A Heart Divided by Angie Williams

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


When I saw A Heart Divided listed on BSB’s NetGalley offerings, I passed it up. Twice. And then went back and grabbed it because I love a historical romance where one woman passes as a man. One of my top five romances of all time is Backwards to Oregon and this seemed to have some very basic similarities.

I was initially swept up in the story and ready to be sucked in to the drama and romance. We meet our protagonists, the widow’s son, and our two new ranch hands. We have the makings of a lovely chosen-family. We get the love rival and an evil bad guy. Feelings are developing, secrets are being revealed, the bad guy does a bad thing and then – it all falls apart for me. Let’s discuss some of these things without giving any spoilers.

The book kicks off in 1868. I’m not up on my civil war dates but I just googled and it ended in 1865. So Emma’s husband has been dead for at least three years. Which you wouldn’t know because there are no timelines given. He died in a battle at some point. The battle is mentioned but I don’t know if it was a real one or not but I don’t want to stop to look that sort of thing up while I’m trying to stay in a story.

I bring this up because there are no specific timelines given while reading. Once Jack shows up on the ranch, we get passages of times as “a few months.” Repeatedly. Mentions of Emma being a widow for a few years or several years. I couldn’t tell you how long Jack worked on the ranch and that came up again during the final chapter – which is the second place a year is given. The whole of the story takes place between 1868 and 1873 – five years – but what’s described as a whirlwind courtship and becoming a family (not really a spoiler because, hello, this is a romance novel) two years previously. So, as I’m typing this out and doing math, Jack must have worked the ranch for THREE YEARS before the courtship?? What? Maybe I’ve not had enough caffeine yet this morning and I’m not thinking about this correctly. Because the scenes that I read seemed to be only the span of several “a few months” periods which, I suppose, could absolutely equal three years but it felt like a small fraction of that time.

Okay, I hope that if I’m not figuring this out correctly, someone will post a comment to help me understand.

But that wasn’t the only thing that was problematic for me. I have no idea how old Jack was or how old Emma was. The only person I’m solid on the age of is Ollie, the son. That bothered me. It hindered my ability to let my imagination see these characters as real. And Ollie, who started out at 9 years old, didn’t seem to mature to anything like a 12 year old – if my math is right – during Jack’s pre-courtship time on the ranch. There were no birthdays celebrated, which might have helped the reader with the passing of time. Sorry, I’m thinking these things as I’m typing them out so, yeah, this has turned into a ramble for sure.

Another big issue was that there was absolutely no mention of the bad guy or any consequences coming from the bad thing he did. It was never mentioned again. After the next morning, and the mention of some basic repairs to a structure, it was like it never happened. Another issue that threw me was that during intimate scenes, it was like the characters were completely different people and moved to a modern time with the language they used. We have the use of “clit” and “cock” coming from the POV of a presumably sexually naive widow who uses the language of sometime in the late 1860s. It was jarring to read. I’m no prude but the language should match the time and character and this didn’t. And I’m not even going to go into the event at the very end of the book had me saying out loud, “WHAT?!”

Oh, and before I forget again, this isn’t a story about a lesbian passing. Jack is a transman. I had no problem with Jack being trans, but it wasn’t what I was expecting. It actually made me feel for Jack even more than I had initially. It was the one part of the story that felt genuine in its portrayal. That and how Emma related to her son.

So, all in all, A Heart Divided wasn’t a hit for me. I have no doubt that it will bring joy to other readers because we all look for different things in a romance novel. But if the things I’ve mentioned are problematic for you, you might want to give this one a miss.



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