The Next Always by Nora RobertsMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I read this book because my 4th great grandfather owned the Inn that is at the center of this romance, and the building diagonally across from it. He also owned a section of the National Road between Boonsboro, MD and Sharpsburg, WV, including the the corner on which the inn sets. I visited the town 3 times while I was doing genealogy and fell in love with it. I went in the bookstore and several of the other buildings, including the Trinity Reformed church where John and other of my ancestors were buried. The town is charming and I can see why Nora Roberts chose to make it her home and to write about it.
The first time I saw the Inn it was forlorn looking just as Roberts described it and I had the same feelings of sorrow over this lovely historical building going to ruin. The second time I saw it, Nora Roberts and her son had bought the buildings and were having the Inn redone. She had gutted most of the building by then. I took numerous pictures of the inside because it was stripped down to its earliest woodwork which my ancestor would have known and probably built. I am glad I did because it was later burned. Thank goodness they decided to salvage what they could and rebuild.
As for the story, I am not much of a romance reader, so the story seemed a little stilted to me. It seemed as if the romance was the point of the book instead of something that developed as part of a greater story. However, it is written as a romance and it certainly delivers. I will be reading the rest of the book in this series, but mainly because of the historical association.
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