Pell Ridley, daughter of a good for nothing preacher in mid-19th century England, has watched her mother crushed by the burden of too many children and too little money. Unwilling to repeat her fate, Pell runs away before dawn on her wedding day, taking only her beautiful white horse. But as Pell heads for Salisbury Fair in search of work and a new life, she finds that her ties to home refuse to release her -- even as she journeys through a strange world of gypsies, lost things and unlikely love.
* from the back cover of the book *
The writing is pretty but the plot was a little bland for me.
This is the second Rosoff book I've gotten into (the first being What I Was) and I don't know if I'm starting with the wrong ones? I'm on the fence about her books so far. While there is something to her writing style I like, and there were elements to the story here I enjoyed, as a whole it was a little vanilla for me. I was interested in the relationship between Dogman and Pell, I thought something intriguing was there, just wish it had been developed a little more. Pell by herself though, I found a bit boring and immature.
Also, was it just me or was she just kinda whatever about trying to track down her brother?! I mean, some efforts were made but it felt like she was mostly just waiting for the situation to resolve itself. I may try some more of Rosoff's stuff down the road because, like I said, there are elements to her books that I do enjoy, but so far it doesn't seem to be the type of writing I would later crave.
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