A Bride of Convenience (The Bride Ships Book #3)

A Bride of Convenience is the 3rd novel in The Bride Ships series. It can be read as a standalone, but I recommend reading this engaging series in order. I thought A Bride of Convenience was well-written with developed characters. Jody Hedlund captured the time-period and I enjoyed her descriptions of Vancouver Island. I was especially taken with the cave with the hot spring. In A Bride of Convenience, it is women who worked in the cotton mills who are on the bride ship. They have been unemployed, and food was lacking at home. Zoe Hart’s family fell apart when her mother passed. Her father took to the bottle while her sister, Meg became addicted to laudanum. Two things haunt Zoe. The loss of her sister’s baby and the reason her brother, Zeke fled England. Zoe came on the bride ship to find Zeke and set things right for him. Pastor Abe Merivale is three years into a five-year assignment in British Columbia. After his time there, he wishes to return to England to marry his sweetheart and get his own parish. Abe has plans to become a bishop. First, though, he must do well on this assignment and get the local bishop’s recommendation. Zoe is a spunky woman who is kind, caring, and compassionate. She has a natural affinity with children. Abe has the same qualities. He wants to do more than just address his parishioners’ spiritual needs. Abe has a hands-on approach. He wishes to make sure they have a good home life, food, and shelter. Abe even finds ways to keep the kids occupied during the long winter months. The Christian element is developed and integrated into the book. I liked how all the various parts of the book worked together for one complete story. It was interesting learning about headache remedies utilized. I could feel for Zoe and the pain she suffered. I could tell the author did her research for this series, and I enjoyed reading the Author’s Note at the end of the book. A Bride of Convenience has drama, suspense, family, friendship, and romance. A Bride of Convenience is a captivating tale with a neglected newborn, a bullying bishop, an immoral man, an absent brother, and a wanton woman.

A Bride of Convenience by Jody Hedlund is the third book in The Bride Ships series and definitely worth reading if you love inspirational historical romance. Jody's books captivate you with history, inspirational living and romance. This book is the perfect continuation to her wonderful Bride Ships series. Zoe Hart leaves England on a bride ship to start a new life in British Columbia and in doing so meets Pastor Abe Merivale. When they both come to care for an orphaned baby they decide that a marriage of convenience is the best possible way to provide a home for the baby, but soon come to realize that the marriage isn't what they expected at all. I'm looking forward to reading more books in this wonderful series! I was given an ARC from the author/publisher. All conclusions are mine and mine alone.

I love reading books about the bride ships, so interesting to read about the era that these actually took place. It was a time in history such as the mail order brides…….In the 1860’s several ships left England bound for Victoria, Vancouver Island. The cargo or rather passengers were young women seeking husbands in this unknown land. Except this one passenger, Zoe Hart was looking to find her brother who had fled from the accusation of a crime committed and has followed the dream of gold to this wild land. But landing and coming ashore, things begin to happen. She has a young native baby thrust into her arms by the father after his wife dies. This certainly changes all her plans and leads her to a marriage of convenience with a young, rather orthodox minister, Pastor Abraham Merivale. He is on the island awaiting the time when he can send for his fiancé back in England to come and marry him. He meets Zoe when he preached the funeral of her closest friend who dies shortly after the ship landed. He is present when the bereaved father gave the baby to her. He said he would make sure that he found a place for the babe with native friends that he was trying to win over to Christianity. Zoe stubbornly refused to give the child up even as he tried to convince her it was best for both of them. As fate would have it, during Pastor Abe lowest time, he received a letter from his fiance saying she was marrying someone else. Somehow he finds himself agreeing to marry Zoe. I loved the the character of pastor Abe, it was a marriage of convenience and he was determined to stand by his word. This is such a good story seeing how they worked together for the Lord and finding themselves falling in love. All in all, this was a great inspirational historical romance that I’d highly recommend!……..My thanks to Bethany House Publishers for a copy of this book via Net Galley. The opinions in this review are entirely my own.