Dear Mr Knightley
December 2nd, 2013. Filed under: This & That.Dear Mr Knightley
By Katherine Reay
Samantha Moore has always hidden behind the words of others-namely her favorite characters in literature. Now, she will learn to write her own story-by giving that story to a complete stranger.
Growing up orphaned and alone, Sam found her best friends in the works of Austen, Dickens, and the Brontë sisters. The problem is that she now relates to others more comfortably as Elizabeth Bennet and Jane Eyre than as herself.
Sometimes we lose ourselves in the things we care about most.
But life for this twenty-three-year-old is about to get stranger than fiction, when an anonymous benefactor (calling himself “Mr. Knightley”) offers to put Sam through the prestigious Medill School of Journalism. There is only one catch: Sam must write frequent letters to the mysterious donor, detailing her progress.
As Sam’s program and peers force her to confront her past, she finds safety in her increasingly personal letters to Mr. Knightley. And when Sam meets eligible, best-selling novelist Alex Powell, those letters unfold a story of love and literature that feels as if it’s pulled from her favorite books. But when secrets come to light, Sam is — once again — made painfully aware of how easily trust can be broken.
ISLAND BREEZES
Samantha literally lives her books. She doesn’t know how to deal with real life or how to treat friends. But her life is about to turn into a story book as an anonymous benefactor puts her through journalism school. He even goes so far as to buy her clothes and rent an apartment for her. The catch – she has to write him letters to let him know how she is progressing.
I truly enjoyed watching Sam’s progress through her letters to Mr. Knightly. It was also good to see the way Alex brought her out of herself.
This was a wonderful debut novel. I’m looking forward to many more by Ms Reay.
***A special thank you to litfuse for providing a review copy.***
Katherine Reay has enjoyed a life-long affair with the works of Jane Austen and her contemporaries. After earning degrees in history and marketing from Northwestern University, she worked as a marketer for Proctor & Gamble and Sears before returning to school to earn her MTS. Her works have been published in “Focus on the Family” and the “Upper Room.” Katherine currently lives with her husband and three children in Seattle. “Dear Mr. Knightley” is her first novel.