The Kissing Gate

by Joyce Dingwell

"See me when you grow up."In the patronizing way adults often use, Clem made this comment to Silver when she was little more than a child.Now she was a woman and had returned to the place where she had spent her childhood. Would Clem remember those happy times? Did Silver really care whether he did or didn't?

Genres: Romance, Harlequin Romance

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Enid Joyce Owen Dingwell, née Starr, was born on 1908 in Ryde, New South Wales, Australia. She wrote, as Joyce Dingwell and Kate Starr, 80 romance novels for Mills & Boon from 1931 to 1986. She was the first Australian writer living in Australia to be published by Mills & Boon. Her novel The House in the Timberwood (1959), was made into a motion picture, The Winds of Jarrah (1983). Her work was particularly notable for its use of the Australian land, culture, and people. She passed away on 2 August 1997 in Kincumber, New South Wales.

Reviews

[Fiona Marsden · Rating 4 out of 5]

Silver has grown up on Norfolk Island and belongs to the original Bounty families. Her neighbour growing up was Clem, a young sculptor who lived in a fairly primitive house he has built with the property owners permission in a wood entered by an old fashioned kissing gate.

When she returns after a two year absence working on the mainland, Silver finds the owner of her beloved wood has died and the property is up for sale.

The story centres around her machinations to get the wood, watched by Clem who continues to treat her as the immature child he teased while she was growing up.

It is very interesting reading these stories in the present because the heroine is a young woman on the verge of adult hood and we see how she matures and struggles in that transition.

This is rarely seen in modern category romance and left a gap for many years that is now being filled by the New Adult lines that focus on college age "coming of age" stories. More than anything this change shows the cultural shift from the seventies when it was common for a young woman of nineteen to twenty-one to be looking at marriage where today that is increasingly rare.

Also rarely seen these days is the adult hero who sees in the child something that he wants to explore when she reaches adulthood. I find these rather sweet but these days the concept is tainted with suspicion.

[Myrna · Rating 1 out of 5]

"Silver, you should have been named Green instead, or something as indicative, for I've never seen anyone as criminally naive - the right word should be stupid - "

A very stupid snobbish h and a famous sculptor in the Pacific.
I like an occasional scheming and mercenary h, but this one is a disgrace. She accuses her uncle of not buying ‘her’ wood! Her uncle is 90 and does he get a lot of care from the h? Or even love and affection? Every time she opens her mouth - it’s to repeat how much she wants to own that wood.
And if we forget for the moment, that the H says some appalling things, how does the h treat him? Calling his work “dabbling in mud pies”? Always calling him an outsider, because he wasn’t born on that island and his forebears weren’t sent there as criminals?
And her gushing over the wood’s owner from Australia, because he’s ISLAND, just like her? Because it must be in his blood somewhere and that makes him a good person. Unlike the H.
After reading this book I thoroughly dislike that island.

As for the H, he says some awful things.
I could almost forgive him for always running after the h, saving her and working like mad to buy her that wood. But the last bit destroyed my sympathy.

"You were ten when I first saw you. I've waited thirteen years."
"If you did," she said, "it never showed."
"I knew for sure that first day I slapped you into clay. My God, Silver, I could have slapped you every day since! Because you made me wait ... and wait. Wait for the woman I knew would emerge, worry in case she emerged for someone else. Oh, yes, girl, I wanted to do more than slap you into clay."

[Megzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can take the girl out of the Island, but maybe in this case it’s true that you can't take the Island out of the girl! Not entirely, anyway. Something, deep down, continued to yearn, across cities and continent, for the sight of the woods,her woods! Her wood with the cliff where you could have a 360 degree view of the ocean, the peaceful pine trees, the juicy guava trees, the orchestra of the song birds, and a lone kissing gate but what she didn't realize was her longing for what she helped to build many years ago..the stone path that took you to an ugly shack with a mud patch that was covered by the statue of a teenage girl with a guava nose, or was there ever a mud patch to begin with? .

This is a story about a young, fairly immature girl on the cusp of her adulthood. It is about her love for her woods, her island, and the one man who could give her all she ever wanted.

If you can deferential love from physical lust then you might try this book. On the other hand if you think it is ok for an immortal of 300+ age to fall inlove/inlust with an 18 year old on first sight, but it is sinister for a 20 year old guy to recognize his soulmate/twinflame when she is only 10 and completely back off and risk losing her to another man in the meantime by waiting until she is a grown woman to express his love then you might pass on this book.

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

There are definitely better romances out there, but what I found interesting was that there is no SMUT in older Harlequin's. Time's have really changed! And the story REALLY makes you want to go to Australia!

[Last Chance Saloon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heroine (22) returns to Norfolk Island and is immediately swamped by love again for 'her wood'. Unfortunately she does not own it, and someone else has just inherited it (OM1). Living on that land is the hero (33) who is a sculptor and has known the heroine since she was 10 (she is almost 23). He had recognised his soul mate early, but the heroine had a lot of growing up to do and only realised the hero is her hero when she starts to become jealous over the very beautiful OW. The heroine had been dating the OM2 in Sydney and wants him to buy the wood, so she encourages OM1 to price the wood more highly so the very rich OM2 will want to buy it.
The hero treats the heroine quite abruptly and rudely and makes a fuss about the beauty of the OW, but it becomes clear as the book progresses that he really only has eyes for the heroine (he could have tried to be romantic with her, but she really is fixated on the wood). He's not a typical hero, but she's quirky.
By the end, OM1 has romantic plans off the island, OW and OM2 look like making a match (the OW is very nice and the heroine likes her) and the hero gets his girl and they'll live HEA in a new house he is building on their wood.
It's cute and kooky and for vintage romance - and possibly only Joyce Dingwell - enthusiasts only.