Book Review: The Silent Songbird

The Silent Songbird by Melanie Dickerson is a Christian fiction retelling loosely based on “The Little Mermaid.” It’s book 7 of the Hagenheim/ Fairy Tale Romance Series, so some other characters in the other books appear here, mainly from The Merchant’s Daughter, as the hero here is the son of the couple there. But it could be read as a stand-alone book.

In this book, Evangeline is the ward of her cousin, King Richard II. When he plans for her to marry Lord Shively, a much older man whom she finds disgusting, she decides to escape. Her maid, and older woman named Muriel, finds out and, not being able to stop her, comes with her.

Evangeline is known for her beauitful singing voice, so she decides to act as if she is mute as part of her disguise. She and Muriel travel with a group going away from the castle back to their home village. Right away Evangeline notices that the apparent leader, Wesley le Wyse, is both handsome and kind. He notices her as well, and feels sorry for her when Muriel tells him that Eva (as she’s known now) lost her voice when her master beat her. Eva and Westley find ways to communicate, and as she comes to know him better, she regrets deceiving him. She wants to tell him the truth but is afraid of how he might react to her deception.

When they get to Westley’s village, he gets Eva and Muriel jobs at his family’s home. But Eva has never been trained to do menial labor and either injures herself or someone else at everything she tries. Muriel is more capable but also more miserable, longing for home and a special someone there.

Eventually Westley catches on the Eva is not who she seems to be, learns of her deception, and is understandably angry. Just then Eva learns that Westley’s life is in danger, as is the king’s safety, but will anyone believe her now? And can she ever be forgiven, not only by other people, but by God?

“Losing everything is sometimes the price one must pay for doing the right thing.”

I wasn’t sure if perhaps Westley’s name was a nod to The Princess Bride, but when “As you wish” was said a couple of times, it seemed so.

This series is labeled as Young Adult, and I mentioned last time that most of them didn’t read that way to me. This one did seem meant for a younger audience, but I generally enjoyed it.

Genre: Christian fiction fairy tale
Objectionable elements: None
My rating: 8 out of 10

(Sharing with Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books and Carole’s Books You Loved)

 

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