The Light in the Darkness

Edward Greyson leaves his James River plantation in Virginia to visit his friend, Kayne, and to please his sister by bringing home a wife. ""Grey,"" who doesn't want to marry, thumbs his nose at convention by wedding himself to a dirty tavern wench, Jennifer Leigh Wilton, a 17-year-old who is tired of being beaten and groped on the job. But Jennie has her work cut out for her trying to find happiness with Grey, a boozer and a boor. Grey's first wife, Diana, was raped and murdered, and Grey believes he himself was responsible. Although the reader knows poor Grey has been wounded, it's still pretty hard to like him. Jennifer cleans up well; she is bright and, it turns out, a musical prodigy. By the time her husband decides to mend his ways, however, the reader knows that she can do better. First-time novelist Fisher, a native Virginian, falls short in creating a convincing relationship between her characters in this 18th-century romance. (Oct.)