To Find Her Place by Susan Anne Mason

 

In the  second offering of the Redemption's Light series, Mason reintroduces reader to former case worker Jane Linder and wounded veteran Garret Wilder as they both seek to fill the acting director position for the Toronto CAS. 

While I feel this is the weaker book in the series so far, there are still a lot of elements that make this book worth a look regardless of whether or not they've read A Haven For Her Heart (which I highly recommend!). 

Once again, Mason doesn't shy away from heavier topics to add some depth and realism into her books. I appreciated watching Jane interact with the children in the society's care and Mason's inclusion of how some children grief can appear as anger and/or misbehavior.  I also appreciated her exploration of grief as it related to life altering injury and that she had her characters take time to explore what that meant on an emotional and mental level. Obviously a book tackling WW II era elements will at least touch on grief but I was impressed both with the sheer natural variety Mason includes in this tale as well as how naturally she allows her characters to articulate their grief, even if it's messy.

The story itself was interesting. I appreciate how Mason tackles historical events that are close to home as a fellow Ontarian. She isn't afraid to delve into lesser covered areas and I enjoyed experiencing this fictional account of how children's aid worked in the WW II era. I also appreciated how naturally Jane and Garrett's relationship developed. She took the time to incorporate the back stories she gave them for a natural progression that was far more satisfying. The side story of the missing money was also interesting but felt very much a side story, that wrapped up quickly and without fanfare.

Which touches upon my critique, many of the storylines in this book wrapped up quickly and far more sweetly than was believable given the nature and era of the story. Almost everyone came back from war, children placed with families healed from their issues easily and smoothly, a character faced a disabling injury that he recovered from quickly but also had people bending over backwards to help with accessibility plans in case they didn't (as someone with a disability I confess I laughed at everyone's eagerness to accommodate). After such serious elements it made the ending feel too "fairytale" in some ways for me. While I somewhat expected and maybe even rooted for the unbelievable happy ending it just felt too clean and polished.

3.75 out of 5 stars.

"Book has been provided courtesy of Baker Publishing Group and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc."