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Rebecca Bryn
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Kindred and Affinity: When the man you love marries the sister you hate. A family saga of love and betrayal Kindle Edition

by Rebecca Bryn (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.0 out of 5 stars 20 ratings
In Victorian England, estranged sisters, Annie and Mary Ellen Underwood, fight for the love of one man, Edwin West. Their rivalry ignites passions, jealousies, family feuds, and deep hatreds already sparked by religious intolerance. Edwin loves them both, but both are forbidden fruit. Who will be the winners in this three-sided game, and what will be the price of a second chance at love for the losers? For lovers of Catherine Cookson.
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  1. Print length
    361 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Accessibility
    Learn more
  4. Publication date
    July 12, 2019
  5. File size
    4.4 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
  7. Word Wise
    Enabled
  8. Enhanced typesetting
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Editorial Reviews

Review

'The gritty realities of life for ordinary folk grappling with moral dilemmas against a background of poverty and disease.
Few writers take the trouble to explore the struggles of working men and women. Fewer still can convey both the pain and the joy that accompanies true love and the acts of forgiveness that lasting love entails. Such acts are the beating heart of all of Bryn's work.
From the evils of Auschwitz in "Touching the Wire" to the redemption of the torturer in the dystopian "Where Hope Dares" and now, with "Kindred and Affinity", Bryn mines the lives of hard working people and their relationships to provide us with stories that go beyond entertainment and information to make us think about what really matters in our own lives.
History should be about much more than those who died in the effort to make our lives better, or their leaders. It is also about those who survived, not only to tell the tale but to do all those mundane tasks that are at the root of the gradual improvements in our health, housing, working conditions and education. Who knows what emotional turmoil framed their lives? Rebecca Bryn knows. Thanks to her, we can too.' - Frank Parker, Medium.com'People don't step off the page, they jump. The loveable, the infuriating, and the vicious, all grounded to be so believable you half-expect to meet them in the street. Ms Bryn has given her many fans another un-put-downable winner!' - Readers' Favorite

From the Author

Kindred and Affinity is inspired by two snippets of family history, a great-grandfather who married sisters sixteen years before it was legal, and a great-grandfather who was an alcoholic and fell off a roof, drunk. There had to be a story there, didn't there? Unearthing the facts was a voyage of discovery and a joy, and I feel I know my roots in the small villages of Northamptonshire where I grew up that much better. It has been an honour to become acquainted with my forebears, and I hope you enjoy their tale.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07SXD2FB4
  • Accessibility ‏ : ‎ Learn more
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ July 12, 2019
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 4.4 MB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 361 pages
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.0 out of 5 stars 20 ratings

About the author

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Rebecca Bryn

Rebecca Bryn

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Rebecca lives near Britain's smallest city, St Davids, in the far west of Wales. Surrounded by stunning coastal and moorland scenery, she also loves to paint. She inherited her love of stories from her grandfather, who told stories with his hands: stories with colourful characters and unexpected endings. Her fascination with what makes people who they are, and the belief that life is many shades of grey, informs her writing. A Native American Indian proverb reads, 'Don't judge a man until you have walked two moons in his moccasins.' Rebecca has based her life on this tenet: it is certainly core to her writing. 'We may not condone what a person does, but sometimes we can understand and maybe come to forgive.' In 2019, she won the IAN Fiction Book of the Year prize, the IAN Outstanding Historical Fiction prize, and the Readers' Favorite Gold Medal for Historical era/event Fiction.

Her books have been awarded Readers' Favorite 5-star reviews.

Customer reviews

4 out of 5 stars
20 global ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

  • Kindle Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Kindred and Affinity
    Reviewed in the United States on July 14, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    What a fascinating story, especially since it's loosely based off of facts about the author's ancestry. Anyone who comes from a large family, with children born close to each other, will likely understand the family dynamics that this story relates so well. I know I do. The anger and sense of betrayal when one sister wins the love of a man the other one cares about. The resentment feeling another sibling is more loved than you are. This book has that and so much more.

    Stories from two families unfold as you make your way through the book. I was curious as to their ultimate connection, and was surprised by the outcome. I had set up a different scenario in my mind.

    Definitely a well-researched and written story with characters who are alive and oh so human.
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  • Rita Lee Chapman
    4.0 out of 5 stars A story of two sisters
    Reviewed in the United States on July 31, 2019
    The complicated story of siblings set in England in the nineteenth century, made even more complicated by typhoid and religion. When teenagers Annie and Edwin, a Methodist and a Baptist, fall in love their families will not hear of their union. So begin years of lies, disharmony and hardship. Can there ever be peace between their families? A good insight into how domestic violence can be passed down from generation to generation.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Booklover
    5.0 out of 5 stars Another great novel by Rebecca Bryn
    Reviewed in the United States on July 13, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    Two sisters living apart loving the same man - one too young to obtain her family's permission to marry while the other unknowingly becoming involved. Causing family dissension related to the religious covenants, Annie and Mary Ellen came to hate one another until one's demise caused them to reach out in forgiveness for the future of the husband and children's benefits. Based partially on her heritage, the author was able to transport the reader into the late 1800s, living within the character's lives and setting. Another well-written and researched novel in this highly recommended novel that delves into the past conflicted lives of two sisters who love the same man.
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  • reader2010
    5.0 out of 5 stars Will tug on your heart strings
    Reviewed in the United States on July 12, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    Rules and laws do not govern the heart. A deftly told story of heart ache brought on by a rigid society. Two sisters and one man. Great story, great characters.
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  • Tom
    5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent portrayal
    Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2019
    Historical Fiction might not be the top of your list if you were asked to find a tale which encompassed intrigue, violence, deceit, hatred and fanaticism, but it’s all in this story. Yes, it’s tempered with doses of love, compassion, passion, determination, integrity, and faith, but the balance is created with consummate skill.
    I feel privileged to have found great indie authors in a variety of genres. Having read her other titles I was glad that once again I trusted the pen of Rebecca Bryn. When I first saw the cover and blurb for this book I thought it might be where we parted company as reader and writer, but I had faith in her storytelling—which paid dividends.
    I’ve no doubt that like many others I’d never heard the phrase ‘Kindred and Affinity’, let alone understand where it evolved from, but it is integral to the story. In all of this author’s work, you sense the depth of research undertaken to produce quality.
    The tale is fact-based fiction which lends itself to many genres, but this author has a supreme ability to convey imagery and a keen sense of ‘the moment’. The dialogue in Bryn’s historical writing transports the reader to a time gone by just as surely as if they’d been teleported and left to interact with the characters.
    At the end of the story is a fascinating summary of how the fact and fiction were blended.
    Kudos, Rebecca Bryn.
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  • Sarah Stuart - Readers' Favorite Reviewer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Thou shalt not – what? Read it and see!
    Reviewed in the United States on July 13, 2019
    The story opens in Northamptonshire towards the end of the nineteenth century. Disease was rife, child mortality high, and religion strong; belief in God, and obedience to His commands was most people’s only hope of survival in this world and the next.

    Elizabeth Underwood has many surviving children, memories of those who died in their first year, and no love for one of her daughters. Mary-Ellen grows up with Elizabeth’s childless sister, whilst Annie remains at home, expected to care for her younger siblings. Teenage Annie is sent into service – Annie falls in love with a man from a church with different beliefs and frees him to find someone else, but who does he find, and does he marry?

    People don’t step off the page; they jump. The loveable, the infuriating, and the vicious, all grounded to be so believable you half-expect the meet them in the street. Ms Bryn has given her many fans another un-put-downable winner!
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Penny
    5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Family Saga.
    Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2019
    I was given a copy of this book for an honest review.
    This book is the tale centred around one family, but drawing in other characters. It is a social and religious study of Victorian England and highlights the restrictions placed on ordinary people and the hardships that they suffered. Annie and later Marie Ellen (sisters) fall in love with Edwin, but he is of a different denomination. Both families are against a union.
    The strength of this book and why it is so enjoyable is that the characters are drawn so clearly. You go through their struggles with them.
    When the book was finished I was still thinking about the main characters. I don't think that there can be a higher recommendation.
    One person found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • SGS
    5.0 out of 5 stars Realistic well drawn characters that jump off the page.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 19, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    There is a strong element of Catherine Cookson or even Barbara Taylor Bradford present in the writing of Rebecca Bryn. The author writes authoritatively and accurately about late Victorian period, which aided by realistic well drawn characters that jump off the page very much brings the era alive. This is testimony to the writing skill of Rebecca Bryn who has dug deep into a rich vein of family history to embellish old hearsay and long forgotten scandals. In the writer's notes at the end, the author explains which characters and which parts were real and which parts are plot based fiction. She informs that the 'Kindred and Affinity' Act, now repealed, was an actual English Law preventing a widower from marrying his wife's sister.
    This book, Kindred & Affinity, is ostensibly a story of Annie & Mary Ellen, two sisters who were raised apart, and Edwin, the one man they both love. A love story in which one sister's romance is the other's heartbreak.
    Sadly the issue that tears apart the initial relationship between Edwin and Annie is coming from different faiths and conflicting dogma. This makes very little sense to people in contemporary times in which a person's faith has mostly become a redundant issue in society. However, there is another issue here that still remains very pertinent - that is a person's willingness to compromise their culture and ethics to obtain what they want in life. Annie wouldn't but her younger prettier sister, Mary Ellen did. In return for her sacrifice, she gains Edwin and invokes the jealousy and bitter thoughts of Annie.
    This story smacks of its genuine roots because it evokes a reaction in the reader. I was angry at Annie's lack of initial courage to be with the man she loved. Convinced that she was doing the right thing to protect the interests of her true, she found it hard to live with the consequences of that her decision. The man she showered affection upon was too easily willing to court her sister, but in his defence he didn't even know they were related.
    Alongside this story another one runs parallel. It is the story of another couple, Herbert and Freda, which evokes equally strong reactions from the reader. Herbert is a bad man and Freda suffers because of this. Both stories eventually merge into one and by the end, we have experienced quite a roller-coaster of a family saga. Most recommended.
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  • Kindle Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars What a grear Author.
    Reviewed in Australia on May 3, 2023
    Verified Purchase
    WOW,another brilliant read from Rebecca Bryn, everything she writes turns out to be winner- and this one doesn't disappoint.
    Well developed characters, good and bad, the storyline is filled with so much emotion that you feel it tagging at your heart.
    Some of the story comes from researching the authors family on her mother's side.
    So spins a story before our time, of spirits of the past.
    A highly recommend read.
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  • Kindle Customer
    4.0 out of 5 stars Well-written but depressing
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 6, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    Having read the author's notes at the end of this book, I understand that the fictional story is based on her own forebears history. Regardless of this fact, the book is relentlessly depressing, although no doubt true to life as it was in those times. It is very well-written and researched but there are never any light moments amongst all the dark.
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  • Sarah Stuart - Readers' Favorite Reviewer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Thou shalt not – what? Read it and see!
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 13, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    The story opens in Northamptonshire towards the end of the nineteenth century. Disease was rife, child mortality high, and religion strong; belief in God, and obedience to His commands was most people’s only hope of survival in this world and the next.

    Elizabeth Underwood has many surviving children, memories of those who died in their first year, and no love for one of her daughters. Mary-Ellen grows up with Elizabeth’s childless sister, whilst Annie remains at home, expected to care for her younger siblings. Teenage Annie is sent into service – Annie falls in love with a man from a church with different beliefs and frees him to find someone else, but who does he find, and does he marry?

    People don’t step off the page; they jump. The loveable, the infuriating, and the vicious, all grounded to be so believable you half-expect the meet them in the street. Ms Bryn has given her many fans another un-put-downable winner!
    Report

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