Amanda, moves with her eccentric mother and headstrong sister to a remote area just before Christmas. They are completely unprepared for what—and who—they find in their new home.
The set-up is familiar to anyone who’s ever read Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility: a widow and her daughters must leave their ancestral home and move to a small cottage in a strange part of the country. But that’s where the similarity ends. In this story, Amanda, her eccentric mother and headstrong sister move to a remote area just before Christmas. The neighbors are not quite as genteel as the ones in Austen’s beloved tale.
Excerpt
Though he could see no flames coming from the house, smoke poured out the open front door and drifted up from the behind the building as well. The pungent aroma of burning rotten wood filled his lungs as he drew closer.
“Mary?” he called out, hoping she was out in back of the house.
There was no answer.
“Mary? Mary Puckett?”
He stopped for a moment, wondering whether to look around outside but decided to go inside before the fire grew any worse.
He saw no sign of Mary or any flames in the smoke-filled kitchen or parlor, so he charged up the stairs. Puckett may have been smoking his pipe in bed and set the straw ablaze. “Mary!” He could imagine tiny little Mary trying desperately to wake her drunken father or using all her weight to drag him from the—
His pace slowed as he realized there did not seem to be any fire upstairs. The first chamber he glanced in was empty of everything save a few trunks. And when he stepped inside the chamber next to it, he found more trunks and a young lady of uncommon beauty standing next to them with her back against the non-flaming wall, eying him warily.
“I think you must have the wrong house.” She spoke in a deliberately slow and calm voice, as if trying to soothe an excited horse. But shaking in her hands and the trepidation in her expressive gray eyes showed that she was plainly afraid of him as an unknown intruder. “There is no ‘Mary’ here, sir, so please be on your way.”
“I was looking for Mary Puckett, the girl who lives here,” he said stupidly. Obviously this striking blonde incomparable was not Mary or even vaguely related to her. The young lady’s speech, manners and dress plainly revealed gentle breeding. But why was she here? The Pucketts had lived in this old house as long as he could remember.
But now that he thought about it, Isabel had mentioned something about new tenants somewhere. If he’d realized who the new tenants would be, he would have paid more attention.
“I’m sorry, I…” He really could not think of how to apologize properly for his shocking intrusion.
When she nodded for him to leave, he immediately bowed and stepped out of the room, but despite his wish not to frighten or offend the young lady any further, he could not resist the urge to peek into the last bedchamber.
“She said to be on your way!” From behind the door came a screaming banshee wielding a handful of sticks which she used to swat him on the side of his head. The banshee couldn’t have been much more than Mary’s age but she had obviously enjoyed a healthier diet over the course of her life because she was as stout and strong as a ploughman.
“Ouch! There are thorns in—” His words were cut off by another swat from the banshee’s bundle of branches.
“Out, vile intruder!” the girl demanded in an imperious squeak. “You have no right to invade our home.” She raised her weapon to strike again but this time he was ready and was able to intercept the blow, grab the bundle of sticks and twist them out of her hands.
“Hey!” she protested. “Those are mine.”
“No, they’re mine, actually. And I do have the right to be on the premises. We own the land here and everything on it.” He glanced down at the bundle in his hands. “Including the thorns.”
“Oh,” said a hard feminine voice from behind him. “I suppose we must apologize, then.”
He turned to see the young lady he’d seen initially, an older and more refined version of the blonde banshee who’d hit him, glowering at him with an expression as dark as her face was fair. It was without a doubt the single most unapologetic apology he’d ever received.
“Are we to expect visits such as this on a regular basis?” She eyed the bundle of sticks as if she wished to seize it for her own use.
Professional Reviews
Long and Short Reviews
“It may be short, it may be sweet, but it is fully formed, and peopled with believable characters, a few somewhat unbelievable plots that still work beautifully and a setting so vivid I could feel the damp chill of the new home… A Change of Address tugs at both laughter and tears and was a thoroughly enjoyable Christmas read.”
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