About this book:
“Only the hidden treasure will allow Louisa and her sister to gain their freedom.
England, 1388: All her life, Louisa has dreamed of finding the rumored “Giant’s Treasure,” a collection of ancient, lost riches said to be hidden on a mountaintop in Scotland, guarded by a fierce monster. It’s a story her father used to tell her, and when he dies and she and her younger sister have to go live with their shiftless, greedy uncle, Louisa is determined to find that treasure. It’s the hope that has kept her defying her uncle’s efforts to marry her off to the highest bidder.
Charles is intrigued by this young woman who claims her name is “Jack” and is set on going to Scotland. He goes along, pretending to believe she is a boy, in order to make sure nothing bad happens to her. As they meet new friends along the road, and as Louisa comes clean about her identity, the pair find themselves falling in love. But what will happen when they reach Scotland? Will they find their independence and the freedom to marry in the form of a buried treasure, or will the monster from Louisa’s own past keep the young couple apart?”
Series: Book #6 in the “The Dericott Tales”. Review of the Book #1 Here!, Book #2 Here!, Book #3 Here!, Book #4 Here!, and Book #5 Here!
Spiritual Content- Scriptures are mentioned & quoted; Many Prayers & Thanking and Praising God; Going to churches, lighting candles, & praying; 'H's are capital when referring to God; Louisa’s aunt tells her that it’s her “duty to God and to [her] husband to bear children and baptize them”; There is a friar that joins Louisa and Charles & is very opinionated and shares many judgmental things (such as stained glass on churches are for the “uneducated” people to feel God’s presence, shoos away a beggar child and comments on the child going to becoming a thief, begging being “idleness and is of the devil”, that Louisa rebelling is a sin of witchcraft and needs to repent for that and wearing a man’s clothing, telling Charles and Louisa that they are committing a graven sin by traveling alone together, comments on the way for a soul to go to hell is broad, and fears for Louisa’s soul if she doesn’t repent); The friar shares about the dangers for a woman alone and other “various tales of woe” which are not in the Holy Writ, which Louisa knows because she’s read the Holy Writ herself; Charles comments to the friar about Jesus traveling with women during his ministry & the friar has nothing to say about that; Charles thinks that the friar is condemning Louisa because she showed more Christian charity and compassion to orphan children than he did; Charles tells the friar that Jesus only condemned Pharisees and the teachers of the law, adding that Jesus care more about mercy towards others and He said to not judge others or they will be judged in the same way; Because of the friar’s words making her feel like “the worst kind of sinner”, Louisa prays and asks God if the friar is right; Louisa has a moment where she wants to tell the friar that he is being pharisaical and not Christlike at all; Louisa prays about finding the treasure & thinks that God would bless her with it if she believed it was real; Charles thinks that people are too fearful of the devil & forget that God is more powerful; A woman wants to pray at a church and put a penny in the poor box at every church she sees because “who knows where one might meet the very Spirit of God and gain His favor for a miracle?” (Louisa has never thought of it this way before and has a desire to pray where many others have prayed before her); Louisa has had a couple of times where God appears to her with a thought appearing in her mind; Louisa prays for a sign from God about a decision & recalls a conversation with a priest (the priest discourages her from asking for a sign, she asks why not because Gideon asked for a sign, & he only answers with “you are not Gideon”which wasn’t good enough for her; Louisa believes she’s more justified in asking for a sign compared to Gideon because she “didn’t have the benefit of hearing from God first”, but understands that “asking for a sign was not something to be done lightly or in any and every situation. She had to truly believe and not doubt, and to go against what God was telling her would surely be a grave sin”; She later sees something that makes her wonder if it is a sign or just her trying to see what she wants); When Louisa takes part in a ritual about dreaming about her future husband, she thinks that while she believes in miracles “surely God did not let people manipulate Him into telling her who she would marry by placing herbs under their pillows on certain night of the year. However, just as she’d argued with her priest, perhaps Gideon using the fleece was simply an example of a child of God asking Him to confirm what they believed God had told them” & she asked God to let her dream of the man she would marry; *Spoiler* Louisa prays with the “giant” for forgiveness of his sins and after repenting, he says he feels lighter; He later thinks that he deserves whatever happens to him because of the bad things he’s done, but Louisa is quick to say that “none of us get what we deserve because God is merciful and forgiving, and He has forgiven you” *End of Spoiler*; Mentions of God, Jesus, His will, & forgiveness; Mentions of prayers, praying, thanking God, & praising God; Mentions of the Holy Writ & reading it; Mentions of those & events in the Bible; Mentions of churches/cathedrals, monasteries, priests, friars, nuns, & stained glass; Mentions of a mother going to a shrine to procure some of “St. Thomas’s Water” for her sick daughter (hoping that it will heal her) & when she put a drop of the saint’s blood with water on a man’s forehead in the sign of the cross and it shockingly did not restoring his strength; Mentions of sins & sinners; A few mentions of crucifixes; A few mentions of showing Christian charity; A handful of mentions of pilgrimages & holy relics; A couple mentions of miracles; A couple mentions of blessings; A couple mentions of God resting someone’s soul; A couple mentions of others crossing themselves; A mention of bad things happening to everyone because we live in “a fallen and evil world”; A mention of Heaven; A mention of being Blessed; A mention of a chant from church;
*Note: The phrase “saints above!” is exclaimed thrice; Louisa thinks she sees a unicorn & is excited about it (thinking that it may be a sign from God); A child that was born with one arm is called cursed by a village leader and is casted out of the village (Charles has read the Holy Scriptures are knows that the child isn’t to be blamed for misfortunes); A man (who is called a “giant”) says that people want to know if he made a deal with the devil or if he was “cursed by a witch or a demon” to look the way he does; With many mentions of the Viking treasure, there are also mentions of magical beans, giants, fairies, elves, & unicorns; Mentions of curses & people calling others cursed because they are different than “normal” (including a child with one arm and a man who is very tall); Mentions of a ritual about young women putting certain herbs under their pillows & dreaming about their future husbands (Louisa takes part of this); Mentions of evil men; A couple mentions of luck; A mention of strange tales that were of “miracles and fairies and giants, strange beasts and heroic deeds that defied normal abilities of man”; A mention of a child being born with only one arm being considered as a “sign of the devil’s curse”; A mention of a guardian angel; A mention of fate deciding something; A mention of an evil spirit.
Negative Content- Eye rolling & Sarcasm; A mention of a curse (said, not written); Being attacked by robbers, Being attacked with arrows (& shooting one that injures another), Being slapped, Fighting, Fighting back, & Pain (up to semi-detailed); Being surrounded by wolves, attacked by them, & killing them (up to semi-detailed); Louisa behaves badly with potential suitors to keep them from choosing her (scowling, crossing her eyes, and “generally saying and doing anything that might make a man not choose her for his wife” when her aunt and uncle weren’t looking); Louisa disobeys her aunt and uncle when she thinks their commands are unreasonable (“which was often” she adds); Louisa runs away from home to find a rumored treasure (to be able to live with her sister without the pressure of marriage or her uncle’s ways); Louisa lies about being a boy to others (including Charles; which she hopes will be forgiven because she’s only trying to save herself and her sister & she hates deceiving him; He realized right away that she was a girl); Louisa feels guilt about potentially stealing someone else’s treasure; A giant is said to have skinned & killed people that come after his treasure & threatens Charles and Louisa (*Spoiler* It turns out that the villagers are forcing him to kidnap those who come for his treasure so that they can get ransom money for them; Other times, they have kill the people; *End of Spoiler*); Charles thinks about killing someone, but knows he wouldn’t because the man was unarmed and that vengeance belongs to God; Charles threatens someone about harming him if Louisa is hurt at all (saying that if she is harmed or touched, he will kill the man and even adds that the man will wish he was never born; Louisa takes comfort in his words and is soothed by picturing it); A man threatens Louisa with slitting Charles’ throat and burying his body if she doesn’t listen to him (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of killing, murders, & being held hostage for ransoms; Mentions of deaths (including of Louisa’s parents and a cousin); Mentions of potential illnesses and/or deaths; Mentions of attacks, being attacked, screams, injuries, pain, & blood/bleeding (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of stealing, stolen items, & thieves/robbers; Mentions of women being beaten and flogged for disobeying a man above them (implied that this would happen to Louisa when she’s found); Mentions of lies & lying; Mentions of gossip & rumors; Mentions of alcohol, alehouses, & drunk men; Mentions of relieving one’s self (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of being attacked and/or killed by wild animals; Mentions of hunting & slaughtered animals (for food, up to semi-detailed); A few mentions of a baron who mistreated, murdered, & robbed his own people (Book #5); A few mentions of a man who lost his arm in a sword fight (Book #1); A few mentions of almost beheadings (Book #1); A couple mentions of treason; A couple mentions of poisons; A couple mentions of nightmares; A couple mentions of jealousy; A mention of a massacre; A mention of a bully; A mention of horses being shot with arrows unintentionally; A mention of a nearly dead horse;
*Note: Louisa thinks about how woman have no more power than in Jesus’ lifetime (thinking about the women that followed Him and went where they pleased); Louisa’s aunt and uncle threaten and manipulate her to do their bidding (typically by threatening to marry off her younger sister); Louisa’s aunt calls her selfish and ungrateful, which Louisa doesn’t think she’s any more selfish than more people as she just wants to protect herself and her sister; Louisa wants to rebel against the “duties” her aunt says she has to do (such as getting married and bearing children specifically) because the aunt has made marriage to be “something distasteful that was done out of duty, not a joyful relationship of love and choice” (this makes Louisa thinks that most men didn’t have such distasteful duties and could do whatever they pleased; She also thinks that she wants to rebel more the more her aunt talks); A man is called a “giant, misshapen beast of a man”because of his height and appearance; Mentions of a man’s chest pains & him believing that he doesn’t have much longer to live; Mentions of those with afflictions being treated as if having a curse (a women with difficultly walking and a child being born with one arm); A couple mentions of some women laughing at another woman for being clumsy and breaking her ankle.
Sexual Content- Two almost kisses (one in a dream), two hand kisses, two hair/forehead kisses, two cheek kisses, two barely-above-not-detailed kisses, and six semi-detailed kisses (including two of him kissing her neck); Remembering kisses & almost kisses (up to semi-detailed); Staring at another’s lips & being tempted by the thought of kissing the other (up to semi-detailed); Wanting to kiss (up to semi-detailed); Touches, Embraces, Being held, & Nearness (up to semi-detailed); Wanting to touch & embrace (up to semi-detailed); Swooning; Blushes; Noticing (including muscles, up to semi-detailed); Louisa recalls when a potential suitor (who was drunk) sneaked into her room and tried to force himself on her (also called trying to steal her “virtue”; she was able to knock him out and she had nightmares of it for weeks after, mentioned a few times, barely-above-not-detailed); Both Louisa & Charles aren’t interested in marriage due to past events; Charles thought he was in love with a wealth woman and entered her bedroom to find out that she’s been stringing him and other knights along (she’s engaged to someone else and tells the knights they can love her from afar; Charles says he doesn’t want to spend his life in love with a married woman; They had prior shared kisses); Louisa disguises herself as a boy on her trip (including by binding her chest), but Charles realizes she’s a girl right away; When Charles helps her, Louisa is afraid that he’ll want something in payment that not money (she doesn’t think he’s that kind of man, but is distrustful towards men because of a prior event); Louisa starts to wish that Charles could see her as a pretty and feminine woman; A friar asks if there is something between Louisa and Charles that “would be considered fornication” (which they both quickly deny); Louisa and Charles sleep close to each other on the ground when a storm keeps them in a shelter/cave (they both think about how much they want to kiss the other, but Charles definitely won’t kiss her when she’s asleep because that would be unchivalrous); Louisa’s uncle comments on her running off by saying that bad things would happen to her and that she “would be with child and then [she] would be no good to him anymore”; Louisa’s uncle asks if she’s with child & she answers that she is not and asks him if he is (he says that would be impossible and she responds that it is the same for her); After one kiss that leaves them breathing hard, Charles comments on needing to be “a bit more restrained until we’re married and alone with a lock on the door”; Many mentions of Louisa’s uncle trying to marry her and her twelve-year-old sister off to man (ranging in age from 16 to 60 and some are called “disgusting” and “perverted”) for the highest amount (it’s also said that some of the men will just “use [Louisa and Margaret] and not care about them”); Mentions of kisses & kissing; Mentions of reputations, virtue, & it being looked as “unseemly” that Louisa & Charles are traveling alone together; Mentions of flirting; A few mentions of men leering at Louisa with greedy and disgusting smiles & make her feel as if there were bugs “crawling on her”; A couple mentions of men trying and succeeding in taking advantage of servant girls; A couple mentions of men “blustering about their conquests or making ribald jests” about women; A couple mentions of children born out of wedlock (including Jesus); A couple mentions of jealousy; A mention of seeing a couple kissing (barely-above-not-detailed); Love, falling in love, & the emotions;
*Note: Margaret (Louisa’s younger sister) comments on her lack of breasts and sticks out her flat chest to Louisa; A man comments on Louisa being “well proportioned”; Mentions of women being forced to marry & bear a man’s children (Louisa mentions this for herself and her younger sister & being “used” by a man who only care “about having a boy child to carry on his name”); Louisa is concerned about falling into the same “trap” that her aunt and uncle set for her about “marriage and a life of having babies until her body was so worn down that it gave up”; A mention of Margaret not being able to bear children yet, but would be able to soon; A mention of a wife dying in childbirth to a stillborn baby.
-Louisa Lenton, age 18
-Charles Raynsford, age 21
P.O.V. switches between them
Set in 1388 (Medieval)
304 pages
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Pre Teens-
New Teens-
Early High School Teens-
Older High School Teens-
My personal Rating-
After some…concerns with content in a couple other books of this series, I was pleasantly surprised that this one did not have an insta-love attraction between the main characters. They fell more for the other’s personality than their physical appearance (though, they did notice the other’s physical assets) which was better to see after said prior books in the series.
I’m learning with a lot of fairytale retellings, that you really have to suspend your disbelief for a lot of the book. At least, that’s how I’ve been feeling with the series. Louisa is not the brightest bulb in the chandelier. I don’t understand her logic of wanting to protect her sister and then goes off to find the treasure which means she’s leaving her 12-year-old sister alone with the people that are trying to marry her off?? She estimates that she would have a week to stop a wedding from happening if she comes back to that, but that’s way too close for my comfort and events can come up to alter travel plans—especially in this time period when plans get derailed easily.
I liked the Charles wasn’t fooled by her disguise at all, that he instantly knew that she was a girl. He did have about the same personality though as his brothers in the prior books especially because they all really want to do is rescue damsels in distress and be all knightly. There really hasn’t been much difference in their thoughts, compared to the prior main characters of this series.
I wasn’t a fan of the message of asking God for a sign and then Louisa brushing off a priests’ comment on the topic. In this series, I have noted that if there are priests or any type of clergyman (friars even) their comments get pushed to the side because the main characters know what the Bible says about such topic they’re discussing. (Because they’ve been privileged enough to have been able to read the Holy Writ for themselves.) And I think the author is trying to point out that you should read the Bible for yourself and just the overall the judgmental era of the history with the Catholic Church, but it also puts those supposed to be men of God in a bad and judgmental light. I could go much more in depth on my thoughts about both of those elements, but this review is long enough.
Honestly, it wasn’t terrible. It wasn’t fantastic either, in my opinion. I liked it more before all the kissing happened. I feel like it’s just a bit too much kissing to be read by preteens. And that’s what I feel like fairytale retellings are really for—or should be aimed for—especially in the Christian Market when the plot is very fluffy like in this book. Older teens would probably be absolutely fine with that amount of kissing, but the storyline may be too simple and cheesy for some. Definitely better than the prior books of the series in terms of plot and characters, but I still just didn’t love it, unfortunately, and would not give it a wide age recommendation.
See y’all on Friday with a new review!
*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
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