Welcome To the Cedar Grove

"This is your people's way?"
"Yes."
He sighed and rolled onto his back. As I watched he closed his eyes and sighed again. Without opening his eyes, he spoke. "Sleep, Warprize."
I closed my eyes, wondering if I would ever hear my own name again. Kier and Lara: Warprize by Elizabeth Vaughan.

This book was both not quite what I expected, and exactly what I expected both at the same time. It was predictable, but even those moments were tackled in an interesting way that made you want to read on. I got this book over a year ago, and wanted to read it because of the obvious parallels: The woman of noble blood who becomes a master healer, whose healing leads her to a life changing situation was quite the draw for me, and it was hard to wait to read this book.

One of the things I liked about the book was the way the clash of cultures was approached and dealt with by the writer. It was never overstated, but since it was a central cause of conflict in the story, it was an important element and played its part perfectly.

There were points in the book where I felt myself become so emotionally invested that I almost wanted to cry, and times when I laughed out loud. There were points when the behaviour of the characters put me in mind of other people from different stories, going to show that some of the things we do for love are universal, even when that concept is almost completely alien to us. For a blatantly obvious 'romance' novel, (the author thanks her chapter of RWA), it was surprisingly engaging.

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