To Love and to Cherish

Wyckerley Trilogy #1

by Patricia Gaffney

When Anne Verlaine's hellish marriage appears to be ended by the disappearance of her drinking, carousing husband, she turns to Christy, the handsome vicar of All Saints Church in Wyckerley, for solace--but longs for a great deal more. Original.

Genres: Romance, Historical Romance, Historical, Historical Fiction, Fiction, Victorian, Adult

400 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Patricia Gaffney was born in Tampa, Florida, and grew up in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C. She earned a bachelor’s degree in English and philosophy from Marymount College in Tarrytown, New York, and also studied literature at Royal Holloway College of the University of London, at George Washington University, and at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

After college, Gaffney taught 12th grade English for a year before becoming a freelance court reporter, a job she pursued in North Carolina, Pittsburgh, and Washington, D.C., for the next fifteen years.

Her first book, a historical romance, was published by Dorchester in 1989. Between then and 1997, she wrote 11 more romance novels (Dorchester; Penguin USA), for which she was nominated for or won many awards. Many of these previously out of print classics are available again today as digitally reissued classics, including the author's most recently re-released and much beloved novels in The Wyckerley Trilogy.

In 1999, she went in a new direction with her hardcover fiction debut, The Saving Graces (HarperCollins). A contemporary story about four women friends, the novel explored issues of love, friendship, trust, and commitment among women. The Saving Graces enjoyed bestseller status on the New York Times, Publishers Weekly, USA Today, and other lists.

Circle of Three (2000), Flight Lessons (2002), and The Goodbye Summer (2004) followed, all national bestsellers. Gaffney’s most recent novel was Mad Dash (2007), a humorous but insightful look at a 20-year marriage, told from the viewpoints of both longsuffering spouses.

More recently, Pat's been indulging her purely creative side in a brand new format for her -- novellas. With friends including J. D. Robb, she has contributed stories to three anthologies, all New York Times bestsellers. In "The Dog Days of Laurie Summer" (The Lost, 2009), a woman in a troubled marriage "dies" and comes back as the family dog. "The Dancing Ghost" (The Other Side, 2010) brings together a pretty spinster and a shady ghost buster in 1895 New England. And in "Dear One" (The Unquiet, 2011), a fake phone psychic (or IS she?) meets her match in a stuffy Capitol Hill lobbyist -- who couldn't possibly be that sexy-voiced cowboy from Medicine Bend who keeps calling the psychic line.

Patricia Gaffney lives in southern Pennsylvania with her husband.

Reviews

[Maria Clara · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5/Qué puedo decir, aparte de que me ha encantado? La verdad es que no sabía qué esperar de esta lectura, pero me he encontrado una pluma que me ha recordado mucho a la de la Laura Kinsale. Una historia muy bonita; dulce, en que los personajes están muy bien trazados.

[Meg · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 artistic stars

‘To Love and To Cherish’ was everything I hoped it would be and much more.
Before its infamous sequel, Patricia Gaffney wrote a soulful and evocative romance between a world-weary viscountess and a country parson.

What sets this romance firmly aside from countless others with a similar premise is the vividness and humanity of its main characters: both of them are struggling in their own secret ways and yearning for a state of grace that they ultimately find in each other. Despite their relationship progressing organically from friendship to love, there was such an innate (and forbidden, given the h’s nubile state) attraction between Christy and Anne that I was thoroughly invested in their dynamic from the first page to the last.


The author shows once again her talent for presenting with the most degenerate of characters in a compassionate and tragic light, because Anne’s erratic, guilt-ridden husband, inspired nothing but pity in me, despite him committing some pretty terrible actions.
Introducing him and the hero as childhood friends was a stroke of genius, as was having Christy confess his love for Anne seemingly out of the blue, after we’d been following their friendship through the pages of her journal and we hadn’t heard his POV for what seemed like actual months.

Christy deserves a statue in the ‘Best HR Heroes’ hall of fame: he’s a rare case of a truly compassionate and most of all LOVING man also having depth and an interesting and not entirely spotless backstory and owning it. Genuinely one of the best men I’ve ever come across in a HR.

While it didn’t send me into a three hour long meditation on the nature of love like ‘To Have and To Hold’ did, I knew when I reached this passage:

I’m afraid of losing my hold on the here and now, of sliding farther and farther away from the commerce of my daily life and ending in some dark room, screaming. Absurd! Oh, but I long for a drug that would make me sleep now, deeply and dreamlessly, until dawn. Morning birds, rude sunshine, everything full and unexperienced—then I would have my courage back. But now I fear this dusk, these dark thoughts, dying, death, my end. Oh, God, what shall I do?

and it hit me like a brick wall because I could’ve written those exact words (albeit less articulately) a couple of years ago, that this was another unique book in its genre that would stay with me for a very long time. This book was much more in my chords than the previous one I read from this trilogy, and reading it felt a lot like staring out to sea at sunset. Peaceful and mesmerising at the same time.

[Joanne Renaud · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had an interesting discussion with a friend recently. When she asked me why I didn't want to read John Varley's TITAN, I told her that I'd read the wikipedia summary, and when I saw that the heroine was raped about halfway through by an ex-shipmate, I lost interest in reading it. It seems to me that having your main character getting raped is the equivalent of setting off an atomic bomb in your manuscript. It is a huge, HUGE thing that will hang over the book like a cloud of radiation-- and there are not many authors who can adequately deal with the fallout. Hence-- unless the author is Margaret Atwood or Maya Angelou-- I am going to avoid books that use rape as a plot point like the plague.

So there's that.

Anyway, when I picked up Patricia Gaffney's TO LOVE AND TO CHERISH, I'd heard great things about the adorable blond beta-hero vicar hero and the bucolic early Victorian English setting. And as I plowed through the book, I ate it up. I loved the hero. I sympathized with the heroine. It was easily one of the best romance novels I'd read that year, and it was going to end up in my Top 10 Romance List for sure...

And then the ending happened. And Gaffney dropped Little Boy onto her bucolic English village, and Wyckerley became a second Hiroshima. Or so it felt to me at the time.

SPOILERS AHOY.

So our heroine, Anne, has this douchey husband named Geoffrey who's an old friend of the hot vicar, and Anne and the vicar hook up because they think dude has kicked it over in the Crimea. But he's not dead! He comes back and rapes Anne. And then he's killed. But it's okay, see? Because Anne realizes this violent and horrible rape was actually an "act of love"! And she forgives him. And she decides she's not going to tell her new husband, the vicar. For... reasons. I'm not exactly sure what they were since a red haze clouded my vision at that point.

As you can imagine, I felt so absolutely transcendently angry reading this that I would thrown the book against the wall if I weren't reading my Kindle. It reminded me of the retrograde monstrous crap force-fed into women a few decades ago: hide your abuse! hide your rape! You're damaged goods. You brought it on yourself. The rapist didn't really hate you anyway. Plus, you don't want to burden your loved ones with the shame that you must bear alone.

No. HELL NO.

So yeah. Anyway. This excellent novel, through the miracle of shoddy plotting and half-assed characterization, by the end had turned into a post-apocalyptic landscape of twisted wreckage and toxic sludge. Gaffney can turn a deft phrase, but I can never read any other books by her now. CHERISH left a truly nasty taste in my mouth.

Blech.

[Dinjolina · Rating 5 out of 5]

You know how there are 5 star book and there are book that are so good you want to make a whole new category for them?
This is one of those.

The story was so sweet you wanted to sight after most of the scenes. But it never got really diabetic even thou the characters fell in love rather quickly. The hero and heroine had so much between them and still it was never less real or a cliche.

The hero is...he is...i just love him. Not like. I am IN love with him. His looks, his deeds and way of thinking but mostly his soul. When Anna in the end falls on her knees and prays she says the real truth 'Please God save your greatest creation'. He deserved his happy ending more that any hero I read about.

Even thou the heroines husband was at first drawn up half evil the author makes the best ever move-she makes him lovable. In the final scenes when he almost rapes Ann I cried. For him,for her,for them...I wished there was a way for them to be together. I even wish that he did not take the gun even thou Cristy would suffer without Anna. But Geoffry needed her then. And I loved Anna for asking him to stay. I love the author even more for making Geoffrey fall in love with Ann when it was too late for everything. Not because it was his just punishment but because it was written in the light of so much love, seeing as how all three of them really did care for one another. It was late for Geoffrey and Ann from the first days of their marriage. But the author redeems it all with the pure and wonderful love of Cristy and Anna.

Before I finish and usher everybody I know to read this book I have to add: I was stunned speechless by the diary entries. This bold move was a very good one and it shows that the author knew what she was doing. Diary entries rarely work, but here they were a good plot device and a nice whay to really be inside Anna's thoughts.

Now go read it. :)

[Laurie (barksbooks) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has everything I could hope for in a romance. It's a beautifully written love story, is intensely moving, and has deep, layered and completely developed characters. I enjoyed everything about it.

It's a story about forbidden love and also one about faith. Geoffrey D'Aubrey returns as Lord to the home he ran from as a child. With him he brings his wife. His beautiful, cynical, lonely and battered wife Anne. War and soldiering are the only things Geoffrey truly loves. Before they've barely moved in he leaves Anne to fight another senseless battle. He leaves his horse and her (and in that order) in the care of his childhood friend Christy - a minister.

Christy is gentle, kind, caring, loving and he and Anne become fast friends despite their differences in faith (she's an atheist). They have a great time joking about their differences and are open and honest with each other. Despite their attempts to avoid and deny it they fall in love but are both such! honorable people they refuse to do anything about it - until Geoffrey is reported dead. But before they can live happily ever after they must struggle through some horribly bleak times.

I ached for this couple as they suffered through so much darkness and pain. This book is so good that it haunts me still. I don't say this often, and haven't said it in a long while, but if you haven't read this already go find it immediately.

[Chels · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second book in the Wyckerley trilogy, To Have and To Hold, is one of my favorite romance novels. This one hits a lot of the same notes: high angst, a nuanced villain, and intense stress from an otherwise placid life. The biggest difference between the two is that the villain in To Have and To Hold, Sebastian Verlaine, is also the love interest. In To Love and to Cherish, the love interest is Christy, an incredibly soft and kindhearted vicar.

I didn't know quite how to feel about Christy at first, but he's just shy of perfection in a way that makes him even more endearing. He's handsome, kind, and honest, and Anne, the married viscountess, is just as drawn to him as the rest of the townspeople. The trouble is, she's married to a manipulative, ailing, coward: Geoffrey.

I loved reading about Christy and Anne falling in love. It was so natural and casual that if Geoffrey was removed from the picture this wouldn't make for any type of romance novel at all. (Alas, we need the conflict!) Anne's diary entries were also so poignant it made me want to start writing to myself too. ("I want, I want, I want.")

[Linda (NOT RECEIVING NOTIFICATIONS) · Rating 4 out of 5]

To Love and to Cherish was a bit of a departure from most historical romances that I have read. Christian Morrell- ‘Christy’ to all the people who loved him- was the vicar of a small mining town. He was born and raised in Wyckerley. The townspeople, an eclectic lot, filled his void of loneliness. An illness, a new birth, an argument or gossip between friends were just a few matters that encompassed his day. He loved what he did but he never felt worthy of his position. He believed in God with his whole heart but he fretted that his parishioners did not truly understand what he preached. And he had never discovered love- the constant and enduring kind his parents had shared.

When the story opened, Christy’s best friend, Geoffrey, had returned home after years away. Whereas Christy had loving parents, Geoffrey’s childhood was a nightmare. His mother had abandoned him and his father was a cruel person. Geoffrey took the brunt of his father’s bitterness. It left him with deep emotional scars that traveled into adulthood and molded his existence. In addition, he was different from the best friend Christy once remembered. Time and distance had changed him.

Now married, the new Lord D’Aubrey greeted Christy with a questionable happiness. What the reverend soon surmised was the marriage between Geoffrey and his wife, Anne, was off-kilter. It was a troubled union with deep secrets.

I. Liked. Christy. He was a good man but very human. He struggled with his friendship with Geoffrey and Anne. Because of this, I can’t continue without writing spoilers. I only hope I see more of him in To Have and To Hold.

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

1. I can't believe I loved this almost as much/as much as To Have and To Hold. 2. I can't believe how different they were, in so many ways. 3. I thought while I was reading "...should I make a Spotify playlist for Anne and Christy?" So that's is its own level on endorsement.

Update: Spotify Playlist. I limited myself to three Taylor songs and three Florence songs. you're welcome.

I read Lessons in French earlier this year and it really made me realize how much I value *not* knowing things about characters and instead having to trust the information the author is giving me through their minds. For a less-skilled author, this comes across "wait where is this coming from," but if it works, and you trust the author, it actually makes more sense that being inside someone's brain, you don't get a literal one-to-one reportage of their thoughts. Lessons in French accomplishes through a second-chance couple without any real, substantive flashbacks.

To Love and Cherish the tension comes from the POV structure. I talk about interesting perspectives a lot. I have a formalist tendre for discussing it--I just think when it is done well, it makes the whole novel sing and it is fun to find out *why* it works well.

In this book, we have Christy Morrell (the best man to ever exist) and Anne Verlaine (newly arrived viscountess of Seton Park, currently married to Christy's former best friend, who is a wastrel with a dark secret). The structure is pretty standard, dual POV, third person, except that Anne keeps a diary, obviously in the first person.

A large portion of the book is given over to Anne's diary and large swathes of time are covered by her diary. She does have traditional third person POV as well. So lots more time passes in this book than some romance novels. I've never read a romance with this conceit before and the experience was closest to an epistolary novel.

Unlike an epistolary novel, Anne has no audience for her writing other than herself. So you might think this is going to be like a normal first person POV, with total access to information in her head. but the diary plays into this other tension that makes total sense--you don't write down everything in a diary. So the tension is not between a two characters writing letters, but between Anne's thoughts and her documentation and working through those thoughts on the page.

This structure is so interesting and novel, I feel like any histrom reader would get something out of this book, even if they didn't really like the characters.

But! the characters are WONDERFUL. The dynamic is one I feel is usually flipped the other way along gender lines, where one character, usually the man, feels fallen from grace, or inherently bad and is "saved by"/"corrupts" the literally holier-than-thou, gentle, perfect character. (Or maybe I am just thinking about Flowers from the Storm

I could see someone struggling with the discussions of faith in this book and Anne's relationship to her atheism and eventual questioning of that stance. I found the discussion to be really redeeming and assuring, but my relationship with Christianity and God is not everybody's!

I cannot wait to read the third book now.

also tw for rape. it isn't a bodice ripper, so the MMC is not the rapist, but it is there.

[new_user · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing was nice.

One of the main attractions for To Love and to Cherish, in fact. Patricia Gaffney's neat, elegant prose saved this novel from the donation bin.

She also conveys love in a realistic fashion compared to 99 percent of historical romances. I actually believed Anne and Christy (that's the hero) were in love, and I believe I've only said that once or twice before of a historical romance. I've bemoaned grand declarations before because, frankly, it doesn't take much talent or sincerity to paraphrase Shakespeare's lines -women in the 16th century died at 40, m'kay, Romeo's nothing to emulate- or exaggerate. Anne and Christy exchange those declarations occasionally, but mostly, they convince the reader as a couple because of the way they think of each other first, in a practical, even self-interested fashion. More than once, Anne or Christy thought, "She felt bad for John, but she was more concerned about Christy- she hoped that he hadn't stubbed his toe. Christy felt bad for Jennifer, but really, he didn't care about the heifer. He just wanted to know if Anne was okay." Yes, I'm paraphrasing, but my point is that Gaffney captured couplethink pretty well. So my hat's off to you.

Cherish's other main attraction? Christy Morrell. Yes, I will join the hordes of readers in love with him. He is so noble. Christy deserves a stalker shrine. Every romance hero should be a Christy clone, LOL. I should also say that I appreciated that this romance hero wasn't a rake, the roles were reversed, she needed saving instead of him, etc. There was also good characterizationblahblah. LOL.

Gaffney also indulged in a mysterious abundance of bucolic country landscapes in detail, literally birds twittering and does in the wood. I think Gaffney was watching too much Disney. She did, however, paint a three-dimensional portrait of a country parsonage in the few pages alloted her, and I did appreciate the heroine's conflict adjusting to country life, independent of the hero whom we love.

However. Now we come to the bad. Anne suffers from Whiny Rich Girl syndrome, also known as there-haven't-been-enough-problems-in-my-life syndrome. Gaffney presents Anne's "problems" as a mystery, and when revealed, Anne's problems pose weak justification for sulking 50 percent of Cherish. Every woman I know in real life tackles bigger problems on her lunch hour, the least of them because they have bad marriages and they also have to raise children. Anne experiences only one of these. Unfortunately, Gaffney inflicts Anne's diary entries on us! Spilling her angsty beans across pages and pages!

This was a bad authorial decision.

Anne could have walked right out of a young adult novel with her misplaced feelings of alienation, her love of graveyards, her secret pain. She was characterized well. Unfortunately, she was intolerable. I could not stand her epistolary, even for glorious Christy. So, three stars.

[Heather ~*dread mushrooms*~]

DNF at 40%

Good god, this is boring. The characters aren't even likeable. I read some spoilers so I don't have to finish it.

[Petra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was such a sweet love story. I absolutely adored it.
Both Christy and Anne were well developed characters and I wanted to read more and more about them.

The plot was surprising as well. Patricia Gaffney is one of those authors you can trust to pull you out of the impossible situation with grace and excitement.

Anne is married and Christy is a vicar. She is atheist and he a devout christian. Their love is first rate romance, no insta lust but passionate slow buildup.

I felt bad for Geoffrey (doesn’t it seem as though every bad character is named Geoffrey?), we are just waiting for him to somehow disappear… but that tells you as well how well developed he is, you can have compassion for him yet, still want him to go away.


“I’m going to wear you down,” he warned
“I’m going to seduce you.”
“No you are not.”
“Yes I am. If I’m a sinner and I have to go to hell, I damn well take you with me.”

A chef’s kiss

Any recommendation for other Patricia Gaffney’s books?
I read the second one in this series and loved as well, not as much as this one though. But I am weary of the third in the series since the reviews are not as good.

[Paula · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is not the kind of story I'm looking for (with a priest..), but the second book in the series caught my eye; it has been on my bookshelf for months, and as this series develops in the quiet village of Wyckerley, with some of its inhabitants as MCs, I thought it was wise to start with book 1.

In this book, the focus is on the viscounts of Aubrey and Christy, Reverend Morrell. I think it's a good read if you like stories with a lot of detail; for example, the parish events were secondary to me, but if you're a reader who appreciates this kind of detail with a lot of secondary characters, this might be a book to consider.

Geoffrey could be a lot worse; I don't think of him as a true villain. He's too broken, really. He just seems lost. Of course he was awful to Anne, but that was undoubtedly a plot twist that I valued for shaking up the story. The MCs' romance was well built and cute. They are an unlikely but credible couple, I think.

I really liked the FMC's diary scripts!

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a rare author who can make a truly good, selfless, godly and religious man into an interesting and sexy hero -- one whose beliefs don't make him insufferable when you don't necessarily share them as a reader. Who can create the perfect foil for this kind of hero in a woman who is a cynical, bitter, depressed atheist yearning, whether she knows it or not, for friendship, love, and community. Who is capable of writing a villain who isn't just a roadblock to the hero and heroine's happily ever after, but a believable, nuanced, and even heartbreaking character in his own right, in spite of the unlikeable and even wicked things he does. Who can bring an entire village of secondary characters to life, giving all the people we meet personalities and lives of their own, even if we're only seeing those lives in brief snatches. Patricia Gaffney is good. Very, very good. I love her lyrical, evocative writing style and found myself highlighting passage after passage in my Kindle.

There were things I wasn't crazy about. The middle of the novel loses a little steam as the conflict veers into a moral conundrum for the hero that might be a little difficult for most modern readers to relate to. There's also a big plot twist about 3/4 of the way through the book that seemed much too convenient, plot-wise, in terms of the timing -- though I forgave it when it led to an increase in the angst and tension of the story and to some of my favorite sections of the book. Some of the things that happened toward the end of the novel were gut-wrenching and so emotional. I teared up several times before the story reached its conclusion.

I feel like I'm being super vague. Here, read this for more details, it says a lot of the things I didn't. I can see why this book is considered a historical romance classic -- it's pretty wonderful. I'm looking forward to reading the second book in the Wyckerley trilogy.

[Océano de libros · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anne Verlaine es una mujer que se siente infeliz en su matrimonio con Geoffrey. Él está más interesado en juergas y en su faceta militar que en su relación amorosa. Anne busca compañía en Christian Morrell, Vicario de Wyckerley, la única persona con la que siente una verdadera conexión.
Esta ha sido una novela diferente, no es la típica novela de romance histórico ambientada en los salones londinenses, nos desplazamos a un pequeño pueblo llamado Wyckerley con personajes no tan notorios sino más sencillos. Es cierto que tenemos a la parte rica e influyente representada pero también a la más sencilla. La autora refleja muy bien esa pequeña burbuja con los distintos estratos sociales. Anne pertenece a la clase alta es por ello que la tratan de diferente forma el resto de habitantes que en su mayor parte dependen de la minería. En cuanto a ambientación creo que ha estado muy bien reflejada en la novela, sin duda nos metemos de lleno en el funcionamiento de esa pequeña población y de las costumbres de sus habitantes, no he encontrado ninguna pega con los personajes secundarios han aportado a la historia.
Anne es un personaje bastante particular...https://oceanodelibros.blogspot.com/2...

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. An enjoyable and sweet HR about the very Reverend Christy Morrell, the village minister of a pretty Devon (England) village. Christy is a lovely character, honest, sincere, caring, devout, and hot! Lady Anne comes to live near the village with her unpleasant husband, once a childhood friend of Christy. Anne and Christy are attracted but have too many scruples to act on their desires. But when Anne is finally freed they are able to pursue their passion and achieve their very sweet HEA.

As always, Patricia Gaffney builds interesting and complex characters, and the plot has a few twists and turns that keep things interesting. This is the first book in a trilogy and I'd actually read book 2 (To Have and To Hold) first but, it didn't matter. This book is lighter and sweeter in tone than book 2. Book 2 is different and much more intense. I would like to read Book 3 when I can get hold of a copy.

[scarr · Rating 5 out of 5]

I need to reread my favorite books more often.

[Ridley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I will review this later. Definitely a strong 4-4.5. Might make it a 5 later.

Wonderful character-focused victorian romance. Everyone was so nuanced that they felt real to me. The vicar hero is now in my top five for favorite heroes. He was such a strong, honorable person it sort of blew my mind.

[Pepa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enlace reseña
https://masromance.blogspot.com/2021/...

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shout out to Emma and Christy for making me want to re-watch Fleabag.

Anne is married to a selfish man, Geoffrey. His true love is soldiering, but he takes a quick break to head home to Wyckerley. His father, a viscount, is on his deathbed and Geoffrey comes home for money and to bury his father. Christian, or Christy, is Geoffrey’s childhood friend and now the town’s vicar. Anne has grown up all over Europe as she was the daughter of an artist. Christy can tell Geoffrey and Anne don’t have a good relationship. Geoffrey leaves Anne alone often and then eventually buys another commission to head back to the military. Geoffrey asks Christy to watch over Anne. They form a friendship and then Anne gets a letter informing her Geoffrey was on a ship that sank. While she grieves after a fashion without Geoffrey, her friendship with Christy evolves. She’s an atheist, and he’s a vicar, and they disagree on how to proceed with the relationship.

This is the first in the Wyckerley trilogy. What drives much of the story is what each character believes. Christy has this running internal thought process where he rationalizes moving forward with Anne even though there are “rules”. Even right at the beginning of the book, when he’s sitting with Gregory’s dying father, Lord D’Aubrey, thinks he’s Gregory and Christy lies without hesitation. He’s more focused on the spirit of the law, so to speak. So with that in mind, it’s interesting to watch Christy calculate what he can morally bear. I spoke about this a bit in another review, but falling for each other quickly can still work. The author ups the stakes and tests the relationship by adding another conflict for them to navigate. Make characters question what decisions they think they’ve solidified. Anyway, a good start to this trilogy and I’m eager to revisit Wyckerley.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second book in this trilogy has been on a few book lists over the years that had me anticipating it. But because I'm me and have to read in order, I needed to start with book one. I didn't have many expectations and wondered at a trilogy in which the only book I'd heard of or seen mentioned was the second book. But I'm so glad that I did read this book first. It ended up being a beautifully written, complex, layered, character-driven love story. The way everything unfolded, the conversations the main characters had, all made this a very rich experience for me. I mean, this was a romance between a minister and an atheist (who calls herself an agnostic to soften the blow), and the theological conversations, debates, etc were really fascinating to me. These types of explorations and differences between people is one of the reasons that I love to read.

If not for a few minor quibbles on my end, I think it would have been a 5 star read. I am looking forward to spending more time in the town of Wyckerley.

[oitb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots thoughts on this one. TW at the end for discussions about rape.

1. I think this was beautifully written. I had some hangups about some language anachronisms, but they didn't ultimately distract me from the story.

2. The characters are so complicated and rich. The setup is unlike anything I've read before: You have a vicar and his best friend's wife falling in love with each other — !!!!! — which, while not completely bananapants, I genuinely did not know how the author was going to resolve this seemingly immoveable conflict.

I loved the narrative choice the author used for the heroine, which is expressing her thoughts and feelings via diary entries. It gave the reader a very unfiltered access to her thoughts that felt more realistic than 1st person POV; most people don't narrate their thoughts and feelings in real-time IRL, but they DO reflect when writing in a diary.

With the hero, I totally didn't expect to like him and was honestly a little wary about a vicar character because of my own views on Christianity and religion, but I really liked that he felt very lost about his religion and that his interpretation of religion seemed to adhere to religion as it's been idealized by some people — where somebody learns to love unconditionally and withhold judgment. He embodied a kind of patience and understanding in a way that I — someone who is not Christian or religious, but still lives in a society where western Christianity permeates through a lot of society — don't generally associate with the current religious climate, and through this character, I'm able to see why religion would have such a heavy draw on people.

3. There were a couple of things that nagged at me. I want to caveat that this will involve some armchair psychologizing and I'm definitely coming into this with modern sensibilities, but it does seem that the heroine is pretty depressed and unhappy. She explicitly talks about unhappiness many times, and at one point after she and Christian start having a romantic relationship, talks about bouncing back between extremely highs when she's with him and extreme lows when she's not. And those also seem like symptoms of something else, and so my general impression of the heroine is that she is overall unhappy and perhaps clinically depressed — and the way she depends on Christian for lifting her mood seemed troubling? Because I think this plays into the unrealistic, romantic notion that love cures all, and frankly, because I came into this book with a modern reader's eyes and thoughts, I felt like this relationship would be unsustainable because the heroine has a lot of things she needs to work on first, and that she may be overly reliant on her romantic relationship for happiness.

The second thing that nagged at me is that the heroine is atheist, which is presented as one of the major conflicts between her and the hero. She doesn't want to marry him because she thinks she would make a terrible vicar's wife and it'd look bad for a town vicar to be married to someone who doesn't believe in god. The hero, thankfully, never tries to convert her in ways that felt oppressive or uncomfortable to me, and really thoughtfully talks to her about his religion and maintains an open mind about her own lack of belief (he reads the agnosticism tracts she leaves him!!!!!!!! what a guy!!!!!!!!).

But — not surprisingly perhaps, given this book pubbed in the mid 90s — she ends up converting of her own volition during a low moment in the book when the hero's physical safety is in danger. Aware of my own biases as someone who's not religious, while I personally really didn't like that she converted, I'm ultimately okay with it. What I'm NOT okay with is that the heroine gets — TW! — raped by her husband at the end when he comes back from the dead and then finds out about her relationship with the hero. And not only does she internally excuse her husband — calling his rape "an act of love" instead of a violation of her person — she thinks that this is her punishment for falling in love with the hero and engaging in premarital sex with him. This I'm not okay with because this feels very much like the author's moralizing on a character without engaging with the more interesting ideas she litters throughout the text, which is that, if the two people are not attached to other people (at that point, the heroine's husband has been pronounced dead), what is the harm in loving each other emotionally and physically? It personally bothers me when an author plays with boundary-pushing ideas only to punish her characters for engaging with those ideas, and it sucks that in this case, it's with the woman. Christian doesn't have these self-flagellating thoughts, nor does he get "punished" for sleeping and falling in love with someone who he's married to. This really bugged me and really dented my overall very, very strong impression of the book, but ultimately YMMV.

[Suzy Vero · Rating 5 out of 5]

To Love and to Cherish (1995) the first book in the Wyckerley Trilogy, is a deeply layered story of love found between two very different souls.

Christian Morell (Christy) is the vicar in Wickerley, Devon, 1854… his father was the minister before him. He meets Anne Verlaine when she and her husband Geoffrey, the new Viscount d’Aubrey, return to the village upon the death of his father. Christy and Geoffrey were childhood best friends but haven’t seen each other in over ten years. It’s not the same… Geoffrey has changed.

Anne keeps a journal, and the entries appear frequently which moves the story along slowly, very slow. She’s agnostic, and has never gone to church. Geoffrey comes across mostly as a cruel, unpredictable man… then heartbreakingly tragic at the end.

Christy wonders at times if he is meant to be a minister, does he truly have a calling? His character makes the story… compassionate, kind, devastatingly handsome with blond curly hair, beloved by his parishioners, and sexy in the sizzling sex scenes. This is definitely a very spiritual story permeated with religious references to scripture, holy days, hymns, faith in God and Jesus Christ, and Christy’s heartfelt prayers. As an Episcopalian I felt completely at home in this religious setting of the Anglican faith.

The story goes back and forth from slow and sweet to jarring incidents which are very painful to read, and frequently tragic. It’s so beautifully written which makes it all very believable. The residents of Wickerley play a starring role as does the bucolic village life. At times I was lulled into thinking all’s fine, and then shockingly it wasn’t. In the end the romance between Anne and Christy shows that God is Love.

Best HR I’ve ever read with a member of the clergy as the hero. Christy is a warm cinnamon roll man anchored by his faith in God, and his love for Anne. Nevertheless, it’s definitely not a sweet story .., there’s plenty of illicit passionate sex scenes juxtaposed with tragedy... most importantly, it’s a lovely love story.

RITA award winner for best historical romance, 1996.

[LaFleurBleue · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was among the top of my watchlist for already a few years, as it came highly recommended by several reader friends extolling the wonderful writing, unusual but deeply moving story and characters. Honestly the praises were so unanimously laudatory that I was afraid of starting it, fearing that my expectations were built too high.
Indeed I understood where those praises derived from. However I did not manage to be as taken by the book that I would have liked. The writing was indeed very refined, but to my opinion, might even appear a bit detached and cold. It might just be that I was not in the right mood to read this book, but I'm really not sure a better mood might have been enough for it to succeed in reaching my very limited keepers-shelf.
This was obviously not a standard and easy-going romance. The heroine was already married, unhappily at that, when she met and fell in love with her husband's childhood friend. This latter was a pastor, which prevented them from enjoying an easy elopement and life in sin but freedom. Add to that several secrets relating to the husband and the reasons behind his falling out with his wife, several debates between the heroine and the pastor regarding faith, as she was atheist/agnostic at best and enjoyed debating. I really appreciated nonetheless that those debates and overall the religion environment was very far from preaching or taking positions and for that the detached and colder writing worked perfectly for me.
In the end, it's a nice story with some predictible elements in it, the main characters seem quite real, with their failings made quite obvious but extremely likable. However I did not completely root for them and that's the reason behind my rating.
Which would be a 3.5, if I could.

[Kat · Rating 5 out of 5]

A friend recommended that I read this one. Thanks, Jan...I LOVED it! Could not put this book down. My heart was broken, I was shocked, I cried, I smiled.... How have I not read this author before?! Thank goodness I found the next two in the series in my Kindle library. On to the next!

[Julianna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reviewed for THC Reviews
"4.5 stars" The first Patricia Gaffney book I read was Wild at Heart, which I loved for it’s uniqueness and depth of emotion. I’m rather appalled to say that was nearly six years ago. I have no idea why I didn’t read another of her books until now, other than that I’ve found a lot of equally talented authors who’ve been drawing my attention away since then. In any case, I’m so glad I finally got around to reading Ms. Gaffney again, because To Love and to Cherish was equally as unique in it’s own way and filled with a richness of detail and sumptuous emotions that really grabbed me and didn’t let go.

When I started the book, I wasn’t sure if this would be the case. I was enjoying it, but it seemed a little subdued. The first 150 pages or so move rather slowly with not a great of relationship building from a romantic standpoint occurring between the hero and heroine. I did, however, like the slow-building friendship between Anne and Christy. It was appropriate for the circumstances, since she’s a married woman when they meet and he’s a minister. I also very much enjoyed how Anne, an atheist, feels more comfortable and can be more herself with Christy, a minister, than anyone else in her life. I felt it showed just how open their hearts were that two people from such disparate religious backgrounds could become so close. During this time, we see just enough of their interactions to feel the deepening of their friendship and a blossoming attraction, but sometimes I felt like the author was holding back somewhat on the emotional development. I'm not sure if it's because of the sensitive nature of the relationship or what, but I kept wanting to feel more or for something more to happen between them. At that magical 150 page mark, though, that all changes, and from there, we get an emotional feast that at times was so deep and intense as to leave me feeling either euphoric over their shared joy or a tad wrung out from their shared turmoil. Either way, I wouldn’t have changed a thing about this part of the story. From that point on, it was practically perfect in every way.

In some ways, I think this story is more about Anne’s journey, as she went through more changes and growth. When she first comes to Wyckerley with Geoffrey, her husband, and the hero, Christy’s childhood best friend, she’s in a very morose place. It’s easy to tell that her marriage is an unhappy one, but exactly what makes it that way isn’t revealed until much later in the story. All we get are little hints: that Geoffrey may have been cruel to her in some way or possibly even abusive, that at least one of his dissolute friends behaved inappropriately toward her, and that they haven’t been intimate since their honeymoon. But the why of all these things unfolds slowly over time. When we finally learn the full import of what Anne’s life has been like, I couldn’t help feeling empathy toward her. She feels rather blind and stupid for having allowed her girlish self to believe Geoffrey’s lies and manipulations and now she feels trapped in a loveless marriage. Yet she still feels some loyalty to her husband in spite of his treachery. When she meets Christy, Anne is in a desolate place. Even though she wasn’t raised in the high life, she’s now an aristocrat, and as the only aristocratic lady in town, she feels isolated and has trouble making friends. I could really relate to Anne in this way as well as her almost overwhelming sense of loneliness. Christy becomes something of a lifeline to her, so much so that when he reveals his growing feelings for her and tries to call off their friendship, she all but begs him not to. The last thing she wants to do is tempt him or hurt him in any way, but she feels like he’s all she has. I really enjoyed watching Anne go on her journey to finding emotional wholeness, a deepening spirituality, and a growing sense of community with the people of Wyckerley.

I greatly admired Christy. He's an amazing man and most definitely a sweet beta hero, a kind, gentle soul who IMHO genuinely embodies his role as a minister. He always thinks of others first, even putting his life in danger at one point to bring spiritual comfort to a man who everyone believes is going to die. He truly cares about people, and is deeply committed to all of his parishioners. That’s how things begin with Anne, with him trying to befriend her and bring her some comfort. It just so happens that he comes to care for her on a much deeper level than his other parishioners. Christy is the type of minister who really brings the love of God to his flock and doesn’t judge them for their weaknesses. But at the same time, Christy feels like he's living in the shadow of his father, the former minister, and can't quite measure up. Anne, however, sees the truth and knows how much help he is to his congregation even when he can’t. It’s through his gentle, heartfelt faith that he brings about spiritual change in others, most especially Anne. Readers who don’t like perfect heroes, probably won’t care much for Christy. At one point, even Anne teases him, asking whether he has any flaws, because he seems so perfect, and in my opinion, he nearly was. But I loved that about him. He’s a truly honorable man, who is also deeply self-controlled which I found very sexy and appealing. (Not every hero has to be a randy goat 24/7.;-)) Even though Christy is deeply passionate and desires Anne, he refuses to merely have an affair with her like she initially wants, but he’s not averse to compromise when he’s finally able to wear her down a little. This really helped to build a sense of anticipation and once he does get her to compromise, their intimate scenes are filled with tenderness and emotion while still being quite sexy and sensual.

There are a couple of very unique elements in To Love and to Cherish, the first of which I’ll address being the faith message. In many ways the story almost reminded me of an inspirational romance, because this element is front and center throughout. This might bother some readers who are averse to religious messages in their books, but I found it refreshing, in part because it’s rare to find a character outside of inspirational stories who has a deep faith in God like Christy does. At the same time, it wasn’t like any other inspirational story I’ve ever read, because the characters act like real people. They curse, they have vices, they experience temptations and doubts, and they reason things out through logic and intellect, instead of merely following a set of pious, puritanical rules and regulations. The author also doesn’t gloss over or completely omit sexual desire and even love-making, which no true inspirational author I know of would do. However, I actually liked all of these things much better than most inspirational romances I’ve read, because of how it all seemed more deeply rooted in reality with characters I could relate to. Even Anne’s conversion experience was very organic and not the type that you would typically see in inspirational fiction, not to mention, Christy fully accepted her as she was before that, without trying to change her or placing unrealistic expectations on her. Even when she had doubts that she could ever make a suitable minister’s wife, he completely trusted her.

The other unusual element is that a significant part of the story is told through Anne’s journal entries. I appreciated the uniqueness of this storytelling medium, which is rarely seen in romance. They were well-written, and as a whole, I liked them. They give us some insights into Anne's life, and show her introspections in a different way. However, some of the earlier entries, during that first 150 pages, didn’t delve quite as deeply as I would have liked. There are also a few interactions with Christy that Anne writes about in her journal that I think might have had more impact if written in real-time rather than after the fact in this narrative format. Otherwise, I liked this uncommon look into Anne’s POV and think that it proves my earlier point that this story is a little more about her and her journey.

I also have to say that Ms. Gaffney did an incredible job of bringing the little village of Wyckerley to life, so much so that it became a character unto itself. Some of this is because of the author’s sumptuous descriptions of the environment, while the other part is the people of the town itself. Throughout the course of the story, we meet many of the townspeople, who, of course, are also Christy’s parishioners, and I came to care about all of them. In her author’s note at the end, Ms. Gaffney says that she didn’t originally envision this book as the start of a series, but some of the characters she created just wouldn’t let go when it was finished. She wanted to know more of what happened in their lives, which is why it ended up being a trilogy. Although we don’t get to meet him in this story, the presence of Geoffrey’s cousin can be felt from afar. He comes to town and becomes the hero of the next book, To Have and to Hold. Then there’s pretty, young Sophie Deene, who if memory serves is the niece of the mayor. Her father dies, leaving her the heir to his copper mine, and she becomes the heroine of the final book, Forever and Ever.

Overall, To Love and to Cherish is a wonderful, heartfelt story that makes the reader feel everything that Anne and Christy are feeling. If anyone starts it and isn’t quite feeling it during the first 150 pages, I encourage you to stick with it, because it definitely takes off after that and is completely worth it. And for anyone who might be worried about a potential cheating element, due to the heroine being a married woman, there’s no need for concern. Anne and Christy are very controlled in their relationship, never doing anything improper, not even kissing, until they fully believe she’s a free woman. Except for the slow early parts that I mentioned, this was a great story. It has earned Patricia Gaffney a spot on my favorite authors list, and I’m very much looking forward to continuing the series and revisiting this quaint little town in the English countryside soon.

[Natalie]

I was at times both bored and riveted to this. I feel like there was more to the characters than I was letting myself be patient enough to discover.

I really loved the internal conflicts they both had. I love how they compromise but don't change. I liked seeing that Gaffney maintained the integrity of their characters in the second book in the series.

Even though this book didn't make my heart bleed like To Have and To Hold did, I think Gaffney is an inspired author. Books hit differently with people, but, as of now, Gaffney is an author that I'm ready to dive into her backlog of.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

Christy Morrell is the vicar of Wyckerley (the small town which is also the setting of To Have and to Hold). When his childhood friend Geoffrey Verlaine returns to Wyckerly upon the death of his father, Christy's faith is sorely tested by Geoffrey's caprices and by his own strong attraction to Geoffrey's wife, Anne. Unfortunately, Anne's past life has made her an atheist, and even when it seems that they can be together, their different beliefs may keep them apart.

It's really refreshing to read a romance in which the hero isn't a rake, reformed or otherwise, and I quite liked reserved, wry Anne, whom we get to know better through diary entries interspersed with the main third-person narrative. Though there are some dramatics around Geoffrey, this story is much less fraught and angsty than To Have and to Hold and takes advantage of a lovely village setting which gives it a more pastoral, low-key charm. I can't say I was quite convinced by the resolution, but I was so entranced by the characters that it didn't really matter.

[Hero · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actual rating 3.5 stars. I would rate this higher except....I could not connect with the two main protagonists. Two of my favorite tropes are marriage of convenience and young love separated and reconnecting, of which this book satisfies one of them. However, the marriage of inconvenience is between the heroine and a minor character and not much is explored there for me to feel for the heroine. The "surprise" toward the end was not really a surprise as it was pretty obvious. The angst that was promised between Christy and Anna did not really materialize for me. The writing was beautiful and lyrical, which makes it a pleasure to read. All in all, I would recommend to give this a try but it's not a story I would read over and over like a few other fave books of mine.

[Lucimar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quase abandonei este livro por conta da lentidão inicial. Mas no decorrer da história se encontra de uma sensibilidade incrível entre o amor de Pároco e uma mulher casada, criada com certa liberdade pelo pai libertino que era pintor, isto lhe dá um visão cínica dos relacionamentos, da vida e de sua crença em Deus. Christy se apaixona perdidamente pela esposa de seu melhor amigo, por algum tempo consegue esconder esse amor, mas quando seu amigo é dado como morto, a paixão extravasa e eles se entregam a ela.Uma leitura bonita e preciosa...

[Gloria · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Not as good as the 2nd one but very sweet. One loose end not tied up and it bugs me.