Wishes. Jude Deveraux. Pocket Books (1989). 278 pages. Genre: Romance.
First Lines: "Later, it was said that Berni was the best dressed corpse any of her set had seen in decades. Not that many of them admitted to having lived for much more than a couple of decades, and, what with the wonders of plastic surgery, none of them needed to admit to the exact number of years."
Summary: The story opens at Berni's funeral. In life the most important thing to Berni had been Berni. She did everything possible to remain young, to be the best dressed and to have the wealthiest husband. Plenty of people attended her funeral, but not many were sorry she was gone. Soon Berni wakes up with a jolt, thinking she has overslept. She realizes she is not at home in her bed and begins to look around. She soon learns that she is in a place called THE KITCHEN, not quite heaven and not quite hell.
"The Kitchen is a ... I believe in your time you would call it a halfway house. It's between heaven and hell. It's for women only - not for bad women, not for good women - it's for women who don't quite deserve heaven or hell."
Berni is told that she will be given an assignment to help someone on earth. If she fails, she will stay in the Kitchen, if she succeeds, she will eventually go to heaven.
The assignment she is given is to help Nellie Grayson. Nellie lives with her younger sister and her father in Colorado in the year 1896. Ever since Nellie's mother died, Nellie has taken care of her father and sister. In fact, that is how she has spent all of her time. She picks up after them, washes and irons their clothes, makes meals, bakes bread, scrubs floors, changes sheets and hauls wood until she collapses into bed each night. Even with all of this work she has managed to gain quite a bit of weight. She does the best she can every day, but she can never seem to please her father or sister. When she senses their disappointment in her she becomes very hungry.
Nellie's younger sister, Terel, has her dance card full. There isn't a man in town who wouldn't think she was a catch. Terel is expert at making Nellie think she cares about her, while giving her a back-handed compliment that makes Nellie very hungry. And when she gets hungry, she is apt to eat an entire cake or a batch of cupcakes. Terel secretly cheers when this happens, because she thinks that the fatter Nellie gets, the less desirable she will be to men.
Mr. Grayson has invited a man he met on the train to dinner. Nellie and Terel are expecting an old man. When he arrives early for dinner, Nellie is sent to entertain him. But, Jace Montgomery is tall, slim, muscular and young! Nellie is very kind to him and recognizes that he is lonely. Jace is smitten. Terel assumes that he is attracted to her and will be asking her to the upcoming dance. But when Terel finds out that he has asked Nellie to the dance, she is shocked.
Berni is not given much direction on her assignment to help Nellie. She is told that she must supply the wisdom. Will Berni be able to overcome her selfishness in time to really help Nellie?
My thoughts: This was a completely different kind of read for me. I have to admit that I enjoyed it. This was a Cinderella story with a twist. The story line was unique and enjoyable. I kept reading because I had to know if Berni ever became less selfish and if Nellie would find love.
Terel was so evil and could not think of anyone but herself. And Nellie was so trusting of her sister, that it was almost ridiculous. It was helpful to remember that the extremes were shown for comedic effect. In the end a satisfying conclusion is reached.
This is not a clean romance, however, the intimate scenes were brief and not overly graphic. There is also some language.
Overall, I found this to be a light-hearted, fun read.
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