Maia

I found this really hard going. The happiest parts are raced through, with much of the book either overshadowed by upcoming sadness or mired in present sadness. Fortunately the bit where the author piles on the tragedy is raced through as well, but by that point my reaction was just "oh come on, enough already." The characters are cliché and stereotypes, and the men tend to be rather controlling. Which makes sense for some of them, as the bulk of the book is about a young woman in the early 1900s. It's a story within a story. It didn't work for me. The first of seven books, it ends with hints towards some unanswered questions. If someone has a blog post with the answers I'd read that but I'm not putting myself through more of this series. There are better, more rewarding books to read.