This HaBO is from Linnea, who is looking for this historical romance. The request does deal with a pandemic as a warning:
This is extremely vague. Not sure when I read this book, I don’t remember the author, and so on. I have been reading romance novels for at least 50 years…
The main thing I remember is that it takes place in or near New Mexico at a mission and takes place in 1918 because there is an influenza epidemic that plays an important part in the book. I think the heroine is a teacher, maybe at the mission school? Another woman comes to the place to teach, but she brings illness with her and suddenly everyone gets sick. The heroine implements good sanitation and mask wearing.
That’s all I remember, except of course there was a hero with an HEA.
Does this ring any bells?
Man, I thought this was maybe a historical by Kathleen Eagle, FIRE AND RAIN, but that’s about the Lakota and has an earlier timeline, I think. I’m definitely curious about the 1918 setting.
I had thought this might be one of Carla Kelly’s westerns – but since I haven’t read any of them (have just been aware of them in passing) I couldn’t pinpoint which title it could be. A trip to her website didn’t clarify matters so I might just be wrong on this one, lol.
It is definitely NOT Carla Kelly; I have read all of her books multiple times. She did not recognize the plot, but thanks anyway!
This has nothing to do with the book,sorry.
We named our daughter Linnea. I rarely find someone with the same name. It’s so lovely.
I agree. In case you did not know, it is a Swedish flower named after Linnaeus, the physician who developed the system for naming plants and animals.
It’s not the book in question but Years by LaVyrle Spencer features a school teacher in North Dakota. Her name is Linnea. The book begins in 1917 and the Spanish influenza plays a role.
It’s a book I’ve reread many times.
There are similarities to Holly Bush’s Contract to Wed. A widow marries a rancher in Texas who happens to have political ambitions. A newly hired teacher arrives with the flu and most of the people on the ranch get sick. She had lost family to an earlier outbreak so she knows the best ways to fight it. I don’t remember if masking was part of it. It did take place in 1891 – I had to check – so it probably isn’t it.
I don’t know this book, even though I live in New Mexico. But if you’re interested in a New Mexico setting that takes place during (and before and after) World War 1, I can recommend this one, which I’d call historical fiction with a romantic element:
A Blaze of Poppies
A novel about New Mexico and World War I
Feisty little Agnes Day is determined to keep the family ranch and run it alone on her own terms. The last thing she wants is to fall under the authority of a husband who has different interests that will keep her from the land she loves.
A family death along with the attack of a nearby town threatens her ability to keep the ranch—making her goal seemingly impossible. Agnes presses on and trains to become a nurse, then volunteers to go over there to help the thousands of doughboys suffering in the trenches of the greatest war the world has known.
As Agnes moves ever closer to the front line, she faces increasingly primitive and dangerous conditions. She is challenged beyond endurance, but also surprised to find a man she could share her life with. Agnes gives her heart to the quiet and competent Will Bowers, who loves the Sunset Ranch just as much as she does. But, Will is haunted by a dark secret. Until he can come to terms with his past he will continue to move from town to town.
Can Agnes secure a peaceful future on the Sunrise Ranch after the insanity and bloodshed of war? Dare she hope to share that future with someone else?
Marlene – I have a cousin Linnea, and it made my parents’ short list for my name, too. My mother is half Swedish. I’ve never met a Linnea that I wasn’t related to!