SLEEP IN THE WOODS

A period romance returns to the end of the century, and the start of a new life in a young country, New Zealand, for Briar Johnson, illegitimately born if well schooled, who accompanies the husband-hunting Prudence and Sophia there as their servant girl. An ambitious, spirited, and anything but submissive girl, Briar goes to a masked ball in Sophia's gown and at the ""marriage dance"" attracts- not the proposal she seeks- but that of Saul Whitmore, first cousin to an earl, eligible and elusive. While first refusing, she later accepts the marriage he offers her, and the opportunity to be the mistress of his large estate in a lonely territory, terrorized by the Maori Hauhaus (very like the Mau Maus). While not concealing her distaste for Saul- and her reluctance to be a wife to him, she does prove her courage, as does Saul, and eventually realizes her love for the man she has almost lost.... The pioneer and period disguise covers some of the more conventional aspects of the story and the spitting and spatting romance- but it's a pleasant entertainment.