Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn

Author: Jennifer Armstrong.

Publisher: Bantam Books.

Price: $3.99, paperback.

Pages: 178.

Do you like historical fiction? If so you will want to read Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn. The events of this story happening one right after another made this book interesting and hard to stop reading.

Sixteen-year-old Bridget MacKenzie (Bridie) has waited 10 years to reunite with her parents in a Massachusetts colony. They left her in Scotland to stay with her grandfather because they didn't think that a 6-year-old could make the long boat trip.

When Bridie gets to Marblehead, the coastal town in Massachusetts where her parents live, she learns that the colony law requires her to give up her Catholic faith and become a Puritan. She also meets her younger brother, Johnny, for the first time, who was born in Marblehead.

Also, during her first few days in Marblehead, Bridie meets a boy named Will of God Handy. They become good friends. Unfortunately Will's overprotective mother, Goody Handy, wants to get Bridie out of Will's life because she wants him all to herself.

Goody Handy finds that the easiest means of getting Bridie out of her son's life is to get Bridie accused of witchcraft. So Goody Handy tries to dig up evidence.

I liked Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn immensely because the author shows Bridie's personality from the start. She is funny and outgoing. Here is one of my favorite parts where Bridie meets Will in a meadow and they get into an argument.

Bridie gasped and brought her hand down hard by her side. Through the cloth of her skirt, she felt something sharp. Curious, she reached into her pocket and drew out the crooked nail she had picked up on the ship.

"Why do you carry such a talisman?" Will asked suspiciously.

"I don't carry it," she replied. "Not by design. Nor is it a talisman, but a simple nail. I only picked it up for thrift."

Will looked affronted. "A crooked nail may not be so simple."

"I believe the fairies have been at you," Bridie said, laughing. She tossed the nail away, only to shock and confound him more. "You're all mizzled in the head."

He blushed angrily, which tickled Bridie further. She knew she should cease her taunting, but she could not.

Reading this book is fun. The descriptions make you feel as if you are really there. And Bridie's personality keeps you laughing. She is really comical, and comical people are a delight to read about because they get in trouble a lot.

I recommend this book for those people ages 12-15 because it is written in English/Gaelic dialect, which can be difficult to understand.