A Sweet Lowcountry Proposal

Williams brings readers back to the South Carolina setting of her debut novel, A Lowcountry Bride, as she introduces wedding planner Jaslene and archivist Marcus. Jaslene called off their wedding after her sister Hope tragically died on their wedding day two years ago, but they begin to reconnect when Jaslene plans a mutual friend’s wedding at Charleston’s Black history museum, where Marcus works. Jaslene, still reeling from her sister’s death, struggles to reconnect with Marcus at first, but readers will enjoy watching them rekindle their relationship. There is also a fascinating subplot in which Marcus researches his family’s history, which could easily be its own novel, and which ties beautifully into the book’s exploration of the ways that grief shapes people and their relationships. Some of these digressions take away from the romance, which could have been developed a bit more, but Williams’s nuanced observations of the ways in which trauma and history affect relationships and her lush, detailed descriptions of the South Carolina Lowcountry more than make up for occasionally clunky dialogue and some plot points that are tied up a bit too neatly.