I wanted to like this book and I found several things about it that pleased me very much. To begin with, Swan’s Grace has one of the loveliest covers I’ve seen all year. In addition, I was very happy to see a book set in 19th century Boston with a musician as its heroine. Although I do love the British Isles, sometimes it’s nice to come back to the States. There is an interesting story in Swan’s Grace but the telling of it was a bit too ambitious for the length of the book. There’s simply too story and too many characters.

Sophie Wentworth was a child prodigy – a cellist who amazed people with her ability to play so well for one so young. But as she grew older and became less of a wunderkind, she gave up her pursuit of art for cheap popularity. Sophie has become a European sensation – not for the beauty of her technique, but for her showmanship. She wears beautiful and slightly provocative gowns, expensive jewelry and plays flashy pieces that have been adapted for the cello from popular operas. Bach? The classics? Too staid. Since she has become the toast of Europe, Sophie plans to return to Boston and dazzle them (and incidently, make her distant father notice her.)

When Sophie returns, she is horrified to find that her father has sold her beloved home, Swan’s Grace, to Grayson Hawthorne. Not only that, her father has betrothed her to Grayson.

Grayson Hawthorne is the oldest of the three Hawthorne brothers. They were raised by a stern, remote father who kept their mother from expressing any softer emotions toward them. Grayson has become a successful attorney and is considered a prize catch by the Boston debutants, but he is emotionally cold. Secretly, he loves Sophie and has always cared for her since she was a pesky little girl following him around with a cello.

There is a large cast here who are all troubled and sad. Grayson’s father was not only distant, he was cruel to his sons and his wife and he hasn’t changed a bit. Grayson’s mother is hurt from her husband’s rejection of her and secretly pursues her old dream of becoming an artist; her pursuit puts in her the path of a man with whom she was once in love. Sophie’s father married again right after her mother’s death and is busy with his new wife and family. For him, the facade is all and he hides his financial problems from everyone. Grayson himself is repressed and unable to express the love he secretly feels for Sophie, while Sophie herself hides under a facade of flippancy.

Eventually, family secrets meet the light of day and skeletons in the closet come tumbling out. Sophie and Grayson achieve their HEA, but given their dysfunctional family dynamics – I wondered if and how they would truly ever be happy.

If ever a book cried out to be a big, long leisurely family saga, this one did. It was so chock-full of incidents that I wished it could have been three times as long to examine the characters and their pasts. As it is, Swan’s Grace is a not-too-bad story, but oh, what it could have been!