The Colonel's Lady

The Colonel’s Lady (2011), a historical romance with Christian elements by Laura Frantz, tells the story of a woman who falls in love with a fort commander when she takes her father’s place as a scrivener at an outpost. The book is very popular with romance readers and fans of Christian fiction. Frantz is a bestselling author of romance and historical novels for adult readers. A direct descendant of Jacobite Rebellion leader, George Hume, her novels often include Scottish themes and settings. She is well known for writing her manuscripts in longhand before typing them.

The Colonel’s Lady takes place in Kentucky during 1779 and the American War of Independence. Roxanna Rowan comes from a modest family in Virginia. Unmarried, she assumes that she will be single forever. A shy and genteel lady, she finds it hard to flirt with men to gain their affection, and her parents aren’t wealthy enough to secure a marriage of convenience.

Roxanna relies on her father for everything. Without him, she would be destitute. He works as a scrivener, someone who reads and writes letters. He is responsible for drafting letters to nearby regiments; as a result, he is indispensable. Although he does not expect Roxanna to work for a living, he made sure she could read and write well. This means she can always take over his work if necessary.



One day, Roxanna receives the terrible news that her father is dead. She travels to Kentucky to gather his belongings and beg for work. She first encounters the fort commander, Colonel Cassius McLinn, who tells her that the fort is no place for a good woman. The only women who hang around the fort are prostitutes. When Roxanna explains who she is and why she is there, the colonel pities her and offers her scrivening work. Roxanna can’t stand the colonel because he is arrogant and cold, but there is nowhere else to go and no one else to employ her.

Roxanna decides to make friends with the other women at the fort. The colonel warns her away from them, because they are fallen women, but Roxanna knows this doesn’t make them bad people. As a devout Christian, she wants to help these women, ensuring they never have to sell their bodies again. The colonel, on the other hand, lost his faith years ago. All he knows is violence, treachery, and pain. He thinks that Roxanna’s piety is ridiculous.

When the novel begins, Roxanna is mousy, nervous, and lacks conviction. Her mother always told her that she is not good enough and no man will love her. She constantly tries to please people and she does not know her own mind. The colonel challenges her to think for herself and form her own opinions. He teaches her that what she wants matters, and that she could not have survived so long on her own if she were not a strong person.



Feeling more assertive, Roxanna explores the fort and goes through her father’s things. She finds a journal written by him. In the journal, he talks about a spy and a traitor in the fort. He plans to find out the truth before he dies. Unfortunately, the diary is incomplete. Roxanna worries that her father caught the spy, and the spy murdered him.

In one entry, her father notes that the spy plans to kill the colonel. She takes the diary entry to the colonel, and together they plan to root out the spy. Roxanna can’t help falling in love with him as they work together so closely. He is handsome, strong, and domineering, and he makes her feel cherished. She does not expect the colonel to return her feelings, especially since she is older and, in her eyes, past her prime.

One night, Roxanna catches the colonel flirting with a prostitute. She assumes that he is sleeping with her, and she is surprised by how envious this makes her. She spends many chapters debating virtue, chastity, and what it means to be a good woman. After crying and fretting over the supposed rendezvous, she learns that the colonel did not sleep with anyone and she is worrying over nothing.



There is not much time for Roxanna to worry about her feelings. Someone poisons the colonel. He falls gravely ill and some soldiers expect that he will die. She drinks the poison herself to work out what the poison is, but this only makes her sick, and she almost dies. When the colonel recovers, he chastises her for being so stupid.

They declare their feeling about each other before they discover the spy’s identity. The spy is the colonel’s brother, Hank. Hank wants to destroy the colonel to seize his position. Together, Roxanna and the colonel thwart his efforts and see him off. Roxanna vows to patch things up with her mother because she is confident enough now to stand up to her.