Book Review: The Wedding Gift by Kathleen McKenna

The Deal: Leann Worthier is 18 and about to marry into the richest family in her small, Oklahoma town: The Willets, even though her future mother in law isn't thrilled at the idea. But Leann is pregnant and George Junior seems to be ready to come up to scratch.

Since Leann refuses to live with her mother in law, George gives her the Old Willet's house, which has sat unoccupied since George's uncle and his cousins were brutally murdered by their own wife/mother. This is the house that also claimed Leann's brother's life when she was but a baby, having died in a freak accident when him and his best friend were there on a dare.

But Leanne is not the type to turn down such a splendid gift, and soon she finds herself haunted by the ghost of Robina Willets, presumed murderess of the previous occupants of the mansion.

My Thoughts: I'm sad to say I had several problems with this book. It started promising enough with Leann telling us about herself and George and well, lots of general information about the Willets and her own family; and I first I thought the writing was pretty nice with a very chatty style, but the more time passed the less I liked Leann, and so such intimate style of story telling stopped to work.

Also, it took forever to get to the whole haunted house thing, for about a third of the book it was just Leann rambling on and on about how she first hooked up with George Junior (which was just creepy as she was just 17 and he was ways older, and he knew she was under age but that didn't stop him from giving her alcohol and drugs). And she comes off as such a vain, unlikable person that I just couldn't get over it.

As for the haunted house, scary story... I didn't find it all that scary. Plus, I don't know much about Oklahoma's standing as "the South" but the southern characterization of the story sounded rather fake to me. And I can't really recommend this book.