Blossoms

Five stories by Mary Balogh, Karen Harper, Patricia Oliver, Margaret Evans Porter, and Patricia Rice, set in England and America throughout the 19th century, full of passion and promise, scandal and heartache, these exquisite tales reveal the delicate beauty of the flowering of love. Original.

The Forbidden Daffodils - Balogh - A tale of a young woman who ran away Greta Green with a fortune-hunter and was caught and returned to her family by a suitor; not her father, nor her two brothers. This ruins her as unequivocally as running away with the first man had ruined her. She refused to marry the man - a suitor she liked very much - and is sent to live with her aunts in Wales. After five years, the man who brought her back and proposed marriage has rented the big house and wants to understand why he was rejected.

A Golden Crocus - Rice -Takes place in 1885 in Illinois. I wasn't immediately captured by the characters and tended to skim. Two cousins are discussing the letter one of them receives from her presumed suitor. She is a meek and mild maid, looking forward to nothing more than a house and husband with her letter-writing suitor. The other cousin is a lecturer for female rights This is a suitor-switching tale.

Hyacinths for Victoria - Oliver - After 7 years the heroine will attend a family gathering because she knows the once-hero will not be there. Fate decrees otherwise and she is faced with the man she jilted on the wedding day seven years ago. The question is why she jilted him.

The Apple Blossom Bower - Porter - The squire's step-daughter is the daughter of the villainous smuggler and many people assume the rest of his family is as well. Sir Edwin Page kisses her at the harvest fair but her mother warns her not to expect anything from him. Sir Edwin would like to marry the squire's step-daughter. A friend of his comes to pay a visit and attempts to squash the budding romance for reasons of his own.

Violets are Blue - Harper - Baltimore 1835. Violet's mother has recently died and someone is putting flowers on her grave. A confrontation with the man reveals an unknown part of her mother's life, of an early and a forever love with a sea captain and results in a suitor for Violet.