Sweet on You: A New Mystery by One of My Favorite Authors!

Well, this post was supposed to go up about a week ago. But that didn’t happen, due to the fact that I didn’t even have this written yet, much less scheduled! And due to the fact that I was picking grapes last week (a job that I’m learning to really enjoy!), it simply didn’t get posted. I’ve decided that late is better than never, and since I loved the story I thought I’d share my thoughts of the book with you. But then, if you don’t like women’s fiction, or reading book reviews, go ahead and skip this post. I won’t mind!

Mom has done some launch promotion work for author Chautona Havig over the past year, and a couple weeks ago when Chautona was looking for a new launch group, I decided to sign up. And, surprise, I got to be part of it! I’ve loved her books ever since Mom introduced me to Ready or Not—the tale of a young 20-something who is given guardianship of her 8 nieces and nephews after her sister and brother-in-law die. (On second thought, it’s probably not so surprising that I liked the story since I’m the oldest of eight…it was very true to life.)

I didn’t know what to expect from Sweet on You, the first book in the Meddlin’ Madeline series, since the premise was “a young girl notices things that other people don’t, and her noticing stuff involves her in some kind of mystery”. I wasn’t disappointed, though! In typical fashion, what would be a mundane story from many turned into an enthralling adventure under Mrs. Havig’s hands.

A young man recently moved into town appears at one of the many socials. He quickly begins courting the interest of Madeline’s friend Edith, but Madeline notices certain things about his demeanor that make her wonder what he is like in real life. If he is hiding something, will she be able to figure it out before he marries Edith—and perhaps destroys all chances of the girl’s future happiness?

Through the course of the novel, little things kept popping up—until I got annoyed at Madeline for waiting so long to find out the truth! I really enjoyed the mystery part of the story, and yet I enjoyed the historical aspect even more in some ways. Through this book, I got a little glimpse into life in the early 1900s, without the glamour of modern-day retellings of Jane Austen books (now, I do like the movies I’ve seen, don’t get me wrong; but this was an interesting perspective as well). I found the few mentions of the Brownie interesting, and loved the ways Madeline used her camera—not necessarily the way Russell intended her to use it!

Overall, it’s a great story. Not as much “Christian” stuff in it as in many of Chautona Havig’s other books, but like Mom I’m looking forward to seeing where that aspect goes from here.

The Kindle version is now available—you can buy it here.

Well, turns out my review for the blog was as long as my review for the website! Eventually, we will combine my review and Mom’s review into one, but for now we’ll leave things as-is.