WINDS OF DESTINY

Author:
Jayne Bullock

Show, don’t tell. This is the pithy advice given to writers.

Many American history classes tell the story of the Puritans, their search for religious freedom, and their subsequent immigration to the New World. Jayne Bullock’s novel “Winds of Destiny” shows the story, which many history book writers only tell.

The author has thoroughly researched this tumultuous period, showing the details and the settings of the times. The writing brings to life the regional dialects of the characters.

The book is quite relevant for today, in many ways. First, it can give us a better understanding of American history. What were the struggles of people of conscious in a land that did not tolerate religious freedom? What events in mother England drove the Puritans to such places like America?

Since I have been researching life in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in Europe, I was most interested in Jayne’s historical novel during such times. I liked this story because she humanized this period as narrated in the first person of the heroine. I would recommend this book not only to those who love a good yarn of adventure and romance, but to Anglophiles as well. It covers the few decades in the seventeenth century when England actually became a republic, which is fascinating.

~ S.K. Smith, Author