Sweet Everlasting

This book has me shaking my head, frustrated and annoyed. Gaffney writes well, and this kept me reading long enough to finish the book, and she does a great job depicting fully-fleshed characters. It's just that I objected very much to the heroine she created and didn't think she was matched well at all with the hero. Tyler Wilkes is a doctor, formerly one of Teddy Roosevelt’s Rough Riders and has taken up a position in rural Pennsylvania while just getting over a bout of yellow fever he'd contracted in Cuba. I really liked Ty - he didn't take himself too seriously, was something of a hero who was realistic about the horrors of war, at the same time chaffing against his upper crust mother's influence and her political ambitions for show more him. I found him very flawed and very interesting.

The girl, Carrie Wiggins, he was paired up with however, is nothing more than that - a child. Not an annoying brat or anything, just so pitifully young that there was even something a bit off and uncomfortable about the love scenes between these two. She is a back-woods, poverty-stricken country girl who lives on Dreamy Mountain with her step father. She tends to sick animals, knows the name of every flower in the forest, and is mute (at least for part of the story.) Why Carrie can't talk, her history and the subsequent plot developments, just didn't work for me and frankly didn't make much sense. It was all over the place, added to which she was such a martyr, so sweet and nice, always doing what's right. I don't understand why Ty loved her, and her love for him was the instantaneous, blind adoration of a child. It was so unbalanced, and this bothered me so much because I really liked Ty, his romance and charm. He deserved a better story, and a better match. show less

**3.5**

A sweet book set in the early 1900's centering around a mainline Philadelphia doctor who has started a practice in a small town, and the lovely mute mountain girl he befriends.

Can't recommend it highly enough. Will be re-reading it a lot. I LOVE her books. Consistently fine writing.

The heroine's mute, the hero's the town doctor. American historical. The Gaff really has a way with characters.