The Past and Present Collide

Lady in Waiting by Susan Meissner  

From the Publisher…

••••Love is a choice you make every day.••••

Content in her
comfortable marriage of twenty-two years, Jane Lindsay had never
expected to watch her husband,  rad, pack his belongings and walk out
the door of their Manhattan home. But when it happens, she feels
powerless to stop him and the course of events that follow Brad’s
departure.

Jane finds an old ring in a box of relics from a
British jumble sale and discovers a Latin inscription in the band along
with just one recognizable word: Jane. Feeling an instant
connection to the mysterious ring bearing her namesake, Jane begins a
journey to learn more about the ring—and perhaps about herself.

~

In
the sixteenth-century, Lucy Day becomes the dressmaker to Lady Jane
Grey, an innocent young woman whose fate seems to be controlled by a
dangerous political and religious climate, one threatening to deny her
true love and pursuit of her own interests.

As the stories of
both Janes dovetail through the journey of one ring, it becomes clear
that each woman has far more influence over her life than she once
imagined. It all comes down to the choices each makes despite the
realities they face.

From Me…

Normally I get frustrated by books with two stories, because it’s inevitable that once you are genuinely interested in one plot, the book will switch to the other storyline.  Though this happened many times during this book, I didn’t seem to mind.  Maybe this is because the author made both plots and their characters so interesting, that once the switch was made, I was glad to get to read about the other characters again.

I seriously would have given this book 5 eiffel towers, except that I felt the main character in the modern day story to be too weak.  I mean only in the way she handles the problems that she faces.  This woman feel unable to stand up for herself, even when other characters are rude, insulting and insensitive.  For instance, her son becomes upset with her about the state of his parent’s marriage.  I was completely shocked by her reaction!!!  Her husband left her, got a job hours away withough telling her, and moved out an hour after telling her he was leaving.  Worse than that, he tells her later that he left her because he was  falling in love with another woman.  Add that to the fact that it was the other woman who prevented their relationship from becoming an affair.  Now after finding this out, she doesn’t get mad at her husband (she just cries), then when her son finds out, he has no words of comfort for his mother,  He seems to still blame her.  I just can’t understand her reactions to the people in her life.  If you read this book, maybe we can discuss how you interpreted her actions.

Overall, the stories were really good, plus the historical aspect was informational and entertaining!  So glad that I received this book to review.  I really enjoyed it, and I hope others will read it!!! I definitely recommend it!