Love by the Morning Star by Laura L. Sullivan

TL;DR WWII era identity mixup

(finished 10/3/15)

Love by the Morning Star was actually a really lucky library pick for me. It wasn't on my TBR, and I'm actually kind of surprised by that! It was really nice, and the only reason why I think it wasn't on my TBR is that I don't look at historical fiction often enough to go through and find related books. 

The plot was definitely unique, which I really liked. I don't think I've ever read a story about mistaken identities like this before. It definitely had tension running the entire time and kept everything going, but personally I kind of felt stressed about it. Not like super-bad stressed but like "how far into a hole is everyone gonna get before this is resolved". It stayed interesting despite mainly being about the characters' mundane day-to-day lives, which was actually pretty impressive to pull off. The pacing was good enough to establish the mundane stuff without having to really focus on it; you knew it was happening but you didn't have to suffer through it. 

The characters were nice! A lot of them seemed close to tropes, I guess, with Hannah being able to ramble without a problem and Anna being very proper, but they still had unique qualities and flaws that made them more human. Teddy was also a very nice love interest. It frustrates me a little bit that all the characters ended up letting the identity mix-up happen, whether by accident or by a lie of omission, but that was also most of the plot.

And it all worked out in the end. The climax was a little unreal with how everything turned out, but at least it was interesting. It all wraps up a little too nicely by the end, but that's to be expected from a standalone.

As for the romance, it's nothing extraordinary, and I don't know whether it's more funny or sad that the two main romances were also victim to the mistaken identity thing. The two couples were just all-over clueless. 

The reviews on Goodreads are pretty mixed. I went into it expecting something fairly light-hearted and almost kind of sitcom high jinx-y, so I was happy with what I got. I have to agree with a few reviewers though that it's a little anachromatic (though I'm sure that's not quite the right word I want). Hannah didn't seem as worried as she should've been about her parents' well-being. I don't know if this is because as a reader I've learned stuff that Hannah had no possibility of knowing at the time or because Hannah trusted her parents to manage their own safety. Anna's father also put a lot of responsibility on her without actually explaining what all he was expecting her to do, which I don't think someone in that position would've done. He would've made it a lot more clear what end goal he was working towards instead of just sending his daughter off with some vague instructions. 

TL;DR if you're not actively looking for a historical fiction, it's a pretty good fluffy book. If you're looking for a historical fiction, you should probably skip it.