The Violets of March

This was such a touching story and it really tugged at my heart. I usually don't like to read romance type stories but this one was not the typical romance. It starts with a young woman finding out her husband is leaving her for another woman. Emily, who is a writer, ends up going to stay with her great aunt for a month. She planned to spend some time there to heal and maybe write. Instead of writing she ends of reading. In the guest room at her aunts room she finds a red velvet diary and she can't resist reading it. On excursions with her aunt she meets people from the past and her memory of them begins to awaken. She learns some details about the story she is reading and begins to wonder if the story is actually true and if the people in it are closer to her than she thinks.

Books like this make me so mad. The entire plot is based on the fact that nobody will tell the heroine the truth about a diary she has found. The heroine's grandmother and others in the book know all of the plot's secrets, but when the heroine asks them directly, she is told repeatedly “this is your journey,” “you'll find the answers in time,” “it's not my story to tell,” etc. So she (very slowly) reads the diary so that the book will last for 300 pages.

Also, after learning how people in the past made devastating choices after jumping to conclusions, she does the exact same thing with the man she allegedly loves. Although there is so little interaction between the two characters and so little chemistry that it's hard to have any investment in their romance.

A frustrating and unsatisfying read.