What child hasn’t bemoaned the fact that they don’t fit in; maybe even wondered if they were in the wrong family or culture? It is one thing to wonder, but another thing to experience the rejection and frustration of being raised in a culture that feels stilted and forced, somehow wrong. Cecile, the heroine of Helen Rosburg’s novel, The Call of the Trumpet knows the feeling.

Cecile Villier knows the unexpected death of her father demands some type of action from her. The problem is, she is unsure of what to do. Left alone without family, friends and a society that rejects her because of her Bedouin heritage, there isn’t much for her in France. Just maybe this is the time to find out more about her mother’s people. Taking her faithful servant, she decides to embark on an adventure, never realizing what an adventure it will be for a single European girl in a male dominated culture.

Matthew Blackmoore, Englishman, is also El Faris, the horseman, the mysterious man of the desert who deals in prime Arabian horse. The letter Cecile write to his deceased father makes him aware that trouble is headed his way in the form of a spoiled, sheltered aristocratic girl, ready to run willy-nilly into a very foreign world, a world that eats girls like her for breakfast. That’s why Matthew leaves his desert hideaway to chaperone the twit before she does something disastrous. Unfortunately, for him, Cecille manages to get herself kidnapped before even officially disembarking from the ship. Trouble! He knew it! Now he would have to rescue her.

Matthew and Cecile strike parts off each other in their roles as desert dwellers and ex-patriates. There is always the element of danger adding to the tension, making things move a little faster, which is welcome because the scene set-ups are so long. Secondary characters play minor roles making very little impact on the overall story. The chemistry between the two central characters work, the information detailed, conflict real, but something is missing. The title seems misleading, as if it doesn’t fit or doesn’t really allude to what the book is about. This "not fitting" seems to travel throughout the novel, which might be, ironically perfect, since Cecile feels she doesn’t fit in.

The Call of the Trumpet is an acceptable book for historical romance. I would recommend it, with the knowledge that it could be better with a little re-writing to make it tighter.

Reviewed by Morgan Wyatt
© January 2008