Amelia The Brides of San Francisco #5
Historical Western Romance
Firehouse Publishing
August 18, 2016
266
Reviewed by: Linda Tonis
Member of the Paranormal Romance Review Team
It is 1870 and Amelia James is a famous singer in New York but fame and money is not what she wants anymore she wants a husband and family. Amelia knows that she will not find what she wants in New York where she is too well known so she visits Matchmaker & Co. and signs up to be a mail-order bride.
Amelia accepts Philip Dumont’s request, he is a wealthy man raising his sister. Amelia is thrilled to not only get a husband but to also get a child to raise but what she calls a child and what Philip considers a child are too different things since Toni is seventeen years old. Fortunately for Amelia she has a good friend Annie Markum who we met in a previous book in this series, Annie is now Annie Cartwright since she married and fell in love with her new husband.
Amelia does not believe in love since her mother is going on her ninth husband. Her father died when whe was young so she assumes her mother loved him and hasn’t been able to find another man to love. Her mother is a very well known actress and not happy that her daughter wants to give up her career but accepts what Amelia wants.
Amelia and Toni get along famously each happy to have a sister and Amelia pushes Philip into accepting that Toni is a young woman and no longer a child. Her first order of business to is take Toni for a new wardrobe. Although Amelia doesn’t believe she will ever be in love her sex life with Philip is better than she could ever have expected and before long her doubt about love is being challenged.
Philip is also a man who doesn’t believe in love and has a hatred for singers. His mother left him at the age of eighteen to care for all his siblings so she could pursue a career in music. Amelia has no choice but to keep her talent to herself for fear of losing her husband. She is convinced that if he knew he would have no doubt that she would leave him just like his mother did.
Amelia is settling into her new life but someone enters their peaceful existence. Thomas Hardy was Philip’s partner is a gold mine a gold mine that Thomas wanted no part of since it required too much work so he sold his half. Philip and his brothers worked the mine and hit the mother lode so of course Thomas now wants his share and the bill of sale destroyed. His plans involve Amelia and Toni the two people that he is convinced Philip will do anything to save.
This is a wonderful story and I loved it every bit as much as the first four. We are reunited with some of the previous mail-order brides and find out what is going on in their lives. Unlike some of the other books Amelia is independently wealthy and gave up a successful career but will she get the love she begins to desire? I can’t wait for more in this series.