It takes a lot to get this busy teacher to make a moment to write a review, these days. I am reviewing on Goodreads and on the various vendors, but writing a long review, here, is something that I do not have much time to do.
In this case, it took the magic of a great Jude Deveraux novel, one that includes romance, sure, but also time travel, and a story that will, in my opinion, become as timeless and as important to the readers as was, and sill is, A Knight in Shining Armor.
What the book is about (Blurb from the publisher)
Their love refused to stay quiet, echoing across time…
When the world is brought to a standstill in the early days of a global pandemic, Etta Wilmont finds herself suddenly stranded in Kansas City. Desperate to secure a roof over her head, Etta crosses paths with Henry Logan, a lonely older man in need of a caretaker. His invitation for Etta to stay with him seems to be the solution to both their problems—and maybe the spontaneous adventure Etta’s life has been missing.
As Etta and Henry settle into a companionable living arrangement, Etta indulges in Henry’s library. The compelling historical accounts of life in the Midwest soon inspire vivid dreams of Kansas City in the 1870s, dreams in which she’s a mail-order bride, married to a handsome but guarded rancher named Maxwell Lawton.
Haunted by the story unfolding in her mind, Etta realizes her dreams of the past and the familiar faces featured within are starting to have an impact on the present, altering her current reality. Perhaps these dreams are Etta’s chance to finally claim something for herself after so much time spent caring for others. More than anything, Etta wonders if the captivating man she’s falling for while she sleeps might be real, might be out there—true love waiting to be found and which would change both their lives forever.
Brilliantly mingling past and present
Who wouldn’t want to fall asleep and wake up in a whole other time, seeing people that they know, but don’t know since they are another version of those people? This is exactly what Etta is living, on top of meeting a man who she might very well fall for. But is he also someone from her time or is he only a fancy from her dream?
On top of those meetings, and this man, Etta seems to be having some missions to accomplish in order to make things right, in one time or another. Thank fate for Henry, the historian, who can try to help her make things right when she is awake and back in 2020.
This mingling of past and present, superbly researched, makes My Heart Will Find You an absolute page-turner, one that, once started, is extremely difficult to put down, and even harder not to get completely and utterly involved in.
At one point, on her Facebook page, Jude Deveraux mentioned how emotionally involved she has been with Etta and Max’s story. In fact, if she hadn’t, the book would not have been such a compelling read. And this, her capacity to get into each of her books with the whole gamut of emotions that she conveys in each story, is one of the many reasons why her novels are what they are: fabulous, amazing, reread-worthy many times over.
For it takes more than her ever-present exceptional storytelling to make her books such great reads and rereads, and she shows it once again with this time travel story.
A new favourite hero?
Is Max Lawton my new favourite of Jude’s heroes? I don’t know, because I love a great many of them. What I do know is that I fell head over heels in bookish love with this wonderful Kansas landowner.
What’s there not to love? He is sexy as all get-out, generous, loving to those who are worthy of his love, caring towards his sister, but also of his men, and he never goes and treats Etta like a freak, when so many people would do just that.
A hero after my own heart!
Side note: Lockdown musings
Some people will complain about the fact that My Heart Will Find You begins with the start of the 2020 lockdown. However, this would be a massive injustice, for if there is no lockdown, there is no story. If there is no lockdown, Etta doesn’t meet Henry nor stay in his house, and so on.
The book simply cannot exist without the lockdown. Etta represents the hell that then happened to the extroverts, just like Henry shows the heaven that it had been for the introverts.
However, the lockdown is only the starting point of the story, and it is scarcely referenced for most of the book afterwards. In other words, My Heart Will Find You is NOT a story about the lockdown, so if that’s your reason for criticising the book, look elsewhere because such a critic is not founded.
My verdict
Watching Etta evolve throughout the book has been a pure joy, and I couldn’t help but feel for her, however she felt at the page I was at. With the great research into the past part of the story, greatly done and on point, and with a seriously swoon-worthy hero, but also with the array of amazing side characters, Jude Deveraux shows, once more, why she is one of the best in the business when it comes to romance, and one of the most versatile.
In fact, I loved My Heart Will Find You so much that I started a reread mere moments after finishing it, because I was, simply, unable to say goodbye to the characters!
I goes without saying that this book is more than worthy of
A timeless five stars!
Book info
My Heart Will Find You
Author: Jude Deveraux
Date published: 11 April, 2023
Pages: 353
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