Review: Bellewether

Bellewether
Rating: 4/5
Buy or Borrow: Buy
Source: Copy courtesy of the publisher! 

It's late summer, war is raging, and families are torn apart by divided loyalties and deadly secrets. In this complex and dangerous time, a young French Canadian lieutenant is captured and billeted with a Long Island family, an unwilling and unwelcome guest. As he begins to pitch in with the never-ending household tasks and farm chores, Jean-Philippe de Sabran finds himself drawn to the daughter of the house. Slowly, Lydia Wilde comes to lean on Jean-Philippe, true soldier and gentleman, until their lives become inextricably intertwined. Legend has it that the forbidden love between Jean-Philippe and Lydia ended tragically, but centuries later, the clues they left behind slowly unveil the true story. 

I'm sure you guys are well aware that this book sounds riiiight up my street! History and ghosts...I'm all over it. I freely admit, right here, that I was not aware of The Seven Years War, or it's something I've heard of briefly in passing but didn't know anything much about. I was excited to learn more about it and this book certainly does a good job! 

The opening is intriguing and rumour filled, detailing the history of the Wilde family and the rumours around Jacob Wilde, the man who built the house, before we hear about the alleged ghost. I liked getting all of this background information to the family, it started to paint a picture before we delved in to the actual story. 

We have three POV's, Charley in the present and Lydia and Jean-Philippe in 1759. Charley is restoring the house to turn it in to a museum, and set it up how it used to look. She's also trying to piece together what happened with Lydia and Jean-Philippe after she becomes aware of the story and finds evidence that Jean-Philippe was actually there. Lydia is the daughter of the house, obviously, and Jean-Philippe is the Lieutenant sent to live at her house after being captured in the war, he can't speak English, but I admired his determination to try. As well as the fact instead of sulking like the other officer with him, he attempted to help out and fit in with the family as best he could. I don't really have much to say about Lydia to be honest. 

I really liked the way we switched between the POV's, a lot of the time they where connected, for instance the first time it was a part to start raining in Jean-Philippe's POV and it had started in Charley's. Sails connect another POV change, it was very nicely done. 

The writing was brilliant, it lures you in with the basic story and then builds it up through the different POVs. The modern one lends clues to what happened or is going to happen. Lydia and Jean-Philippe's builds up the situation, the circumstances starting from when Jean-Philippe arrives, and filling in all of the details. The history weaves throughout providing plenty of information on the time period, as well as on the story. Seeing as I didn't know about this particular war, I was particularly intrigued about the details of it. 

One thing that did surprise me was the ghost. Honestly I thought the ghost was just going to be a story with nothing much to it. But it would appear the ghost actually does exist and it was trying to help Charley. I enjoyed how it was portrayed, it was very Most Haunted but also realistic, no white spectre, or see through actual version of the person. Just paintings being turned round, and white lights. 

I liked how the different times showed you what it's like delving in to history. You see in the past what actually happened, and then you see Charley in the present attempting to piece things together but not getting the whole story. Like when you try to use Ancestry to do your family tree, you see who lived when and died when and married when, and how they where related, but you don't get all the details. You don't get how the people felt, or all the intricate details and this book really shows that, especially as Charley was off the mark a couple of times. 

There where a lot of really nice connections between the past characters and the present characters. You could see who was descended from who, and how history repeated itself in some cases like Charley's father and Pierre. Another nice touch! Honestly, I actually talked to myself a lot while I was reading this one as I tried to puzzle things out. 

I found Bellewether to be a brilliant read, it was totally engrossing for me and it pulled me in and I loved the way history was woven throughout the book instead of textbook style shoved in. There where a couple of parts that did drag a little bit, but overall I really enjoyed it, and I loved the ending and how everything came together!