A Hope Undaunted by Julie Lessman (review)

Product Description
The 1920s are drawing to a close, and feisty Katie O'Connor is the epitome of the new woman--smart and sassy with goals for her future that include the perfect husband and a challenging career in law. Her boyfriend Jack fits all of her criteria for a husband--good-looking, well-connected, wealthy, and head-over-heels in love with her. But when she is forced to spend the summer of 1929 with Cluny McGee, the bane of her childhood existence, Katie comes face to face with a choice. Will she follow her well-laid plans to marry Jack? Or will she fall for the man she swore to despise forever? A Hope Undaunted is the engrossing first book in the WINDS OF CHANGE series from popular author Julie Lessman. Readers will thrill at the highly charged romance in this passionate story.
My review:
I have never read anything written by Julie Lessman before and I am totally blown away by her ability to draw us into a novel making us feel as if we know the characters personally. The authors writing style captures your attention from the beginning with a story that flows so easily that your totally engrossed and unable to stop reading till the conclusion.

The roaring twenties are coming to an end and Katie O'Connor knows exactly what she is going to do with her life. She is fresh out of high school, and has plans on going to law school in the fall, she wants to become self sufficient, answering to no one, well except her dad that is, because he is the key, she wont be able to attend law school unless he pays for it.

She also has a boyfriend that will be the perfect husband, Jack, he is handsome, well connected, has money everything she could want. Life should be great, right? Well except for the fact that her dad is tired of Katie not obeying curfew, so when he decides to ground her for the summer, and volunteers her to work for the Children's Aide Society. To make matters worse a childhood adversary, Cluny "Luke" McGee will be her boss.

Sparks literally fly between Katie and Luke, and even when it becomes clear that Katie may need to change her well laid plans she is to stubborn to realize it.

I must say that in the beginning I really didn't like Katie very well, she seemed like a spoiled girl to me, but once I got a bit of her background, I saw her in a much different light, and really could understand where she was coming from, and I enjoyed the fact that she was such a strong character, knowing what she wanted.
I really enjoyed how Katie's family was included in this story, the secondary characters were very grounded and their faith in God really shined thru.

I loved reading Katie's story and have fallen in love with the O'Connor family. I can't wait to read the next book in this exciting series !

About the author:

Julie Lessman is an award-winning author whose tagline of “Passion With a Purpose” underscores her white-hot passion for both God and romance. Winner of the 2009 ACFW Debut Author of the Year and 2009 Holt Medallion Awards of Merit for Best First Book and Long Inspirational, Julie is also the recipient of 13 Romance Writers of America awards. She resides in Missouri with her husband and their golden retriever and is the author of The Daughters of Boston series, which includes A Passion Most Pure, A Passion Redeemed, and A Passion Denied.






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This book was provided by Revell Publishing in return for an honest review.

"Available September 2010 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group."