Rainbow in the Royals

3.5 stars.
It was really an enjoyable story, adventure on the high seas and all that sort of fun. I read the entire thing without stopping! You could feel the splash of the waves and the sting of the ice, and the characters nearly leapt off the page in their realness. That much of the story is worth five stars.
I also loved the strong Christian message of God being the one that gave their success, and liked it that the hero is portrayed as a strong Christian. There is no preachiness, however, and no application forced in; the reader is left to draw their own conclusions.
However, I do have some nit-picks. One is the language; h–s and d–s were pretty common. Also, the heroine says “darn”, which seems a very unlikely term for a well-bred young woman of the time (it was considered slang, and the young lady of the day would have been aware of exactly what the word stood as substitute for), and Ellen does not include any other slang in her speech. She also allows two men to kiss her without her protesting, which bothered me.
The ending was a good one, but I wanted to know more... does Bill ever learn his lesson? Or does he just go off happily ever after with a free pass? An epilogue would have been nice.
Another big thing was the historical aspect. It's written in 1950 and set in 1850. The language was mostly generic sea talk, but in many ways it felt more like the characters moved and spoke with a twentieth century flair rather than an early-Victorian terminology. I never felt deeply grounded in the historical era the characters lived in; it was more like they could have been the same characters in any decade. I kept having to convince myself of their 1850 dates, rather than feeling like I'd lived in the era for a few hours.
Overall, an enjoyable sea yarn with high stakes to win. I felt, though, that the author inserted a tad much of his 1950s sensibilities and worldview.