A Love To Last Forever

Title: A LOVE TO LAST FOREVER
Author: Tracie Peterson
Publisher: Bethany House
April 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7642-0149-3
Genre: Inspirational/historical women’s fiction

Beth Gallatin is happy as long as she is settled down in one town, with her family, and hopefully marry and raise a family of her own. Her dime novels feed her fantasy, but she isn’t certain how to know what love is. After all, she has feelings for neighbor Nick Lassiter as well as railroad scout Adrian Murphy.

But when Adrian asks Beth to wait for him while he goes to report his findings about land to the train company he’s representing, Beth hesitates. They aren’t engaged. They barely know each other. Why should she put her life on hold when she isn’t sure.

Nick has had feelings for Beth since they moved to town, but he believes she is going to marry Adrian. He tries to avoid Beth, but that doesn’t work. And just when he hopes that she might find him to be more than a friend, Nick’s past catches up with him. Will this ruin his chances forever?

I read the first book in this series when it first came out and wanted to read this one to see what would happen. There is plenty of page turning drama in this book, with Rafe’s house right next door to the stage stop. And the Gallatin girls are good for both a laugh and stirring up trouble.

The characters are realistically developed, and the setting is well described. Sometimes I felt the conversations were a bit stilted, but not all the way through the book. While A LOVE TO LAST FOREVER did start a little bit slow, it didn’t continue that way, and I had to keep reading to find out what happened next. $13.99. 367 pages.