Valancy is on the verge of being an old maid - the rest of her life is stretching out in front of her as lonely and painfully boring as its been so far. Living with her overbearing and obnoxious family is bad enough, but when a startling letter arrives, Valancy knows that she must change her own stars. If she is ever going to live in the Blue Castle of her imagination, she's going to have to take matters into her own hands.
And so she does.
And I'm not going to tell you how but it was delightful to find out all on my own. Oh, this was fun - watching Valancy morph from dutiful and dull daughter and niece to a snarky young woman speaking her mind and following her dreams. It's both romantic and woodsy, a love song to the Canadian wilderness and to people living the lives they choose instead of what's been chosen for them. Yes, sometimes the descriptions of the wilds got super wordy and there had to be some skimming, that's the only reason I'm giving it 4.5 stars instead of 5. Otherwise, there were not one but TWO fun plot twists (although they were thrown at me right in succession a little quickly) and the romantic climax is quite dreamy. The writing is solid, I underlined way more in this book than I have in anything I've read in recent memory - L. M. has a way with WORDS, I tell you. I couldn't stop smiling for Valancy after I'd finished it.
No, it didn't change my life but it sure made me happy. I wish there was a movie to watch, I'd go watch it right now.
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