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BOOK REVIEW: Beauty For Ashes
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by Vickie McDonough Dancing Word Reviewer
Title: Beauty for Ashes Author: Dorothy Clark Publisher: Steeple Hill ISBN: 0-8423-8119-8 Genre: Inspirational/Women's Fiction
After being burnt twice in love, Justin Randolph wants a wife in name only. Having a wife will get the fortune hunters off his back and supply a mother for his two young children. Still, he can't help wondering what kind of a woman would marry a total stranger.
Elizabeth Frazier is frantic to escape her forced marriage to the cruel Reginald Burton-Smythe. As the daughter of a wealthy man, she's known physical comfort, but has never known love. In fact, she doesn't believe love is possible between a man and woman. Desperate, she sneaks away and runs off, and before the night is over, ends up in a marriage of convenience to a complete stranger.
From the start, Justin senses his wife isn't telling him the truth. Though attracted to Elizabeth's beauty and seeming innocence, Justin shields his heart, especially when his wife swoons and he is given surprising news from a doctor. Still, the more Justin gets to know Elizabeth, the harder it is to believe she's the woman he's imagined her to be ΜΆ a liar and one who married only for the large pay-off she received from him.
Just when he's reconciled himself to loving Elizabeth, all his fears come true. Is Elizabeth a charlatan or truly a victim of circumstances?
I've read Beauty for Ashes twice now and have to say I loved it every bit as much the second time as the first. For a new writer, Dorothy Clark does an amazing job by creating fabulous, gut-wrenching conflict between Justin and Elizabeth. Your emotions will take a roller coaster ride of thrilling highs and tear-jerk lows. Take a handsome, hurting hero, a beautiful endangered heroine, and throw in two motherless babes, and you have a story that will win your heart.
In 1820s Philadelphia, a marriage of convenience was a scandalous thing. Justin prefers scandal to risking his heart again-the only problem is, God has other ideas. A story of true romance, of rekindling faith, and thrilling twists, Beauty for Ashes, one of Steeple Hill's new Women's Fiction line, is a must-read.
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