Truly loved the world-building Tosca Lee creates in her books. This one is stellar. One of the striking experiences is how Havah‘s story parallels every woman‘s desire to leave a beautiful legacy and yet she feels like and sees all her failures. She lives through her own mistakes and sees how those choices affect the generations that follow her. Both heartbreaking and a call to live so my own children‘s children have a positive result.

Tessa has such a rich knowledge of history and setting. She captured me from the opening scene. Beautiful story that swept me into it and held me long past the last page.

I‘m reading this one for research, genealogy, and pure fascination. I do wish the historical stories of battles and anecdotes were more revealing and less scholarly. Hmm... looks like a few I‘d like to fictionalize.