Beyond All Measure By Dorothy Love

I received this book from Booksneeze.com for free for my honest opinion of the book.

Book Description
Unless she can trust God's love to cast out her fears, Ada may lose the heart of a good man.

Ada Wentworth, a young Bostonian, journeys to Hickory Ridge, Tennessee, in the years following the Civil War. Alone and nearly penniless following a broken engagement, Ada accepts a position as a lady’s companion to the elderly Lillian Willis, a pillar of the community and aunt to the local lumber mill owner, Wyatt Caldwell. Ada intends to use her millinery skills to establish a hat shop and secure her future.

Haunted by unanswered questions from her life in Boston, Ada is most drawn to two townsfolk: Wyatt, a Texan with big plans of his own, and Sophie, a mulatto girl who resides at the Hickory Ridge orphanage. Ada's friendship with Sophia attracts the attention of a group of locals seeking to displace the residents of Two Creeks, a "colored" settlement on the edge of town. As tensions rise, Ada is threatened but refuses to abandon her plan to help the girl.

When Lillian dies, Ada is left without employment or a place to call home. And since Wyatt’s primary purpose for staying in Hickory Ridge was to watch over his aunt, he can now pursue his dream of owning Longhorns in his home state of Texas.

With their feelings for each other growing, Ada must decide whether she can trust God with her future and Wyatt with her heart.

Beyond All Measure is Dorothy Love is her debut novel and it is a winner in my opinion. It takes place in Hickory Ridge, Tn after the Civil War with the South still in unrest. Ada Wentworth lives in Boston, lost her family and means to support herself and she answers an ad to take care of an elderly woman, Lillian, in Hickory Ridge, TN. So Ada makes the trip and finds that things aren't exactly how she was told they would be. Her employer Wyatt Caldwell is the nephew of the woman she will care for. Ada and Wyatt seem to have love at first sight. But Ada had her heart-broken in Boston and doesn't want to do that again. So she takes this job so she can start her own business making hat. Ada and Lillian experience scary encounters with Klan activity not far from Lillian's home, a mixed orphan comes into Ada's life which causes a lot of problems with the people of Hickory Ridge. This book is a beautiful story of romance and the growing for faith in God and his plan. Ms. Love's characters were very well researched and characters you can relate to. Her descriptions of the town, the activities, and the small town community were real and historically correct. Wonderful book for anyone. I look forward to reading more books from Dorothy Love.