Waterfall (River of Time, #1) Lisa Tawn Bergren

Waterfall (River of Time #1)
by Lisa Tawn Bergren
Paperback, 369 pages
Published February 1st 2011 by David C. Cook
​3 stars
Most American teenagers want a vacation in Italy, but the Betarrini sisters have spent every summer of their lives among the romantic hills with their archaelogist parents. Stuck among the rubble of the medieval castles in rural Tuscany, on yet another hot, dusty archaeological site, Gabi and Lia are bored out of their minds...until Gabi places her hand atop a handprint in an ancient tomb and finds herself in fourteenth-century Italy. And worse yet, in the middle of a fierce battle between knights of two opposing forces.

Suddenly Gabi's summer in Italy is much, much more interesting.

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My Thoughts

I first read this when I was in high school. I want to say about 10th grade. I have to admit I liked it more as a 10th grader then I did now. I found the characters to be sort of flat. The main characters main goal is to get home from medieval Tuscany. But she gets caught up in all of the wonders of the time. Those wonders mainly being Marcello. She doesn't really care about anything but him and her sister who is missing for most of the book. 
I felt that Gabi's character had to many convenient skills, such as: knowing how to fight IE Fencing, basic herbal medicine and how to speak medieval Italian because she read Dante's Inferno. While if one of those things were to happen I feel like I would be okay with it. But all of them? Not to mention that her sister was an acclaimed archer. To many coincidences for my taste.
Another issue I  found with it was the instalove. As soon as Gabi falls into the past, she sees Marcello and instantly fell in love with the gorgeous italian man.
So what did I appreciate? I liked the fact that Bergren did quite a bit of research into the times before writing and kept with the historical contexts throughout the book. I loved the details about the castles and about all of dresses and servants.  So for me it gathered 3 stars. It wasn't the worst thing, but it wasn't the best either.
Katelyn Costello
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