Such Things Happen

Rating: 4/5

Review: "It was bitter cold, the air electric with all that had not happened yet." Read that sentence, and tell me you're not intrigued. I certainly was. This book was intense, disturbing, erotic, tragic, and even a little romantic in some ways. Catherine Land has a plan, but she has no idea how much her life will change once she's married to Ralph Truitt. He has his own agenda in regards to his new wife, who has lied to him from the very beginning. Of course, he doesn't realize how much this woman will come to mean to him by the end. In the midst of all of that turmoil, there is a dark and depressing look at the tragic life in a cold Wisconsin countryside in the early 1900's. I couldn't turn away no matter how disturbing the words got, certain descriptions that made me cringe. They were hypnotic, engrossing, beautiful, ugly. I had goosebumps by the end, and not the fearful kind. More like the kind you'd get when something tremendous has touched you, and has made you feel so lucky to be where you are, instead of where you could've ended up.

Book Description:
He placed a notice in a Chicago paper, an advertisement for "a reliable wife." She responded, saying that she was "a simple, honest woman." She was, of course, anything but honest, and the only simple thing about her was her single-minded determination to marry this man and then kill him, slowly and carefully, leaving her a wealthy widow, able to take care of the one she truly loved.What Catherine Land did not realize was that the enigmatic and lonely Ralph Truitt had a plan of his own. And what neither anticipated was that they would fall so completely in love.