Review: A Most Inconvenient Marriage by Regina Jennings

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How would you get out of such a predicament? Or would you?

From the back cover:

Abigail Stuart Thought She was Jeremiah Calhoun’s Widow.
But Jeremiah Calhoun Is Very Handsome, Very Alive, and Very Perplexed.
Most Inconvenient Indeed.

With few options of her own, nurse Abigail Stuart agrees to marry her patient, a gravely wounded soldier calling himself Jeremiah Calhoun. They arrange a quick ceremony before he dies, giving Abigail the rights to his Ozark farm and giving Jeremiah the peace of knowing someone will care for his ailing sister after he’s gone–a practical solution for both of them.

After the war, Abigail fulfills her side of the bargain–until the real Jeremiah Calhoun shows up, injured but definitely alive, and wastes no time in challenging Abigail’s story. Abigail is flummoxed. After months of claiming to be his widow, how can she explain that she’s never seen this Jeremiah Calhoun before? How can she convince him that she isn’t trying to steal his farm? And will she find a way to stay, even though this practical arrangement has turned into a most inconvenient marriage?

My thoughts:

What begins as a kind offer to care for the sister of her favorite patient quickly turns into a fiasco when Abigail discovers that her patient must not have been who he claimed to be. Now that she is settled into this new family and truly wants to stay and fulfill her deathbed promise to the young soldier, how does she handle the arrival of the real Jeremiah Calhoun?

Jeremiah was injured during the war and wants nothing more than to return to him farm and attempt to resume the life he had prior to the war. A life of peace, nestled in his mountain home. When he arrives, he finds not peace but confusion. A young woman living in his home has claimed for two months (to his family, neighbors, and beloved) that she married him before he died. But he has never seen her before, and he certainly hadn’t married him. How does he settle this, especially when the pretty nurse selflessly offers care to his suffering sister and overwhelmed mother?

A Most Inconvenient Marriage had me completely entertained. What a predicament! The characters were wonderful, and the messes they found themselves in were believably funny. I don’t know that I would have been as patient with the antics of the neighbor children as Abigail was, but her compassion for those around her was endearing. It was not a “quick read” as far as the actual length, but it was in the sense that I lost all track of time while I was flipping pages.

I believe this was the first novel written by Regina Jennings that I have read, but it certainly won’t be the last. A Most Inconvenient Marriage is definitely a keeper!

(I received a complimentary copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review. The thoughts expressed here are entirely my own.)