A very good book! I liked the history and getting to know the characters! ( )

This book was recommended for me by Goodreads, probably due to my interest in historical fiction; however, I found the history element was not the main focus. It was primarily a Christian allegory, where the storyline appeared to be secondary to the message. I was interested in finding out the various stories behind the wearers of the wedding dress, but found the characters to be rather one-dimensional. If you like Christian romance, you will probably enjoy this novel. ( )

I couldn't put this book down. I was intrigued by the concept and was drawn into the different stories. I loved being able to piece parts of the four brides stories together, but there were moments that still surprised me. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and am likely to read again. ( )

There are really no surprises in this grown-up version of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, centered this time around a wedding dress that turns up in an old trunk purchased on impulse by bridal shop owner Charlotte Malone. The fact that the narrative switches back and forth between Charlotte, dragging her feet on finalizing her own wedding plans in 2012, and Emily Canton, feeling ambivalent about her forthcoming wedding in 1912, sets it all up and there’s certainly never any doubt in the reader’s mind that there’s going to be a direct connection between the two.

The fun here is in the journey, and of course in rooting for each of these women to make what the reader has already identified as the right choice. Hauck does lift it out of the generic Christian Romance rut by setting the novel in Birmingham, Alabama and acknowledging that city’s often-troubled history of racial strife with a subplot that feels organic to the story. Non-believers can choose to accept the strange little man in the purple shirt as an angel … a pixie … a messenger of fate, or the embodied spirit of the Traveling Wedding Dress, but whatever he is, this reviewer instantly pictured him as being played by actor Leslie Jordan. (Sorry. Once I got that image in my head, it just would not go away.)

Drop your pre-conceptions and just enjoy this one for what it is. ( )

Loved it. Superior plot pacing and character development, one of those I'm-staying-up-way-too-late-to-finish-this kind of books!