The Beloved Invader

by Price, Eugenia

• ISBN13: 9781596528451
• ISBN10: 1596528451
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-05-29
• Publisher: Turner Pub Co

Summary

A timeless tale of one man's devotion toward the women he loves, the sorrow of lost love, and the beautiful island on which compassion and kindness abound.In this masterful novel by Eugenia Price, a wealthy young northerner, Anson Dodge,discovers new meaning in his life on St. Simons Island, Georgia, just after the Civil War. A man of remarkable and unforgettable kindness and strength, he shares his heart with two very different women - Ellen, who passionately adores him, and Anna, who comforts him in sorrow. They each surrender themselves to his dreams. Anson's story unfolds as a beautiful tale of honor when he rebuilds the war-torn Christ Church, Frederica, in memory of happy and lost love.

Excerpts

  When he swung into the saddle on the borrowed mare at daybreak on a December morning in the year 1879, young Anson Dodge could think of nothing except that he hated his father.
     The New York streets had been rutted with ice when his mother and Ellen had seen him off for the South a few days ago. Now, as he galloped coatless across the southern end of St. Simons Island, through the red gold of the lingering Georgia autumn, the city seemed unreal. As unreal as that Anson Greene Phelps Dodge, Sr., could be his father.
     "You haven't been with him since you were thirteen, son," Rebecca Dodge had said, sitting between Anson and Ellen in the carriage because they wanted her there. "Six years bring a lot of change—more than a young man of nineteen realizes. He'll be a stranger to you."
     Waiting for the ferryboat that would take him across the Hudson to the train, his mother had tried once more.
     "Your father will be his usual charming self. He'll act as though six years' absence from us is nothing at all."
     Anson covered her gloved hands with his. "None of what you're saying is penetrating in any way except to remind me that I love you desperately, Queen Victoria!"
     "I'm neither old nor plump enough to remind you of Queen Victoria, and I should resent that."