Strands of Bronze and Gold

"I'm kinda new to this review thing so bear with me: <br/><br/>When Sophia Petheram's father dies, she goes to live with her godfather whom she has only known through letters and gifts. <br/><br/>Her godfather is an enchanting man with lots of wealth and power. <br/><br/>As her stay with her godfather carries out she soon discovers he is not all that he seems to be and that the abbey he owns hides terrible and astonishing secrets. <br/><br/>For my un-spoiled review:<br/><br/>Rating 3.5 out of 5<br/><br/>The beginning of this book was delightful and interesting. I couldn't help smiling at the book and loving everything inside of it.<br/><br/>Towards the middle, when things finally start settling in, my excitement kinda waned. I began to put it down more often but I still found it an okay read. <br/><br/>Toward the ending, where things take a twist, I still liked it but I wasn't sure of my feelings were conflicted because of what was happening in the book or the quality of the reading. <br/><br/>All in all, though, I liked it and while it was a bit crazy, and it did kinda drag on just a bit, it was a nice read. I would recommend it to people who like fairy tale remakes and people who like historical books. <br/><br/>For my spoiled review:<br/><br/>****SPOILER ALERT****<br/><br/>So as I said, I liked the starting quite a bit. I myself was kinda charmed with Sophia's godfather and his wit and their conversations. <br/><br/>I kept wondering through the starting of he liked her, liked her. He seemed more flirtatious than father-figure to me. <br/><br/>Anyway, after a little while, I could quickly see that he was adamant about getting his way and Sophia seemed to think that was OK. I don't know. <br/><br/>Later when she finds and falls in love with the preacher(it kinda seems that it's just because he's the complete opposite of her godfather) and then got heartbroken when he said he couldn't come it seemed kinda silly to me. I guess maybe because I've never felt that way or whatever I don't know. <br/><br/>When her godfather announced that he wanted to marry her it was kinda not news to me as it seemed inevitable throughout the whole book and I really didn't understand why she would think that it was sorta out of nowhere. <br/><br/>I didn't like when her siblings came and her brother asked her to ask for more money and her sister was basically saying that she should marry him and that all her reasons for not wanting to were silly. I keep wondering though, should I have liked the book because the author so well portrayed siblings who were willing to take advantage of someone? <br/><br/>Oh, and the ghost thing: was it supposed to have an element of paranormal as well or was the main character just supposed to be able to see stuff like this? It confused me. Then when her godfather saw them too it confused me even more. <br/><br/>Now the ending wasn't really very exciting for me. When I was at an earlier part of the book I was curious about what Bluebeard's story line was as I've never heard/read the fair tail myself. So I found out that it's about a person who has a lot of wives and kills them and yes I have heard of that story. I kept wondering what I would've thought of the ending had I not decided to see what Bluebeard was about. Even though, I still thought the ending was okay and kinda gruesome too. <br/><br/>So again, I liked it and the starting was nice but the book is not exactly a favorite."