The Ground She Walks Upon - Softcover

Rendering the fanciful plausible through strong characterization, McKinney ( When Angels Fall ) spins a romance set in Ireland in the middle and late 1800s. According to a Celtic legend, arrogant Lord Niall Trevallyan is destined to marry the woman whose identity is signaled by a magical cross. When the ancient amulet is interpreted, the intended bride seems to be an illegitimate baby, Ravenna. Trevallyan flaunts his scorn for the ancient plan, marrying several times but never finding the love and family he craves. When Ravenna matures, polished but headstrong, he feels stirrings of passion. Obstacles galore arise before the requisite romantic ending, including uprising by locals, pursuit of Ravenna by aristocratic rakes, accidents and a famine caused by the failure to honor the fated betrothal. Trevellyan is a fine if derivative hero, stern and powerful, sometimes even cruel, always amorous. Ravenna conventionally spars with and beds him, but McKinney adds another dimension to her portrayal by giving her literary aspirations: Ravenna writes and publishes a novel, with homage to Mary Wollstonecraft. While this novel is surely not for Wollstonecraft devotees, it is more than competently rendered, distinguished by its colorful setting, gothic sensibility and the interaction between its appealing protagonists.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

For hundreds of years, the Lords Trevellyan have ensured the prosperity of County Lir by following the dictates of an Irish curse placed upon their English ancestors when they were given Irish land. In 1828, a magical Celtic cross reveals the identity of his bride to Niall Trevellyn on the eve of his 20th birthday; she is an illegitimate orphan named Ravenna. Proclaiming himself a modern thinker, Trevellyan flaunts the curse and marries another, thus beginning a cycle of misfortune for himself. The emotions between Trevellyan and Ravenna are riveting: he alternates between fascination, contempt, and petulance while she is conflicted by her independence, loneliness, and parentage. The good plot could have fared even better had McKinney spent fewer pages on Ravenna's own writings and more on the action and dialog of secondary characters (rather than narrative) to support the psychological motivations of her main characters. Recommended for public libraries.
- Kimberly Martin, Washington Univ. Law Lib., St. Louis
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.