Jessica is the fifth in the Springwater series by Linda Lael Miller, about a small town growing up around a stage coach station in Montana in the late 1800s. This book is strong in authenticity but weak in character development and plot detail; it’s a fault that’s hard to avoid in a book of this length (151 pages).

Jessica Barnes has fled a scandalous situation in the East for Springwater at the invitation of her brother, arriving to find he and his bride dead and their newborn twin daughters orphaned. She determines to stay and make a go of her brother’s newspaper so that she can forge a future for herself and her two nieces. She has already formed opinions about Springwater and its inhabitants from her brother’s letters. For instance, she knows to dislike Gage Calloway on sight, since he was her brother’s enemy and, in her mind, likely the one to blame for her brother’s business failure and death.

Gage Calloway is a wealthy attorney and the mayor of Springwater. He ignores Jessica’s rudeness, helps her every chance he gets, and is altogether a more sympathetic character than the heroine.

Fans of westerns will appreciate Linda Lael Miller’s obvious knowledge of this time and place in history. This book is written with simplicity, authentic in language and imagery. The lack of satisfaction I experienced in the story stems from it’s brevity. Jessica and Gage’s love grows in a natural way, a crisis occurs to bring things to a head, but the book culminates so abruptly I had to check to make sure I really was on the last page.

Jessica and Gage remained only a little more than stick figures in my mind – not fully developed characters that will remain in my memory. Since this is the first of this series that I have read, it is possible that details build from one book to the next, but stepping in at this juncture left me feeling like a stranger walking into a family reunion. I found a town and lots of characters who are likeable at first meeting, but without more details, there is nothing to grab my emotions or my interest. The misunderstanding Jessica has about Gage and his character is not fully explained, and the truth never comes out other than a few stray comments made by one character or another that contradict what Jessica had either heard from her brother or had assumed.

On the other hand, this book did leave a lingering sense of a simpler and harsher time, and I could feel the sting of Montana winter air, and the warmth of people who look out for one another in order to survive. So I am not altogether sorry I visited Springwater, and perhaps I will wander through again some time.