Carolina Gold by Dorothy Love
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Dorothy Love writes "Carolina Gold"


This is the story of a young woman who returns to the old plantation after the war to refurbish and try to make a living raising Rice.
she has many problems from the house needing lot of work to the fields that she needs help with to grow crops.
Many of the black people that used to be slaves that she thought would be loyal and help didn't want to work for wages.  with a small crew she worked alongside them to make a rice crop.  Many times failing and starting again.
The beautiful lowcountry is just that,with the river nearby where she could use a boat to go upriver to her summer home at Pawley's Island, which was also in bad shape but livable and she so enjoyed the summers there when she was a kid playing on nearby beach. Many memories came back as she sat on the little beach...
Not long after coming back to the plantation she meets Nicholas Baetencourt who has two little girls that needs someone to tutor them since their mama had died, he ask Charlotte to take on the work.  she is reluctant at first but when she has such hard times with the rice crops and needs money she takes the job part-time.
A young boy named Daniel showed up one day hoping he could sit it on the girls lessons and learn too.  He was refused at first but when she found out he was homeless , he too ended up learning with the girls and helping out around the plantation for Charlotte in exchange of food and place to sleep.
I enjoyed reading the story of how all these people came together and became "almost family".  You will learn many things about the south as you read this story and I was thrilled to learn that a young woman by the name of Elizabeth Waites Allston Pringle actually did work in the rice fields of her family home after the war and was the inspiration for this story Dorothy has told.  I love to read about strong women who try to make a difference in the world.


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