Hello everyone!
So I just got back in from doing some early Christmas shopping. Brrrr, but it's cold outside now! I wish we'd get some snow as well, for the proper holiday feeling and all, but temperatures are definitely all Christmas-y now!
I was reminded of a very intriguing book I read a while back as I was perusing through the choices in our bookstore for my family, and decided to write about it tonight. The book is titled 'An Untamed Heart', and it was written by Lauraine Snelling. Now, I initially didn't even want to read any of Mrs. Snelling's books because I had gone through Janette Oke and most of hers, and thought I'd had enough of that kind of literature for a while, but in every one of Oke's books there would be some sort of introduction to a Lauraine Snelling book, so I eventually caved. For those of you who have never heard of the author before, she has written numerous children's books, but her most famous ones are the adult fiction she created about a town in North Dakota, Blessing; it is around Blessing that several of her series circle (Red River, Return to Red River, Daughters of Blessing, Home to Blessing, Song of Blessing), and 'An Untamed Heart' was the much-anticipated prequel to them all.
Basically, the series as a whole centers around the Bjorklund family, who one by one emigrate to America from Norway in the late 19th century to find land for themselves to farm, and a better future for their children. The central personality of them all is Ingeborg, who takes the place of matriarch of the family, and later on becomes sort of a female leader to the other women of the area, as more families move in and work the earth. By the time Ingeborg's son is old enough to attend college, Blessing has grown into a well-respected town right out of the harsh prairie.
But 'An Untamed Heart' begins before all that, still in Norway: we meet with twenty-year-old Ingeborg Strand, the eldest daughter in her family, who appears to be destined for spinsterhood (according to her mother). Mrs. Strand would like nothing better than to have her daughter settled in her own home, but Ingeborg has other ideas, because none of the suitors who come a-calling seem to fit what she wants, although it's debatable she herself knows what that is at the time.
We are introduced to life in Norway mid-19th century, with everything you love about the country, mountains, fjords, blue skies and open seas - and of course the tragedy of so many young people emigrating to America to look for a better life.
Ingeborg hasn't yet given thought to that by the time summer rolls around and she and the children are taken high up into the mountains to look after the grazing cattle, and sheer the sheep for wool and produce cheese from milk. Up there, Ingeborg, being the eldest, reigns supreme - and it's up there that she saves the life of a young student from Oslo (who, despite being an avid hiker, somehow manages to get himself caught, head-down, in a narrow and rocky ravine). Ingeborg's greatest wish is to become a healer, like her mother, who is a midwife to their village, so she nurses the wounded young man back to health, and it's soon obvious (to everyone) that they've fallen in love.
They plan to wed, but since he is from a wealthy family in the city, he needs to finish his studies first - and unfortunately, during a particularly harsh winter, he gets thrown when the carriage he's travelling in turns, and drowns in the icy river.
This leaves Ingeborg devastated, and once again without purpose in life, until a man - Roald Bjorklund - comes into her life, with his young son, Thorliff. His wife had passed away recently and he needs a mother for Thorliff, as they are crossing to America. After deliberating, Ingeborg agrees to marry Roald and go with him - but if you want to know what happens later, you'll have to continue on reading with the book 'An Untamed Land'!
I'm now on the second series of Blessing, 'Return to Red River', and I'm as delighted with this as I was with the first. Normally, when series take this long, or so many of them are published, something gets lost, a character gets all confused and changes, or ... something! But Lauraine Snelling has managed to keep up with all the characters (who have now become numerous indeed!) and the narrating style is the same in this book as it was in the first. In some ways, I even enjoy it more than Janette Oke's series, maybe because these are European settlers, and they speak to me more, who knows? But I love reading about Ingeborg and her family, and all the other familes of Blessing, and about the life and hardships they face out on the American prairie. These are also religious books, with the settlers being quite strong in Catholic beliefs, but being non-Catholic myself, I can honestly say this didn't bother me in the slightest. It's written realistically, to the point, and I would say these are definitely worth reading!
Have you read any books by Lauraine Snelling?
Have a good one x
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