Carolina Rose (Zebra Splendor Historical Romances). This item is unavailable.Carolina Rose (Zebra Splendor Historical Romances)

A young woman who challenges the restrictive conventions of 1850 South Carolina, Charlie Whitney is struggling to make a success of her father's newspaper, a job that becomes further complicated by the arrival of Adam Chase, a big-city editor from Richmond. Original.

Charlotte (Charlie) Whitney is trying to survive being a woman who is orphaned and "still a spinster at twenty-four" in South Carolina. She is not overly pleased to be a spinster but she isn't prepared to give up her independent and non-traditional way of life either. Charlie's father had owned the local paper, the Sentinel, and when he died Oliver Stokes bought the paper, causing Charlie to lose the two things that mattered most to her. Oliver Stokes has been buying up most of the town and has many of the town folks, including Charlie, hating him for it. Enter Adam Jared Chase, an employee of Stokes and the new editor of The Sentinel. Adam has Charlie's hate through his association with Stokes even though he allows her to keep working on the paper. Adam is a man filled with ghosts and demons, and prides himself on being a cold shell of a person. In a flashback he tells his father "You showed me how to be the coldest, most callous bastard I know how to be..." Both of the characters have many challenges to overcome before they can be happy together. Each begins to depend on the other for the support and strength that they need, and before they are even aware of it a spark of mutual like/lust has started. It's then that things get really interesting! Tracy Sumner's characters are not perfect and it is a refreshing change. Charlie is a nineties woman struggling in a more repressed society and Adam is a bitter, haunted man struggling with his decision to love and trust again. I enjoyed the book despite one or two slow parts. This is Tracy Sumner's first published romance and I think (hope) we're going to see more of this new author. An auspicious start for Tracy Sumner's writing career! Charlie and Adam are strong characters that the reader sympathizes with. Carolina Rose blossoms and draws the reader in! Michelle Sawyer -- Copyright © 030199 Literary Times, Inc. All rights reserved -- From Literary Times