet
    http://twitter.com/oHIoKit/status/13166921646

    ReplyDelete
  15. I follow you on Twitter @oHIoKit

    ReplyDelete
  16. Looks like an interesting book and review.
    Erin
    emmasmom0305@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  17. I follow you on twitter
    @emmasmom0305

    ReplyDelete
  18. I did a RT
    http://twitter.com/emmasmom0305/status/13168333473
    @emmasmom0305@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  19. posted again on twitter
    http://twitter.com/oHIoKit/status/13197307461

    ReplyDelete
  20. I forgot to leave me email address after i entered above..its
    allisonsattic at gmail dot com :-)

    ReplyDelete
  21. http://twitter.com/oHIoKit/status/13224498127
    Did a tweet @oHIoKit

    ReplyDelete