I have given much consideration to rating this 4 part epic saga, and decided to write a review at the conclusion of book four. One review should suffice, just as one book could easily have covered the saga.While I should have read all the tags and been cautioned by the tag "Teenage Girls", there were many tags including "Plantation life", "Race relations", "Reconstruction". So why did I read all four? We all need a fairy tale once in a while, although I am concerned about the misinformation that "Teenage girls" are getting, and that a young mind might think this true of the post-bellum south. Although the 14th amendment guaranteed races equal protection under the law, former slave holding states enacted laws to undermine equal treatment for African Americans, thus ensuring segregation. And yet here are two orphaned teenaged girls, one black, one white, in North Carolina, partnering up to resurrect a plantation. I was surprised that they weren't holding hands while harvesting all that cotton.So, why did I read all four books? To be fair, they were light hearted and endearing. However, there should have been some suggestion in the synopsis that the books are really "young adult fiction", which was not one of the tags. Being a frugal reader, Kindle special $3.99, encouraged me to purchase all four books at the beginning. There seems to be a trend to lengthen one book into three or four. At sixteen dollars, who got the deal, me or Michael Phillips?The under development of the 2 suitors would seem to ensure the content of book five.
4.5 starsOne year has passed since Katie's and Mayme's last adventures, and things are about to change at Rosewood as Katie's Uncle Buchard pays her a visit.I really enjoyed the heartwarming story once again, and I thought this book was a great conclusion to the Shenandoah Sisters series. The new characters are beautifully developed, and we continue to see the old ones grow.The only thing I didn't like in this book is that, although a year has passed since the third book of the series, the characters are not a year older. That annoyed me a little... Other than that, I found the book was perfect.I'm looking forward to reading the sequel series: Carolina Cousins!
Do You like book Together Is All We Need (2004)?
Together Is All We Need by Michael Phillips is a wonderful book about friendship and family sticking together and sacrificing to help each other out. This is a very enjoyable coming of age series with a marvelous ending. Kathleen and Mayme not only became friends and together worked to save Kathleen's plantation and made it productive again after the Civil War, but also built a very unusual household with both blacks and whites living together under the same roof in harmony. The girls also learn from a good friend, Henry, how to trust the good Lord. I highly recommend you read the first three books of this series first before this last one to fully appreciate it. I absolutely LOVED this historical Christian fiction series and zipped through all four books. They were enlightening, giving insight into how things were after the civil war for both whites and blacks and how even though the slaves were set free, they were still looked down upon by most. This series shows how much people can accomplish when they work together unselfishly. I look forward to reading more books by this author. (Karen's review)
—Karen
The setting is 1860s Shenandoah, North Carolina at the Rosewood Cotton Plantation. Sixteen year old Katie Burchard and her half black cousin Mayme, have been keeping a very serious secret. Both of their families had been killed by marauders after the Civil War. Katie and Mayme, along with former slave children, have been running Rosewood all by themselves. Fooling everyone in town to think their families were still alive and well. Soon, their charade is over when Katie's uncle showed up to find
—Shelly
