Book Review: "Love Finds You in Victory Heights, Washington" by Tricia Goyer and Ocieanna Fleiss

The Second World War has stolen Rosalie's fiance from her. But rather than wallow, Rosalie throws herself into her work at the Boeing plant in Victory Heights, shooting rivets into the B-17 bombers that will destroy the enemy. A local reporter dubs her Seattle's Own Rosie the Riveter, and her story lends inspiration to women across the country. While Rosalie's strong arms can bear the weight of this new responsibility, her heart cannot handle the intense feelings that begin to surface for Kenny, the handsome reporter. Fear of a second heartbreak is a powerful opponent - but will it claim victory over love?

I really like World War II stories that take place away from the battlefront. I mean, stories about soldiers and the actual war are interesting but I'm more interested in the background stories. Stories about the people who were back at home, waiting for the men to come back or who were doing their best to support the troops. My favorite stories from this time period are about the women who took over all these male dominated jobs and proved that they could work just as well as any man. Therefore I was looking forward to this book which focused on exactly that subject.

I really loved all the historical fact and research that went into writing this novel. Every Tricia Goyer book that I have read clearly shows that she worked hard to get all the facts straight before writing the book. While the focus is on the home front vs the battlefield, the story still paints an accurate description of how the war affected Americans. I really could picture myself in that time period, listening to the music, wearing the clothes, seeing the hairstyles. It was all told very vividly with lots of description and detail. I loved the incorporation of real life people mixing with the characters in the book. For example, I'm glad that Lana Turner was included in the story and not a fake 40s movie star. It just adds more depth to the story because it seems more realistic. My favorite scene in the book is when Rosalie and the other women make their male bosses eat their words by beating out the record for their job. Even though that history shows that once the war ended, the men would reclaim their jobs, events like this showed disbelievers that women were more than just housewives.

Even though I really liked the setting of the story and the overall plot there were just parts of the story that seemed to drag to me. It wasn't that I was bored with the story or the characters, but some parts of the story seemed very slow. I enjoyed the characters but there were times when I felt a bit disconnected from them. I also was NOT a fan of Lanie. It really bugged me that she could not see that she had done something wrong. If she had done this for revenge or to try to make herself look better, I could understand that. But she simply kept shrugging and wondering why in the world Rosalie wasn't happy with her for doing what she did. It just drove me NUTS!

Overall, I did enjoy this book. It was a entertaining and fun read, yet also a good historical look at the time period. Also the characters had strong faith and beliefs during the story, which was crucial for the time. I enjoyed reading this story from this talented duo and looking forward to more from them in the future.

Love Finds You in Victory Heights, Washington by Tricia Goyer and Ocieanna Fleiss is published by Summerside Press (2010)

This review copy was provided for a blog tour with Lit Fuse Publicity

Other stops on the blog tour can be found here.

Contest: Tricia is giving away 5 Victory Prize Packs of 5 of her books including LFY in Victory Heights. Click here for more information: http://triciagoyer.blogspot.com/2010/08/win-victory-prize-pack.html