review and tour: the bridegrooms by allison pittman

When the Allenhouse girls were small, their mother took off one night. The girls never knew exactly what happened to their mother, though eventually their father told them she'd died. Years later when the youngest is nearly an adult, a man arrives who has some answers--he had an affair with their mother and might be the father of the youngest daughter! Unfortunately not much more is done with this plot point as the focus of the novel is the love lives of the four girls. I wish the possibility Lissette isn't an Allenhouse had been at the forefront because the romances were unremarkable and rushed. Vada dates a man who won't commit, so she ends up tempted by others including a baseball player. Hazel thinks herself unattractive and simply wishes to marry anyone, probably a stranger in Wyoming, so she can gain the right to vote. Althea, who hasn't said a word since their mother ran off, falls for the man knocked out by a ball hit by Vada's crush. Lissette is a stunning beauty never without a suitor. She doesn't think much of the one pursuing her--a baseball player who feels he would've caught the ball that knocked out the man in the crowd if he hadn't been distracted by Lissette's beauty. By the end of the book, the love lives of all four are wrapped up a little too neatly.

Although there were interesting parts to The Bridegrooms, I found myself distracted by some little inaccuracies. For example, in the first chapter Vada spots the time on the wristwatch of a male newspaper reporter; the chapter heading is "Spring 1898." I immediately put the book down. It seems very unlikely that Dave Voyant would be wearing a wristwatch as they didn't become popular until the 1920s and women were the primary wearers. In 1898, a man would've likely used a pocket watch, but then Vada wouldn't have been able to do her lame "oh look at the time" routine. Although I did continue reading and finish The Bridegrooms, I couldn't help but remain on alert for more mistakes.
2/5
Review copy provided by the publisher, WaterBrook Press.