Where the Road Bends is This Summer’s Best Historical Fiction

Rachel Fordham just released a fantastic new historical fiction, and you won’t want to miss it! Here’s what Where the Road Bends is all about:

As Norah King surveys her family land in Iowa in 1880, she is acutely aware that it is all she has left, and she will do everything in her power to save it–even if that means marrying a man she hardly knows. Days before her wedding, Norah discovers an injured man on her property. Her sense of duty compels her to take him in and nurse him back to health. Little does she realize just how much this act of kindness will complicate her life and threaten the future she’s planned.

Norah’s care does more than aid Quincy Barnes’s recovery–it awakens his heart to possibilities. Penniless and homeless, he knows the most honorable thing he can do is head on down the road and leave Norah to marry her intended. But walking away from the first person to believe in him proves much harder than he imagined.

Rachel Fordham’s writing in Where the Road Bends is lyrical and memorable – but it’s her characters that will have you engrossed in the story from the very first page! There’s something about Norah that made me want to cheer her on from the very beginning, and that’s not always the case. There’s much to admire about her, though, and just as many reasons why she needs a cheerleader in her camp.

Quincy Barnes has a past, and he’s a complex character. I found myself believing in him, though, too, and I wanted to see them both survive their troubles. Fordham grabs you from the beginning and gets you completely invested in these characters!

Even though this is a historical fiction, and Fordham sets the scene well, it doesn’t take over. The actions, the feelings, and the problems are all completely relevant to today. It didn’t take long for me to be so caught up in the story that I completely forgot about the time difference.

Where the Road Bends left me pondering lots of smaller life lessons, which fit the story overall very well. You’ll be considering things like:

• When should you give a second chance?
• How desperate is desperate?
• For what – or whom – are you willing to make a stand?
• What does honesty really mean?
• How far should you go to pay a non-monetary debt?
• What does forgiveness – and redemption – really look like?
• Can people really change?

This is the first book by Rachel Fordham that I’ve read, and it certainly won’t be my last! I love the way that she puts words together in this book to make even the simplest objects sound beautiful and poetic, and I want to befriend more characters like Norah and Quincy. If outstanding writing and amazing characters make your heart beat faster, grab a copy of Where the Road Bends today.

I received a complimentary copy of this book. All opinions are my own.