Bridges of the Heart

by Joan Sowards

Bridges of the Heart is a novel about the power of love and forgiveness and the eternal nature of families. Twenty-one-year-old Rachels life falls apart when her mother becomes ill and passes away. To add to her confusion, Maxson proposes on the evening of the funeral. Rachel escapes to Utah to think and take time off from the relationship. After returning to Arizona, Rachel finds Maxson in a relationship with Paige Rachels rival throughout high school. With time, Rachel convinces herself she is over Maxson, but a strange Southern visitor named Jonathan tells her that in the eternal scheme of life, she was always meant to marry Maxson. Jonathan insists it is her responsibility to apologize to Maxson and set things straight. But Rachel refuses, and because of her stubborness, she is whirled back in time to 1820 to learn that families are eternal not only through time forward, but also the past. Latter-day Saint women of all ages will enjoy Bridges of the Heart. This heartwarming tale will remind readers that family bonds reach through all time.

225 pages, Paperback

First published May 17, 2015

Reviews

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed this one but it was light on the romance. It's more of a time travel, family history story. Wished Rachel and Maxson relationship had been built up a little more as there wasn't much to root for other than knowing they were destined to be together.
Content: Clean
Source: Kindle Unlimited

[H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Threadbare Quilts and Time-Traveling Pennies

At the death of her mother, 21-year-old Rachel breaks down, fleeing from Maxson Everell (the man who wants to marry her), a grieving father, and a sister who has secrets. It isn't until a friend pulls her back to the desert that she meets a strange man who tells her she has a special place in time--at Maxson's side. Rachel's not about to give the freak any credence, since he tells her she should call Maxson on the night he's getting engaged to another girl.

But what's a girl to do? She still loves Max. She curls up under the threadbare quilt on the end of her bed--the one that smells like jasmine.

Rachel wakes up two hundred years in the past, near her ancestress' log cabin in pre-Civil War North Carolina. She has a murder to solve, a treasure to find, and a whole passel of angry-hornet family members to cobble back together, all while trying to pose as a boy, learn to milk a cow, and avoid a major family war. As Rachel works to help her forebears solve their supposedly insurmountable problems, her own come into sharper focus.

Things are humming along right fine until Rachel helps meet Jane's housepayment--with three modern pennies. All heck breaks loose when the rent collector accuses Rachel of counterfeiting. To add insult to injury, the Sheriff looks just like Maxson, reminding her at every turn that she has to somehow get back to her own time to make things right with the man who should be HER fiance, before he asks another girl.

I loved the premise of this story. Who wouldn't want to go back in time and fix things in their distant past? Who wouldn't want to go back and find out why this guy turned to piracy and that one joined a strange new church? Sowards' fabulous settings took me right into 1800's South Carolina with its jasmine-scented quilts, calico bonnets, bucket-stomping cows, and ramshackle jails.

I wanted to help Sam, the runaway slave, on his way to freedom. I wanted to show Coker (Rachel's third great grandpa) that he amounted to something. I wanted to hug Rachel and Jane and tell them everything would turn out okay, because they felt like My People.

Get this book for a fabulous journey through time in this fictional story about true people.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anyone who has ever looked into their family history has wondered what it would be like to travel back in time and actually meet their family. Joan Soward’s novel Bridges of the Heart fulfills this fantasy for us as twenty-one-year-old Rachel is plunged into the pre-Civil War South and meets her ancestors. She takes with her a heart mourning the loss of her mother, worrying over her sister and confused about the man who wants to marry her…and returns to the present with a heart healed by the bridges of compassion and forgiveness only a family can provide.
The story carries you from page to page with believable characters such as Lucretia, Jonathan, Coker and the interesting Sheriff Gainey—who looks so much like Maxson, the present-day man Rachel loves. We are taken back in time as we feel the hardness of the wagon seat as we travel over rough ground, smell the clean air of the forest after rain fall and sleep under a handmade quilt scented of jasmine. This is a time-travel journey you won’t want to miss, so take Rachel’s hand and cross The Bridges of the Heart…it will be an adventure you won’t soon forget.

[Andrea Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joan Sowards is one of those authors on my watch-list. When a book comes out, I read it.

When I first started reading this book, I didn't realize it had a time-travel aspect to it, but I loved that part of the story. If only we could all go back and really get to know our ancestors! I'm fascinated with history and I think Sowards did a good job transporting us to post Revolutionary America. I liked how the generations were linked together.

She built strong characters that held consistent to their motivations and goals. The pacing was great and kept me reading late into the night.

This is LDS Fiction and so it has LDS themes throughout the book, but it's not preachy in any way.

This book was definitely worth reading and one that I would read again.

[Margaret Larsen Turley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bridges of the Heart by Joan Sowards provides the reader an intriguing contemporary romance as well as unique perspective of early the 19th century South. I've read this book three times and enjoyed it more each time. This is the perfect Time Travel novel for Family History Buffs.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun story. It sort of ended abruptly, however.