Rating: 
Summary: A Missed Opportunity
Review: With the fertile history of Charleston, I hoped for an intriguing historical tale of romance, suspense, conflict and entertainment. Unfortunately, Jakes delivers a drawn out and at times boring tale of unappealing characters.The novel follows three generations of the Bell family from Charleston, SC. Through the revolution to reconstrucion, Jakes weaves the story of their lives through the historical events of the city, state and nation. He does a mediocre job at retelling the historical events which lend themselves to storytelling, and he does a poor job of creating an interesting cast of characters. None of them are very likable or well developed and they come and go quickly in flashes, so we don't really get to know any of them but the main character Alexandra Bell who I found to be uninteresting and annoying. Since I live in Charleston, I am interested in learning more about the history of it, but this novel did not deliver much insight. The history lesson of the novel seems elementary and offers little enlightenment. I fought the urge to quit this book several times due to its droll nature. Jakes gets rid of several characters by killing them off...eaten by an alligator, killed by falling off a horse due to the ice on a bridge (a rare event in sunny Carolina), killed by a falling tree during a hurricane, burned to death by knocking over a lantern, murdered by an angry slave, a freeman murdered by angry whites, small pox, attacked by a swarm of bees,poisoned by killer iced tea...way too contrived and unlikely. I don't think Jakes applied himself too well to this novel and it shows. I am disappointed in it.
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