Silk: Caroline’s Story is the first installment in a trilogy set in post-Reconstruction South Carolina. This first novel centers on Caroline Corbett, a sanguine southern belle. At the story’s beginning, Caroline suffers from a lack of romantic success. So, at her uncle’s request, she moves to his plantation. She had dual purposes: to work in a clothing factory and find herself an acceptable husband. Shortly, she meets two handsome men, Dr. Stephen Conner and Clayton Bell. Quickly, Caroline is swept up in romances with both men. Dr. Conner is handsome and well-off, while Clayton Bell is a sharecropper, followed by his lovesick little cousin, Jessie.

From the opening pages, author Sophia Alexander takes readers back in time to experience what life is like for women as society is just beginning to accept them as more than homemakers. There is a romance story in this exceptional novel. However, the portrayal of how different life was for women drew me in and kept me. Jessie is a young girl in this story and clings to the old ways, wanting a simple life with the man she has decided is the only one for her. A time when marrying your cousin was not considered strange or inappropriate. Caroline is a dreamer, full of passion and the desire to be different from the elderly women in her life, wanting more than just a suitable husband for her future.

Sophia’s character development as the two leading women is what gives this novel its life. Readers will feel as if they know Jessie and Caroline intimately, though, with Jessie, they may also be afraid of her. Her twisted and dark reasoning to achieve the things she feels she deserves in life is genuinely terrifying at times. It is as much a psychological thriller as a historical romance following these characters.

Dr. Conner and Clayton Bell are prime examples of the class differences in the Carolinas. Both bring something different to the story, and readers will be torn between who is the favorite and who should end up with Caroline. It is a whirlwind following the three of them and watching Jessie maneuvering in the background to make things go as she wants.

The novel’s pacing keeps readers engaged. There is never a dull moment in the plot. The descriptions are vivid, and you feel like you are there in the old south, experiencing the changes in the society as they happen.

Silk: Caroline’s Story is an emotionally charged historical romance that gives readers a complex love story from multiple points of view and a riveting plot that takes this novel beyond the genre of romance.

Pages: 362 | ASIN: B095CVP3G7