Customer Reviews

A Bride in the Bargain

5 star:		(49)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

What a sweet little book this is. No really. Throughout the book I kept thinking to myself, "oh, how sweet." Surprisingly enough this didn't make me roll my eyes and toss the book over my shoulder. You see, to me sweet usually means blah, or boring, or possibly a diabetic coma, but not this time. What saves it from being too good to be true is the author's attention to historical detail. She doesn't pretty it up a whole lot which makes the secondary cast of characters much more human, therefore much more interesting.

I loved the use of Mercer's Girls to drive the story forward, but it's only the catalyst for the meaty part of the book. This is a true love story; love of self, friends, land, career, children and spouse. The only thing that bothered me about this book is that the hero and heroine are a bit unbelievable. Both are a little too good to be true and carry enough guilt to fell a horse. Anna's feelings of responsibility for her deceased family rang especially untrue and I wish the author had resolved the issue much sooner than she did.

I can't say this is the best book I've ever read or that I want to tell all my friends to run right out and buy it, but it's a solid read. I found it to be an enjoyable and comfortable book. And since my interests tend toward action, excitement and steamy love scenes, that's saying something.

Orphaned and jobless, Anna answers an ad in a New York newspaper. The ad is searching for "domestics, nannies, or teachers" to come out west to work in the Northwest territory. She is told she will be cooking for a lumberjack camp near Seattle. Little does she know that the lumberjack camp owner has actually sent for a wife, and is expecting one when she steps off the boat.

Set mostly in rural Seattle in the 1860s, A Bride in the Bargain is a gentle and quick read. The plot is a bit predictable, but still interesting if you like this sort of book. I would recommend it for fans of the historical fiction/romance genre.

If you enjoy Deeanne's book then you will again feel this is another excellent book! It is written when Seattle, WA was just a Territory and the main character comes West thinking she is going to be just a cook. This is complicated by the fact that she has had her passage paid for by a man who thinks he has a "bride" coming for him. He NEEDS this bride to keep his acreage and his lumbermill that he has worked YEARS for ... then to complicate matters, of course, he ends up falling in love with her. I enjoyed this book ... and where is was not a deep book it was a fun book to read ... sometimes it is nice to read a lightheartbook that one just enjoys to read for no reason at all except to enjoy and this book is one of those! Deeanne's books often are this type of book ... they aren't deep but they give you a good feeling and are easy to read and enjoyable with good characters!

The worst thing I can say about A Bride in the Bargain is it's over.
You know what I mean. You pick up a book and scan the first page. It interests you enough to read the second. And the third. Pretty soon, you're skipping lunch and the laundry piles up. You can't seem to put it down.
The heroine, Anna Ivey, is someone you get to know and care about. She's desperate. Her father and her brother were killed in the War Between the States, and her mother died of a broken heart. Anna blames herself.
In the south, we tend to view our own war aftermath of destruction as catastrophic, and it was. But in December of 1865, people in Massachusetts were also destitute. Wives and children of soldiers who would never return were starving and begging in the streets.
Anna found employment as a cook in a boarding house. Unfortunately, the job came with an employer, and she was forced to run for her life or at least her virtue. She makes a deal to travel to Seattle for employment. The procurer swears Joe Denton needs a cook for his logging company, and he will pay her passage.
Sounds good, right? A classic win-win solution. Well, no, not quite. Joe Denton believes he's getting a bride.
What will happen when they meet? Now you're hooked. You swear you'll read just one more page.
I'll tell you just this much without revealing too much of the plot. When Joe picks her up at the dock, he's delighted. The girl's a beauty, and he drives her directly to the church. Although he wasn't particularly interested in a purchased wife, he needs one to hold onto his land. A bachelor could receive 320 acres, but a married man would get 640 acres of prime timber land. Since he is unable to prove he had been married when he claimed the 640 acres and is now widowed, the judge has given him a deadline to produce a wife.
Even though the attraction is there and growing between these two strong characters, their problems are insurmountable. Anna believes she is sudden death to anyone she loves; everyone in her family told her so just before they died. As she slowly begins to realize this is untrue and she gives the power of life and death back to God, she still resists Joe's proposal. Believing he only wants her to marry him to keep his land, she refuses.
Joe will have to find a way to convince her he wants her for herself. He must love her more than the land.
Plan to send out for pizza and forget the laundry. You won't put this book down until the last page and then you'll cry because it's over.

I am a Christian, but I have a hard time really getting into Christian based novels. They usually are pretty corny and not well written. HOWEVER, I really enjoyed this book! I found myself laughing a lot at the lovable characters. But I do agree with some of the other reviews, and it was quite predictable from the beginning. One thing I found surprising, is the level of sexuality in the book. I have made it through several Christian romance novels, but this one was the most sexual by far. Don't get me wrong, I had no problem with the level of sexuality, I just found it surprising. And when you read it, please count how man times the line "talk with our hands" is used. I noticed about halfway through the book that that line is used A LOT. Almost to the point it is annoying.

But all in all, like I said, I liked this book. It was surprisingly good for the genre. I may look into more of her books now.

DeeAnne Gist weaves a touching tale about mail order brides in her novel "A Bride in the Bargain". I wish American history were this enjoyable to learn while I was in school, because this author has researched her subject matter impeccably and taught me a lot with her wonderful books. This story follows Joe Danton, the owner of a Washington state logging camp. He is in a serious predicament: he accepted a land grant to settle in the Seattle area, but his wife died before joining him in Washington, so he is now only entitled to keep half of the land. Unfortunately, he has put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into his land to make it a successful logging community. He must marry or lose his land and his business. He doesn't want a wife - he loves his land. But he pays his money for a bride.

Anne Ivey is a destitute orphan from Massachusetts. She escapes her horrid existence by contracting to become a cook for a man in Washington state, feeding the lumberjacks in his logging camp. Anne figures it won't be too hard since she is used to cooking for so many people in her current "job". This is the perfect opportunity. She wants to make her own way in the world. She has no desire to marry since everyone she loves seems to die on her. She undertakes the long journey only to find that she has been purchased as a mail order bride. Then the sparks begin to fly.

This is an incredibly written story that grabbed my attention with the beautiful cover (your daughter is lovely, DeeAnne!), and captured my heart from the first page as I digested the plight of the brawny lumberjack. (Did you have the "Brawny" paper towel guy in mind for this character, DeeAnne?) The story will make you laugh out loud. It will make you tear up. It may even make you stop reading, glance wistfully at the clouds and imagine what it would be like to be one of these women who left positions of poverty in the east with the hopes of being taken care of by a non-violent man or given the chance to care for themselves in the west. This is one historical romance that you don't want to miss!

A Bride in the Bargain is a pleasant surprise---not to mention a fun, fast-paced read!

Joe Denton is a landowner in the sprawling Washington Territory who needs to prove he has a wife in order to maintain his vast acreage. Joe had a wife but, unfortunately, she perished before she reached Seattle . Joe, a lumberjack, has acres of trees and men relying on him. The last thing Joe wants to do is sacrifice is land for nothing worse than a misplaced death certificate.

When Asa Mercer advertises the soon arrival of a boat full of Western girls of his picking, Denton is skeptical. Unlike his fellow countrymen, Joe reads disaster in fresh brides plucked from their home soil and transplanted to a territory in desperate need of women.

When the local judge gives him a deadline: get a bride or lose the land, Denton signs up with Mercer and forks over a wad of hard-earned money.

To the West, Anna Ivey is still mourning losses from the Civil War: her brother and her father perished in battle while her mother died of a broken heart. Orphaned and desperate to evade the unwanted advances of her employer, Anna signs up with Mercer who lies and confirms her services as a cook are all that are required.

After a treacherous sea voyage, Anna arrives in Seattle . Joe is expecting her as his bride, Anna is expecting employment. At this cross-purpose, they forge a spicy and sparkling friendship. Anna cooks for his troop of lumberjacks and Joe falls stealthily in love with her.

I read it in one afternoon in a chaise lounge.

I really feel that Gist has found her style here. Where her earlier work seemed to embarrassingly strain at making a statement, Gist seems to recognize that she is best suited in the historical-chicklit; rom/com classification. Her ephemera ( marriage announcements; advertisements for Mercer's brides) is well-placed and not over-bearing; her Christianity is kept subtle and classy and her characters are full-bodied and pretty darned adorable .



This fun, sparkly novel has oodles to offer readers looking for the perfect mid-summer escape.

This book was not the first I had read by Deeanne Gist, but it is, by far, my favorite. And the favorite of all my friends with whom I shared it. And all the friends they also passed it on to.
A Bride in the Bargain has spunky characters and a gorgeous setting. And lumberjacks. What more could you ask for. Set in Washington state, the main character, Anna finds herself in the precarious position of marrying Joe Denton with few other options, none of them good. By the end of the book, I wished I was in the story and could meet Joe Denton myself.
I have always enjoyed Gist's abality to write Christian fiction without loosing the "real-ness" of her characters. I find that many Christian romance novels lose some of the human qualities in their character- desire, anger, etc. This book, as well as her others, captures the real feelings of real people without compromising a Christian faith or becoming overly "preachy". She also spends time researching the time and places she puts her characters bringing another layer of believability to her stories.

What a amazing romance. It has humor, passion and everything you could want in a clean romance. I loved the characters and how they interacted with each other and the humor Deeanne brings into her novels makes me laugh out loud. I'ver read some of the bad reviews on this book and I couldn't disagree more. But just look at the numbers. As of this review over 80 loved it and only 10 didn't. Decide for yourself but IMO it's a sweet romance and I look forward to reading it again someday.

I really wish there were more Christian books out there like this one. It was lite and fun, like candy for my mind. I really appreciated how she kept her characters real. She also did a great job making the chemistry between Joe and Anna feel realistic and not cheesy. You knew what was going to happen in the end but it was nice to see the characters develop and change. Thank you Deeanne Gist for writing great Christian fiction!