It’s 1914, and the members of the Lund family are devastated by the loss of the father. Oldest sister Alaina married a man she had only friendly feelings for in hopes that she might save the family farm, while younger sisters Eleanor and Kathryn have been carted off to San Francisco with their mother to live with stuffy and controllable Aunt Ida. Will they ever be happy again?


“Until the Dawn” is author Gale Sears’ sophomore novel, and it’s one of the best LDS novels that I’ve read in a long time. I love how she chose a unique time period that hasn’t been explored by a lot of LDS writers, and I love how she focuses on a specific family and how their struggles help them to become better people.

Like I mentioned earlier, the novel follows the Lund family. Alaina, so in love with her family’s farm, marries a young Mormon farmhand by the name of Nephi Erickson in hopes that she can keep the farm. She learns shortly after the marriage that the farm has been sold, and now she must cope with being married to a man she does not romantically love, along with the stress of having to move to Utah to be with her husband’s family.

Younger sister Eleanor’s free spirit has all but been squashed by having to live in Aunt Ida’s stuffy San Francisco home. When her aunt and her mother forbid her from joining a women’s organization to help Chinese girls who have had their feet bound in typical Chinese fashion, Eleanor leaves the city to live in Utah with Alaina.

Meanwhile, the girls’ former schoolteacher, Philomene Johnson takes a trip to Europe to stay with a relative and gets caught up in the beginnings of World War I.

The characters in “Until the Dawn” after woven together so seamlessly that the transitions are far from choppy and confusing. I loved this book, and I think it’s a great novel for girls ages 12 and up to read and enjoy.

You can find “Until the Dawn” at DeseretBook.com.