Ebook Cover
At First Sight: Althea Winsloe's first marriage wasn't necessarily bad, but she's not inclined to repeat it -- he father basically left her to live with relatives after he remarried when she was a child and she doesn't want her son, Baby Paisley, to feel unwanted like she did - no matter how much the town wants her to, or how much her mother in law meddles.But life in the Ozark Mountains isn't easy, and she did inherit a good farm from her late husband, a farm a lot of people want to get their hands on.
Enter Jesse Best - who everyone calls Simple Jess because when he was born he was deprived of oxygen for a few minutes and his mind has always been a little slow as a result.
Jesse doesn't care about the farm, but he does want to get one of Althea's husbands hunting dogs - which she wants to sell as they take too much time and money to care for - so they strike a deal: Althea will give him the dogs if he helps her get the farm ready for winter.
Since this excels even Jesse's wildest dreams, he's happy and eager to work. Althea has her doubts as to if Jesse knows what needs to be done, but as he sees him work, she realizes that he does know a lot of farming, sometimes better than she does.
At the same time, Althea is being pursued by two very different men - Eben and Oather - something Jesse doesn't like even though he isn't sure why.
Second Glance: I read Simple Jess because a couple of friends of mine said it was a good read. I wasn't sure how it was going to work because of Jesse's condition but it totally worked and it was great.
Jesse was such a lovely character, yes his mind is slow but he's smart in is own way. It takes him a while to learn things but once he does he doesn't forget. He's very good natured and sometimes people take advantage of him and talk down to him, so he relies on his brother in law and sister to help him out when he doesn't know something.
Althea was a little harder to like but after a while she starts to make sense, she's stubborn and spoils her son, but she has a good heart and she slowly starts to see through what she has always known about Jesse to the man he really is. She realizes he's a good provider in his own way - he's a good hunter and farmer, and knows right from wrong.
The subplots were a bit distracting - they are about Eben, Oather and Oather's sister Mavis - and I didn't care for them, but they weren't bad - though there was this scene between Eben and Mavis that was hard to read. But I really liked the central part of the story.
