When you open the pages of Susan Meissner’s Fall of Marigolds, you will find yourself reading a double story.

It begins with Taryn on the 10-year anniversary of her widowhood; her husband perished in the South Tower on 9/11. She had just read the plus sign of her pregnancy test that morning. She planned to meet him and tell him the news.

Now, ten years later, her dramatic dilemmas are: should she consent to some news interviews? Will she ever again see the scarf she lost that day?

If that’s not enough drama for you, at least Meissner inserts Taryn’s own 9/11 moments: walking down the street as it shakes from the first plane’s impact; the cloud of dust; waiting for news back at her apartment.

The companion story portrays Clara, a survivor of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911. Post-fire, Clara flees to Ellis Island and joins the nursing staff. One Welsh patient asks Clara to retrieve his most precious possession from the luggage room. This is where Clara stumbles onto a secret.

Clara’s nurse friends make the most of their days off, dancing in Manhattan or sunning themselves on the Jersey Shore. Clara never goes with them, for she is too grief-stricken by the great love she lost in the fire, Edward, who worked a few floors above her.

Along comes a persistent if wooden young doctor (Wait a minute, here. Did someone trick me into reading romance??) offering to help her out of her staying-on-Ellis rut.

Will she overcome her grief and step off the island? Will she reveal the secret? Will a certain scarf get back to its owner?

Do all these scarves tie the two stories together? (Bad pun, I know, but it kinda makes my point.)

Except for the 9/11 scenes, the whole book felt contrived. Clara mourning her lost Edward? I can hear Dr. Laura’s advice now: “Sweetie, there was no great romance here. It was a few significant glances across the factory floor, plus a couple elevator rides. Go to lunch with your doctor friend. Call me next week to tell me how it went.”

Photo credits:  ellenm1 on Visualhunt / CC BY-NC