Love’s First Light
In 1789, during the opening weeks of the French Revolution, Christophé St. Laurent’s entire family is guillotined at the behest of Maximilien Robespierre. Barely escaping from Paris with his life, Christophé flees to Carcassonne, in the south of France. For five years he lives alone, in constant fear of discovery and denunciation. As he wanders through the cemetery early one morning, he encounters a pregnant woman mourning at her husband’s grave. Her name, Scarlett, suits her vivid personality, and soon Christophé falls in love. Shocked by his discovery that Scarlett’s deceased husband was Robespierre’s nephew, he packs his dagger and heads for Paris. When Scarlett grasps that Christophé plans to avenge his family, she follows him north.
Much of the excitement in this novel is created at the expense of historical authenticity (the St. Laurents are executed, without trial, on a portable guillotine brought to their own home) or practical reality (Scarlett is eight months pregnant when she blithely travels the 500 often-mountainous miles from Carcassonne to Paris) but these lacks may be overlooked in a novel essentially about faith, love, and forgiveness. The inventive plotting of Love’s First Light will entertain the many fans of Carie’s inspirational fiction.
