Two decades before the Civil War, an eight year- old Southern heiress longs for the love of the father she has never known---but when they meet at last, nothing is as Elsie expects. Can the proud and willful Horace Dinsmore learn to love his only child---a little girl whose first allegiance is to God? Introducing soft cover editions in the Elsie Dinsmore Series with newly designed covers.

Elsie Dinsmore is now a young woman who has passed her twenty-first birthday, or her "majority." As an adult, she is responsible for the large inheritance left to her by her mother, yet the privileges of wealth are of little importance to Elsie. Like most young women of her day, she is concerned about her future and the prospect of finding a husband and life partner. She knows that the man she marries must share her abiding Christian faith and be of fine character and loving disposition. But she has been deeply hurt by a deceitful suitor who loved only her wealth. As this new novel begins, she is understandably mistrustful of her ability to recognize real love when it comes her way.

In this book, the fifth in the Elsie Dinsmore: A Life of Faith series adapted from the original 19th century volumes written by Martha Finley, readers will join the resilient heroine as she embarks on one of life's most important journeys--the search for Elsie's True Love. It is a journey with unexpected complications and offers lessons that transcend time.

Though Elsie is a 19th century woman, her struggles and her hopes are not so different from those of girls and young women of the 21st century. Marriage may be uppermost in Elsie's mind, but she has other issues to contend with--changes in her relationships with her parents, other family members, and friends now that she is an adult herself; the proper management of the large estate and many business interests that make up the bulk of her inheritance; and dealing on a personal level with the pressing social and moral dilemmas of her era. At times, she is uncertain of her judgment and her ability to cope with her new independence.

But whatever befalls her, Elsie knows that her greatest help and comfort lies in the love of her Heavenly Father and Beloved Savior, Jesus Christ. This is the message of Christian faith and love which Martha Finley sent out in her wonderful Elsie novels to the young people of the 19th century. It is our pleasure, at Mission City Press, to carry Miss Finley's message forward today, though these newly adapted and updated versions of the story of Elsie Dinsmore's life of faith.