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Hell is My Heaven – Blackmail Marriage by Jeneth Murrey

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Hell is My Heaven is excellent. Hero Jerome, who wants to be The Boss, has blackmailed heroine Kate into marriage expecting a “loving and obedient wife”. Hah. Just how loving would you be if someone forces you to marry them by a) threatening to take custody of your nephew and prevent you from seeing him and b) threatening to send copies of girlie calendar pictures to all the schools in England to prevent you from working? Loving? Heck no. Obedient? No way. The rest of the story shows Kate gradually falling in love with Jerome while he works to overcome her suspicions, distrust and detestment.

Plot Synopsis – Click to Skip Spoilers

The backstory here is important and told at the beginning based on what Kate thought was true, then adjusted to what really happened. Kate was happily teaching school when her younger stepsister Shirley showed up pregnant and tearful. Shirley was hiding from her husband Theo and his nasty mother and older brother and she claimed Theo and his family treated her horribly. Kate took her in, and supported her through pregnancy and childbirth at first by teaching, but when Shirley’s baby arrives the teaching salary wasn’t enough. (Especially given Shirley’s expensive tastes.)

Kate is lovely, tall, slim, red haired, and had earlier turned down offers to try her hand at modeling. Now, with the baby and Shirley needing ever more income, Kate reluctantly quit teaching and became a very successful model under the name Noel Lowe. Unfortunately her first foray into modeling was to pose in risque outfits for a girlie calendar. She was never nude but the photos were suggestive and Kate hated them. Shirley went back to Theo after a while. Kate doesn’t ever meet Theo or his family, and it later comes out that Shirley never mentioned Kate to them. She pretended she took care of herself while away from Theo.

Shirley never fooled older brother Jerome and he had her investigated. It took quite a while but he discovered Shirley had an older stepsister who taught school. He couldn’t understand why Shirley never talked about Kate but he figured Kate had been responsible for Shirley and baby Phillip.

Shirley last visited Kate just before the book begins. She and Theo were going on a second honeymoon and would Kate take care of 2-year old Phillip? Shirley and Theo died in a crash.

The book opens with Kate at her friend Helen’s house talking about how Kate will have no chance if Jerome and his mother want custody; not only must Kate work, but she has been (gasp!) a model while Theo’s family is rich, ruthless and upper crust. Kate tells Helen that she must hide herself and Phillip and she intends to stop modeling and go back to teaching. Helen is an artist and realistic. She warns Kate that she is gorgeous and model-trained and that it will be impossible to hide from Theo’s family. She offers to rent Kate her remote cottage, the one with no running water, electricity or central heat.

After four cold months in a drafty cottage Kate is bathing Phillip. Jerome walks in, coolly tells Kate he wants the boy, that he would win any custody suit, that he has the girlie negatives and will ruin Kate with every education authority in the country if she does not go along. But that’s OK because Kate can come too. As Jerome’s wife.

From what Shirley had said Kate knows Jerome is ruthless and vindictive enough to do this so she very reluctantly agrees in order to keep Phillip as she sees it, unspoiled by Jerome’s vicious, rich family. Jerome makes it clear that he expects a loving and obedient wife and we can infer that “loving” means sexually affectionate and emotionally warm.Kate tries to wriggle out of this but she cannot.

Jerome brings them back to his London apartment but not without an argument. Kate wants to clean the cottage and Jerome gives her one hour to get herself packed, cottage cleaned and in the car or he’ll take Phillip and leave. Kate seethes all the way to London. Jerome kisses her, and although she does not like him, Kate does respond.

Jerome gets his mother to come help get the wedding ready and Kate is surprised to discover she likes his mother a lot, that she is kind, not at all ruthless or vicious, down to earth. This is the first chink in the Shirley story.

The wanna-be Other Woman, Estelle, 19 and spoiled, is a neighbor of Jerome’s in the country and bursts into Jerome’s apartment to tell Kate to bug off, that Jerome is hers, that his little flings never last long and that (shock!) Kate is a model and Jerome will kick her out when he learns that! Mother tells Estelle to control herself, that Jerome knows what he’s doing, and that if Estelle decides to kill herself to do it somewhere else where she won’t get the carpets dirty. Kate realizes that Jerome’s mother would have had no patience with Shirley’s drama and tantrums. Kate still doesn’t like Jerome and she doesn’t trust him. She decides she will fight back by making herself so boring and dull he won’t want her.

They marry and go to southern Italy to honeymoon. Phillip comes too because Kate refuses to go without him. Kate dreads the wedding night (postponed a couple of days to allow her to get used to Jerome) but she promised. In fact she is surprised to discover she enjoys making love with Jerome, that he makes her feel what she does not want to feel. She tells him that she hates him now more than ever, especially when Jerome is amazed that it had been her first time. Kate resents that he thought her a tramp and she tries several times to talk to Jerome about letting her take Phillip since he now knows she is not a loose trollop. That doesn’t work and they return to England together with Phillip.

There are several small incidents. Jerome makes Kate pick out a nanny for Phillip, makes Kate take an interest in her new home, drags her off to his mother’s house in the country. Basically he keeps her so busy she doesn’t have time to think about her grievances nor to work on her dull and boring act.

Right about the time Kate is beginning to feel something for Jerome Estelle comes to dinner where she tells Kate that she needs to leave Jerome, that if she cannot afford to go that Estelle can help her, and that Estelle will help Kate get a few pounds from Jerome when they split – maybe even a few thousand! (A few thousand pounds in the mid 1980s would be around $10,000 today, not a lot.) Kate can’t believe that anyone would talk like this and she suspects Estelle is mentally off. She tells Jerome about it but he doesn’t see either the humor or the insult.

Jerome has forbidden Kate to go anywhere alone but she does anyway. (As she put it, if you wanted obedient you should not have married me!) She runs into the guy she had desultorily dated before Shirley died and realizes that he’s a jerk and that he hates her for selling out for money and a comfy lifestyle. Jerome is not impressed when Kate tells him about meeting ex boyfriend.

Jerome decides that Kate needs to learn a few things about her darling step sister. He tells her that it was not Theo but Shirley who did not want Phillip, in fact she had an appointment for an abortion when Theo found out and made her come to the country house with him. Shirley insisted Theo get a vasectomy because she did not want children. It was Theo who took care of Phillip, it was Shirley who decided at the last minute to leave Phillip with Kate and it was Shirley who did not tell anyone else where Phillip was. Jerome and his mother thought Phillip must have died along with his parents at first. Jerome drags Kate to his so-called yacht, actually a small dinghy, which Shirley had claimed he used to womanize around Europe. Kate is shattered by these revelations. She had known Shirley was spoiled but she hadn’t realized how little she had cared for anyone besides herself.

The final crisis comes when Jerome, his mother, Phillip and the housekeeper are gone and Kate comes downstairs to dry her hair, find Estelle has taken an ax to Jerome’s study and destroyed file cabinets, left files strewn around and is clutching a small envelope that Kate knows holds those girlie negatives. Estelle tells her to get out and to make sure Jerome comes to see her because otherwise she will give the negatives to Kate’s ex boyfriend who would love to publish them in a sleazy tabloid.

Kate tries to find Jerome but he’s en route from New York and she panics. When Jerome comes home she grabs him and can barely speak because she is so worried. Kate tells him that he must go see Estelle, that he should have destroyed the negatives, that it will be his name, not hers, that gets dragged through the media. Jerome calms her down, explains he destroyed the negatives and the envelope was empty, fobs his mother off with a housebreaker story, then we have the happy ever after.

Plot Questions

Which Came First? How Did Jerome Decide to Get Kate? I can’t figure out when Jerome decided to go after Kate. He investigated Shirley, discovered she had a step sister, school teacher Kate Forest, fairly soon after Shirley married Theo, which is some time before Kate started modeling. Kate posed for the girlie calendar after Phillip was born, thus after Jerome knew Kate existed.

He says he started with a missing sister and the negatives. He realized Kate was Noel Lowe when he saw her birth certificate – born at Christmas and mother’s maiden name was Lowe. Then he knew how to get both Noel Lowe and Phillip at the same time. That implies he wanted Noel Lowe the model early on, otherwise how could he track down girlie negatives before he knew she was Kate? That seems out of character.

Emotions and Characters

Kate is wonderful heroine. She’s got class, character, intelligence and she is honest. Kate recognizes that she had been unfair when she assumed Jerome and his mother were vicious and she apologizes for that.

Kate is devoted to Phillip, just as she had been devoted to Shirley before, and she does not want to be devoted towards Jerome, she wants to dislike him and fight him and she is angry with herself for being attracted to him and enjoying making love with him. She’s a little confused.

It takes Jerome and Helen forcing Kate to face facts about Shirley to make her realize that first, she had never even met Theo or his family and that Shirley never had invited her to their home or made any effort to help herself. Shirley was a user.

Kate wants to revolt against Jerome, to either make his life miserable or be so boring that he dumps her. She’s not able to keep up her good intentions though, because she is genuinely a kind, loving, friendly person.

I liked how Kate recognizes that Estelle’s actions would hurt Jerome, but she does not carry that to the logical conclusion. She realizes that Estelle could not harm her without harming Jerome, but she panicked and did not stop to think it through. If Estelle embarrasses Jerome, Jerome would never want her, never marry her in place of Kate. Instead of calmly telling Estelle this, Kate lets her escape through the window, leaving a mess and damaged furniture behind. Then Kate pleads with Jerome to give in to Estelle’s dictates, to let Kate go and to go see Estelle. This is out of character. I read the book several times and each time this scene jars, does not fit, does not make sense, does not align to how Kate has behaved throughout the story. Kate is not the type to give into blackmail and certainly she should know that Jerome is not either.

In fact, Kate should have realized Jerome loses all blackmail threat once she marries him. If he were to release the girlie negatives it would hurt him. For some reason she didn’t think this through earlier although she clearly recognizes that he is not likely to trash her name once she became Mrs. Jerome Manfred.

I love Kate all through the book although this last scene strikes me as off key. In fact it bothered me more each time I read it.

Jerome is enigmatic all through the story. He is attracted to Kate, believes she will make a good wife, sleeps with her and takes care that she enjoys lovemaking. He does not try to jolly her along or change her attitude from hostile and negative but waits for her own good nature to take over on its own.

Jerome makes it clear that he wants all of Kate, not just her body, but her mind and her heart and her devotion to him. He says several times he is very well pleased with his wife and the bargain they made; does this mean he loves her? At the end Jerome insists that he tells Kate how he feels every time he touches her, which is all the time. But he doesn’t say it verbally. The fact that he held the negatives over her head and didn’t tell her he had destroyed them makes me wonder about his ethics. Does he prize obedience over unforced love?

Jerome admired Kate for being so loyal to Shirley and to Phillip and I suspect (if this were a real person, not a story) that he wanted a wife to be loyal to him. He is rich, good looking, has had girlfriends. Now he wants a family and he wants Kate.

Jerome should have realized that Estelle had escalated from pest to drama queen/stalker to genuinely deranged when Kate tells him about the dinner conversation where Estelle offers her a few thousand (Jerome’s money, not hers) to leave. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t go see Estelle’s parents about her behavior or do anything to curb her. It makes Kate wonder whether he in fact does care for Estelle or that he thinks it’s good to keep Kate feeling insecure in his life.

Minor characters Mrs. Manfred, the nanny and Mrs. Manfred’s housekeeper all have characters. Mrs. Manfred loves dogs and has a bunch of them. She dresses like a bag lady at home in the country and dolls up to the nines in London and can put on a gaudy, posh wedding in a week. Kate likes her immensely.

Kate hires the nanny because Jerome insists. Traveling with Phillip is a miserable experience that puts sticky stuff and dirt all over Kate’s clothes while he demands endless attention and entertainment. Kate is delighted that the nanny is perfectly happy to entertain Phillip on long car rides and doesn’t object to sticky. The nanny does have a few less enjoyable characteristics. She talks in first person plural, even when she is talking to Kate about Kate. Ugh. On the other hand, having someone who will entertain a 2 year old…

The housekeeper is forthright and tells Mrs. Manfred off for leaving dirty buckets all over the house. She had been a sergeant cook in the army and it shows!

The nanny and housekeeper add a lot of humor to the story. That plus Kate’s character and ongoing attempts to revolt against Jerome make great dialogue.

Cover Complaints

On the cover Jerome would be handsome if he weren’t so grim or had so many deep lines in his face. Ugh. Harlequin used this particular face on several books of the era and I don’t much like it. Jerome is determined but I didn’t find him anywhere near as hard as this cover depicts.

Kate looks like a glamour puss on her last legs. She has a hard look and is wearing a rather unflattering dress, sleeveless with low V neck, that I don’t see her wearing any point in the story. Author describes Kate as very attractive, sweet tempered (mostly, except around Jerome) and with excellent taste.

Cover does not fit the story at all.

My Version of the Ending

I’ve read Hell Is My Heaven several times. I loved it the first few times I read it, and I still love it. Kate, the minor characters, the dialogue, the humor, are excellent and make this a wonderful book to read. The last time I read it in order to write this review I found Kate’s odd behavior – panicking at Estelle’s ultimatum – so out of character that it jarred me. I would love to rewrite the scene. Here’s my dialogue:

Kate: “You do realize, Estelle, that Jerome won’t buckle to blackmail? And that if your friend Gerald publishes photos he will name me as Mrs. Jerome Manfred? That it would be Jerome – not me – that is embarrassed? That Jerome would never turn to you after you pull a stunt like that? That even if he were to kick me out he would blame you for embarrassing him, that he would have only contempt for you?”

Estelle: “*$&U#)#*(#%R$ D!!!D!” He will too want me! Me ME MEEEE. You’re nothing!!!! MEEEEE!!! #$%&$%*&&%!!!!!”

Estelle leaves in a flounce. Estelle and ex BF tear open the envelope and find it’s empty. Hahahah!!

Jerome and Kate together pay a visit to Estelle. Jerome presents the facts of life to Estelle and tells her to keep away from him and his family.

Estelle: “%*&)%$$$!!! You love me, ME, MEEEE!!!!! !#$%#”

Jerome: “No. I love Kate.”

Summary

Allowing for the vagaries of time travel, copyright and authorship, I’m not likely to rewrite Hell Is My Heaven. Darn.

Even with the clunky way Kate panics this is still a wonderful book, one of the best Harlequin Romances I’ve read.

5 Stars

I got my paperback copy from Thriftbooks after I had borrowed the pdf version from Archive.org. Amazon has used copies and most likely you can find it on eBay and other used online sites.

All Amazon links are paid ads.

Act of Betrayal by Sara Craven 2nd Chance Romance

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Laura divorced Jason a year after marriage when her uncle showed her proof that Jason had raided their joint savings account to pay rent for and support another woman – a woman with a small boy who looked just like Jason. Uncle told Laura that Jason had asked for money, that he was a sponger and might have confused Laura with her cousin Celia who is Uncle’s heiress. Laura confronted Jason, who admitted that yes, he gave Laura’s money, the allowance she received from the business her father had cofounded with Uncle, to Clare Marshall. Laura never asked whether Jason had slept with Clare or whether the two children were his. She left, emotionally devastated, and returned to live with her uncle, uncle’s unpleasant housekeeper and beautiful, malicious Celia.

Plot Synopsis – Click to Skip Spoilers

Act of Betrayal opens when Laura, orphaned she was small, and a trained cook, is called on to make a special lunch for her uncle’s company board members and a prospective customer who could make or break the firm. Jason is now the managing director of Tristan’s construction, the important customer, and he seeks her out after lunch. Laura knows she still loves and misses Jason but she cannot face marriage with a man who has a relationship with a mistress and hides her feelings to protect herself.

Jason comes by Uncle’s house where Celia co-opts him into a spur of the moment cocktail party that evening. Celia makes it clear to Laura that she intends to catch Jason. Laura had planned to go out that evening but her date, Alan, a food critic, stays for the cocktail party then invites Celia and Jason along with him and Laura to the new restaurant. Alan drinks too much and Jason sends Celia home in a taxi and helps Laura get Alan home. Jason pushes Laura aside when she kisses him, and later Laura sees Jason’s car outside Uncle’s home all night, and assumes he spent the night with Celia.

After about a month, when Laura avoids Jason and Celia as much as possible, she learns that Jason has bought Mill Cottage nearby, and that Clare Marshall – whom he calls his housekeeper – will live there too. Laura realizes she needs to leave the area, that she can’t face the ongoing hurt and heartbreak seeing Jason and knowing he is either with Celia or with Clare, and that if she were to come back to him she would be only one of his harem. Laura starts to look for a live in cook/housekeeper job, but her looks and youth are against her.

Laura drives by Mill Cottage and Clare flags her down, wants to talk and be friends. Clare doesn’t explain anything about her relationship with Jason, but makes it clear that she has separate quarters for herself and her children. Laura assumes that Clare’s single bed simply means she will spend most nights with Jason. Laura is going out when Jason comes in, confronts Laura, drags her upstairs and easily seduces her. Laura wakes up, starts to leave. Jason tells her that “I have you now, Laura, and you are not running out on me again.” Too bad, Laura leaves and spends the night at friends’ house.

The next morning her friend, Bethany, tells her she happened to hear about a job. Laura makes an interview appointment for that afternoon, goes back to Uncle’s house to pack and learns that Uncle is anxious for her to come to the office. Yes, her kindly uncle has some news for her. Laura had always thought her father was the junior partner, that her small allowance was a gift, not anything she was owed. In fact Uncle had diverted her trust fund income back into the business, had not increased the income when Laura married Jason, as he should have, and when Jason asked him for money he was not sponging, it was in fact the funds that were Laura’s by right. Uncle says that Jason is holding the contract up for ransom, that Uncle had to tell Laura the truth or Jason would walk away and Uncle’s company would fold.

Laura is dumbfounded at Uncle’s perfidy and when Jason asks her about it she pushes away and goes to her interview. The interview turns out to be with Jason’s mother who has an interesting confession. It was her husband, Jason’s father, who had the long term affair with Clare and fathered her children before he died. Mom used her health to blackmail Jason to keep quiet because she had the crazy idea that she had to pretend her marriage was perfect. She was willing to see anyone suffer, even her own son, in order to pretend that her husband loved her, not someone else.

Jason comes in then and he and Laura go off to remarry.

Characters and Emotions

I wanted to hit Laura and Jason and yes, Clare too, for keeping quiet about this cruel deception. I understand keeping promises and keeping secrets, but never at the expense of one’s marriage, at the cost of heartbreak.

Jason was angry at Laura, thought that she never really wanted to marry him, that she preferred being alone, and that was why she believed Uncle so fast without asking Jason to explain. Laura simply couldn’t. She should have asked Jason just why he was supporting Clare, gave him the opportunity to explain. Jason asked her to trust him, but he didn’t do much to present himself as trustworthy.

Clare too had the opportunity to explain when she showed Laura around Jason’s new home. She had to know that Laura assumed that Jason was the father but she didn’t bother to clear anything up.

Several times I wanted to yell at the characters to ask the question, to explain the problem. Jason could have voluntarily told Laura that he had to help Clare, that he wasn’t the father, hadn’t had an affair with her, but was morally obligated to help her on someone else’s behalf. He did not. He told Laura that she had never understood the obligation he had for Clare, but he never tried to clarify it for her either.

Act of Betrayal could have been improved if Sara Craven had spent time on the issue of trust. Laura did not trust Jason. She says several times that she never really felt she knew him, that he had always withheld something of himself from her. Of course Jason did not make it easy for her to trust him. He lied to her about going to his studio when in fact he went to Clare and he did not tell her he withdrew their savings. Uncle’s lies fell on ground that Jason himself had prepared and fertilized.

Jason did not trust Laura. He always felt she withheld something of herself, that she was glad to be alone again when she left him. In fact she was hurt and lonely, missed Jason whom she loved and regretted leaving him although she didn’t see how she could have stayed.

The author sketched these trust points but didn’t flesh them out. Instead she made it seem as though the physical attraction and need were the main drivers, when in fact they were sub points to loneliness and love.

Sara Craven is particularly gifted at showing strong emotions in her characters and connections between them. We see from the beginning how Jason’s return affects Laura. Craven shows this in party by sharing Laura’s thoughts, but it’s also obvious by how she avoids Jason, tries to hide behind Alan, how she decides to leave Uncle’s home and get a menial job.

It’s not as obvious how much Jason regrets losing Laura. He makes a lot of snide, sarcastic comments, hangs on Celia, makes it clear that although he might want Laura physically that he blames her for their breakup and intends to wreck revenge on her. That could be love or it could be dislike and basic jerk hood.

Overall Summary

I liked Act of Betrayal for the intense emotional connections and also because I wanted to see how Jason can square the circle of having supported a woman with children that look like him and even are named after him. The dialogue is good, the plot is interesting, the pacing is good.

On the other hand, I’m not fond of romances that hinge on not asking/answering questions or misunderstandings. Emotional cowardice keeps people quiet and it’s stupid. It causes immense hurt and harms marriages and friendships.

Using Jason’s mother as the deus ex machina left me unsatisfied. I felt that Jason could have done something before he and Laura divorced, that she should have asked more questions. Laura obviously still loves Jason, so either she or he should have taken the risk to connect beyond the physical. I loved Jason telling Laura that he has her now and she isn’t going to get away again, but then he lets her leave. Of course that’s the spur that has him forcing Uncle and Mother to confess all. I felt the confessions were the easy way out of the tangle, that Laura should have been able to trust Jason and Jason to trust her.

3 Stars

I got my used paperback copy from Thriftbooks. At this moment there is no E version; Archive.org does not have Act of Betrayal in PDF format nor is it available on Amazon.

On a side note, Jason in the cover picture is very good looking. Lots of times the hero looks like an arrogant jerk but this guy looks like he cares about the lady he is holding.

The Millionaire’s Prospective Wife by Helen Brooks

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This romance has some sweet moments, some funny dialogue and scenes and some emotional connections. Cory is a social worker who helps dysfunctional families, sometimes working far into the night when her clients need help. Nick is the typical Harlequin rich, gorgeous hero, except that he’s wise enough to realize that charm and beauty and sex appeal are not as important as a loving heart and strong character.

Nick never committed before and he has let Cory know this, and she, being rather emotional insecure and full of self-doubts, does not realize that this time NIck is committed, that he has committed himself to her. It is so refreshing to read a story where he says “I love you” before she does.

Plot Synopsis – Click to Skip Spoilers

Cory takes her aunt’s big, untrained dog Rufus to the park and makes the mistake of letting Rufus off his leash. Rufus instantly takes off, runs after all the other dogs and knocks Nick right off his feet. Cory is horrified, especially when Rufus then runs back and starts eating Nick’s expensive cell phone. Cory insists that she pay for the cell phone and Nick’s suit; he refuses but recognizes that Cory is determined that she owes him and that she pays her debts. Nick needs a date for a business meeting he is hosting that night. Will Cory accompany him to atone for Rufus’s damage?

Cory reluctantly accepts, tells him that if he finds someone else to not feel obligated to take her. (I think this is when Nick realizes he has found a most unusual lady.) Her aunt insists on buying Cory a designer dress which makes the most of Cory’s looks, which combines with her personality and character to completely blow Nick away. Nick kisses Cory when he takes her home which sets the world on fire for both of them.

They date. Nick eventually worms it out of Cory that she had dated an older, rich guy once before who only wanted to sleep with her, and that she’s frightened of falling for rich, handsome guys as a result. She’s also emotionally insecure, convinced she’s not lovable because her parents never gave her attention or cared.

Nick takes it very very slowly, but steadily works his way into her heart and mind. Cory realizes she loves Nick, but is still convinced he’s a love ’em and leave ’em type and she knows she would be devastated if she sleeps with him then he dumps her.

Cory gets a migraine one night, a very bad attack, and Nick puts her to bed, then stays to make sure she’s ok. She’s still not getting the picture that Nick wants all of her, not a short term sleeping arrangement. Cory is even more terrified when Nick tells her he loves her; she cannot believe he means anything permanent.

The big blow up happens when Nick takes her to his country home, then to his mom’s birthday party. Cory meets his sisters and his mom, all of whom like her, but she also meets Margaret, his mom’s goddaughter who hunts Nick. Nick’s sister tells her that Margaret and Nick had a short no-strings affair a few years earlier, that neither wanted commitment, now Margaret wants Nick back. Nick rejects Margaret, but even this doesn’t clue Cory in.

The next afternoon Cory tells Nick that she cannot keep dating him, that they need to break it off. He breaks all the speed limits to dump her back home where she stews whether she should have taken what she could get, even a short affair, vs. the misery of no Nick. Nick shows up at 3 am, she throws herself into his arms and they end up agreeing to marry and have lots of kids.

Emotional and Character Development

The Millionaire’s Prospective Wife works because Nick gently keeps pushing. First he finds out why Cory is so afraid of dating, then he discovers her parents’ cold attitude, then he realizes she’s a caring, genuine person with a great sense of humor and determination. He never stops pushing Cory to realize she loves him.

Despite the heavy sounding emotions this story has relatively little angst. Nick is never cruel, he never tries to seduce Cory (although he has a hard time stopping himself), he clearly respects her and values her. Cory is also not mean, or vindictive or hateful, she’s simply afraid and knows herself well enough to realize she could not survive an affair. She never dreams that Nick intends marriage.

There is no Other Man except for the cad Cory dated a few years before, and he never appears except in dialogue. Margaret is not a Other Woman because Cory heard Nick tell her no. The other minor characters are good but not particularly fleshed out.

The story is set in London, in Cory’s head, and at Nick’s country home. Author Helen Brooks uses various dogs and cats mostly for humor, first Rufus who brings Nick and Cory together, then the dog in the apartment below Cory’s, then Nick’s mom’s menagerie of dogs and cats, all of whom are a little goofy.

Overall

The Millionaire’s Prospective Wife is a sweet, mostly happy story with a little bit of plot, some humor and some character growth. It’s good and I enjoyed it.

3 1/2 Stars, rounding to 4

I got my ebook copy from Harlequin.com to read on Glose and you can borrow the pdf version from Archive.org here or buy the paperback at Thriftbooks and likely other used book sites. At the moment Amazon does not have this.

Jilted by Sally Romance

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How do you get over being dumped by your fiancé in favor of your best friend? Not only do you lose the man you love, you lose his family, the life you planned together, your dreams, your self-respect and to top it off, you lose your best friend, the girl you grew up with, the girl who knows you as well as you know yourself. It’s hard. It’s hard but ladies do it all the time. It is not such an uncommon story to lose your fiancé or your husband to someone else.

Alexa, the heroine in Jilted, feels this loss. When her fiancé, Mark, tells her that he is in love with her maid of honor and best friend Elaine and they want to marry, she is devastated. She fights to keep Mark, which only makes it awkward. Alexa is an orphan and was close to Elaine’s family and likes Mark’s parents and looks forward to joining their family. Now it is all gone.

Plot Synopsis – Click to Skip Spoilers

Alexa attends the wedding out of pride and is counting the hours until she can leave when she meets Scott, Mark’s older brother, who doesn’t know she is the jilted ex She drinks way too much and notices how much Scott resembles Mark. He gives her a ride back to London and she invites him in. Scott comments how hard it was for Mark and Elaine since Mark’s original fiancée kept clinging and would not let him go. Scott seems to think that the original girl should have faded off to the sunset. Alexa doesn’t say anything and Scott doesn’t realize who she is.

Alexa can’t stop imagining Mark and Elaine making love and she eventually goes to bed with Scott, pretending he is Mark. She calls him Mark which infuriates him, he discovers who she is, she runs to the bathroom and tries to take a whole bottle of aspirin. Scott stops her. He is devastated and brutally tells Alexa she is doing this to blight Mark and Elaine’s marriage, that she must stop.

Alexa is miserable, apathetic, sure she will never be happy or care about anything again. Scott tells her he is marrying her, taking her back to Brazil where he works. She pushes back a little but doesn’t care enough to bother.

Back in Brazil Alexa falls in with “the crowd”, a group of youngish married couples including a bunch of gossipy, bored wives. She drifts along for a while, makes no attempt to learn Portuguese, nor takes any interest in anything around her. Scott doesn’t show how annoyed he is but he’s getting fed up with the pity party. They do not sleep together but Scott presses her several times whether she had slept with his brother. Alexa will not answer.

Finally Alexa gets a letter from Elaine which she finds sad, but sad in the same way one is sad after watching a movie. She’s beginning to recover her spirit and also growing up. She gets interested in the wild orchids, starts to grow some and paints them, and stops hanging around with the worst of the bored gossips, stops going to the club every day, starts learning a bit of Portuguese. She realizes she loves Scott, that Mark will always have a tiny part of her heart but that she no longer loves or is in love with him.

She and Scott go to a remote camp where Alexa gets lost a bit in the jungle and they have to stay overnight in a small bunkhouse. The howler monkeys wake her up and she gets Scott up because it sounds as though someone is dying. Scott starts to make love to her. Alexa tells him that this time she knows it is he, not Mark, yet Scott starts pushing and pushing for her to tell him whether she had made love with Mark. She yells that yes, they had, many times and Mark was wonderful, far better than Scott. He’s infuriated and forces her. She pushes him off and he then is tender and they make love.

The next morning Alexa is so happy, convinced she and Scott have a future, but Scott is completely distant with her, treats her as a stranger. She feels jilted once more.

This time Alexa starts drinking and smoking until Scott hides the booze. She can’t figure out why he would care what she does since obviously he doesn’t love her, that once he got what he wanted – her body – Alexa ceases to matter. She gets drunk and crashes her car. Scott arranges to go back to England a month early, although Alexa tells him not to bother, to just send her back by herself. Scott tells her that she has every right to expect him to come back with her, to take care of her, because she is his wife.

Alexa thinks they should divorce and Scott should let her go her own way. Instead he takes her to his parents’ house where Mark and Elaine come too. Elaine is pregnant and Alexa is happy for them; Scott says that he would like nothing better than to start their family. Now Alexa is confused. Scott doesn’t want her or does he? Finally she goes to his room and does what she should have done right after the jungle camp incident. She asks him. Scott fell in love with her when they met and took her to Brazil hoping she would start to love him. Happy ever after. The End.

Characters and Emotions

It is hard to read Jilted. Alexa suffers intensely from Mark jilting her, suffers again when Scott seemingly rejects her after they sleep together. She is emotionally all over the map, probably more miserable than many people would be, in part because she lost family as well as a husband-to-be, then loses her self-respect when Scott rejects her. She works to grow up, to get over Mark, she succeeds then Scott acts like he detests her after they make love. She is devastated.

Scott calls Alexa a coward and he is right. She kept choosing the easy way out, to suicide in London after the wedding, to drink herself to oblivion in Brazil. She refuses to engage with her new life with Scott for about 2 months until she finally realizes she must.

Alexa grows up during Jilted. She learns that strength must be internal, that she cannot live off others, that she must learn to stand alone before she can stand with someone else. One telling scene is in the car when Scott gives her Elaine’s letter and she reads how wonderful Mark is. Scott tries to anger her, asks her whether she isn’t jealous, whether she doesn’t resent that Elaine sleeps with Mark now. Alexa responds by asking “Why are you trying to goad me into losing my temper?” That is the first time she is calm and can distance herself from the tumultuous emotions. She recognizes that Scott wants to prevent her from depression, from torturing herself imagining Mark and Alexa and she can appreciate what he does, and recognize that she no longer is obsessed with Mark.

I get impatient with Alexa. I want to tell her to snap out of it. Get over it. Discover how to fill the hole in yourself. Scott is brutal with her a few times but no more so than I wanted to be. I had a hard time believing he could love someone so self-pitying, so wallowing in misery. But he does.

Dealing with Rejection

Jilted makes it clear that Alexa was particularly hurt that Mark turned to Elaine, her best friend. She had trusted both of them, and they spent a month or two behind her back. Mark should have broken off with Alexa immediately, not waited. It wasn’t fair to Alexa to keep pretending, to break dates, to act evasive, to essentially sneak around and dupe her. Alexa would have felt less betrayed had Mark and Elaine waited a month or two to tell her.

Overall

I’ve been all over the rating map on Jilted. The heroine gets 1 star for letting herself get so worked up about a fiance and best friend who cheat on her, about a husband who rejects her after first raping, then making love (?) with her but who has never acted particularly loving towards her. The sheer level of emotional misery is off the scale, all the way to STUPID.

The hero Scott is not much better. He can’t see why Alexa would have tried to keep Mark, nor why she would have attended the wedding, nor why she would have pretended she was with Mark when they started to make love after the wedding. I admire him for taking care of Alexa and doing what he could for her.

Neither of them asked the other what went wrong after they slept together in the jungle camp. Scott later says he thought she cried because she realized she had made love with Scott and not Mark, but he doesn’t ask, not even when Alexa starts drinking like a wanna-be dead drunk. Alexa also doesn’t ask him why, right until the final page she thinks Scott rejects her. She brings misery onto herself.

The emotional intensity gets 5 stars. Too bad the emotions are so over the top.

It’s painful to read about someone so messed up and so willing to stay messed up and so happy to dive into a bottle to avoid more hurt. What will Alexa do when Scott dies before she does? Or if they have children who go off the rails? She needs to stop being a drama queen, to develop some strength and some character.

On Goodreads I gave this 2 stars, then 4, and now after reading the third time I think I’m going to stay with 4 stars. The story and characters are not worth that much, but the fact Sally Wentworth manages to write a book that I have read three times makes up for the too stupid to live emotional drama.

I got my copy from Thriftbooks and you can read for free on Archive.org here. Amazon has used copies as do other used sites and eBay.

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Return to Yesterday – Reunion Romance by Robyn Donald

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Return to Yesterday is an intense story about a husband who wants his young wife back while she is determined against further emotional devastation. Catlin married her husband when she was only 17 – he was 26 and widowed with a young daughter, Jennifer, – just before her father died. She was deeply in love with her husband Conal but far too young to be his wife and unable to cope with his high powered, upper echelon Auckland society life. She found him in bed with another woman. That night she called him every name she could and he got angry and assaulted her, raped/forcibly seduced her. She ran away to Australia.

The story opens 6 years later when she wants Conal, as her trustee, to release funds so she can buy a small bookshop, and he insists she return to Auckland before he will even consider it. Conal has her come to his home where he works to inveigle her into resuming their marriage.

Plot Synopsis – Click to Skip Spoilers

There is not a lot of plot here. Essentially the story is how Conal convinces Catlin to come back to him permanently as she struggles to understand her own emotions.

Robyn Donald tells us what happened 6 years prior via Catlin’s memories. She never understood why Conal married her in the first place. Catlin lived on a remote sheep station in New Zealand’s South Island and was not ready to be anyone’s wife, much less a successful, rich, handsome, brilliant and cold man’s. Conal initially treated her well, almost as a loved young sister, but over time got impatient with her inability to adapt, and his mother did everything she could to undermine the marriage and destroy Catlin’s confidence. He seemed to think she was stupid, gauche, unattractive. He didn’t sleep with her. Instead his friends made sly comments and his mistress acted proprietorial, effectively shutting Catlin out.

One afternoon she drove to Conal’s beach house to find out how she could improve. She walked in Conal and his girlfriend in bed, left before they could see her. That night she went into his room and yelled at him, furious and hurt. Conal sexually assaulted her, although it turned into passion for both of them. That frightened Catlin and she left the next morning, saw a lawyer, went to Australia and concentrated on turning herself into everything Conal thought she was not.

Six years later Catlin is educated, articulate, well-dressed, attractive, poised and confident. She believes she is well able to deal with Conal and comes back to Auckland to discuss the bookshop purchase.

Once Conal has her back in his home he turns on the charm. His mother has a mild heart attack and Conal asks Catlin to stay and help him with his daughter, now 9. Catlin and his daughter become friends and Catlin realizes she loves Conal more than ever but she doesn’t trust him.

Conal tries to seduce Catlin several times, then when she’s finally willing, says that he won’t make love until she agrees to come back to him. They have a near-miss car accident and Catlin decides she would rather live with Conal, even if he doesn’t love her, than without him. He takes her sailing up to his cottage and they make love and have the final resolution.

Characters and Emotions

The crux of the book depends on why Conal wants Catlin back. Catlin thinks it might be:

  1. Conal wants to pay her back for leaving him, embarrassing him and causing worry.
  2. He would like a wife and thinks it’s easier to keep the new improved Catlin than find someone else. His daughter Jennifer needs a mom and his mother isn’t up to caring for her.
  3. He wants to get rid of his ex and fend off the many women who chase him.
  4. Lust

Catlin believes it’s a combination of all 4 reasons, mostly #2 and #4, practicality and lust. She never suspects he loves her. Conal doesn’t help matters. He threatens physical retribution when she angers him. Catlin realizes Conal would never hurt her and forgives the cruel comment.

There are some clues though: He lets her get rid of his other women, past and wanna-be lovers. He lets her believe her father’s estate provided her income, before his mother informs Catlin that Conal provides the funds that she lives on. He tells Jennifer that he wants Catlin back. He encourages the growing liking and trust between Jennifer and Catlin. He tells Catlin several times he wants her back. He tries to buy her gifts, takes her out, ensures his friends see her now and realize how Catlin has grown. When Catlin confronts him about providing her income Conal tells her that he made the best investment possible by helping her grow into a confident, educated, beautiful woman.

Catlin of course is afraid to believe Conal. When they finally make love in the grass at his cottage she dares to believe he feels something, but she has to challenge Conal with his feelings before he tells her he loves her.

Catlin is an excellent character but it is Conal who carries the book. Catlin describes him as cold, brilliant, ruthless, charming, an intriguing combination! When she sees him first in her Auckland hotel Catlin wants to feel indifferent, tells herself for a couple weeks that she is over him, that it had been infatuation. Conal works to get her back, first, back in his bed and second, back in his life for all time. (Of course it’s a Harlequin Presents so we expect a happy ending, but how will they get there?)

There are several minor characters, the ex-Other Woman, the wanna-be OW, daughter Jennifer, Conal’s mother, Conal’s friends, Catlin’s old friend, her current roommate, the kinda-OM whose sister is the wanna-be OW. All of these have distinct characters, more than foils for dialogue.

Setting

Return to Yesterday begins in a Sydney apartment, moves to Auckland hotel, then to Conal’s warm and beautiful home in Auckland suburb, several friends’ homes, restaurants, last Conal’s yacht and beach cottage. Author Donald describes the settings and helps us see why Conal’s home is so beautiful and how Catlin could have felt overwhelmed 6 years past. Conal’s mother decorated Catlin’s room in a rather overpowering style that didn’t fit with the rest of the gracious combination of antiques and good contemporary furniture. The settings enhance the story.

Overall

I didn’t like Return to Yesterday when I first read it, but when I re-read it to write this review I realized how well Robyn Donald created her believable characters and plot, how she wrote emotional conflict and tension that crest right at the perfect point in the story. Pacing and language are good.

The bad points are very bad. He raped/forcibly seduced her 6 years ago, he threatens to do it again now. She was a very young, innocent 17 when they married; he says now he married her because he wanted to drag her off to bed every time saw her. Ick. He could have helped her find a place to live in Auckland and get an education, grow up, before he courted her, but he didn’t.

I still don’t enjoy reading Return to Yesterday and probably won’t re-read, but do admire how well Robyn Donald handled the back story and the emotional growth for both characters.

It’s hard to rate a book when I don’t much like it but realize is well-written and has a good story and character development. 3 Stars is a bit of cop out, but it’s either 1 for the ick factor or 4 for the story.

3 Stars

I got my paperback copy from Thriftbooks. Amazon has used copies and most likely you can find this on eBay or other used book site.

Moth to the Flame – Intense Romance by Sara Craven

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Sara Craven has a near-miss with Moth to the Flame. On the plus side this is intensely emotional with rich visual imagery and three vivid main characters. On the minus the romance does not satisfy because it is not believable. The hero, Santino, does not act as though he loves the heroine Juliet. At the end he claims he intends to marry her but he never says he loves her. And I do not think he does.

Plot Synopsis (Click here to skip spoilers)

Juliet’s younger sister Jan works as a model in Italy. She is beautiful, shallow, selfish and the apple of their mother’s eye. Jan hasn’t written for three weeks and mom worries and insists Juliet must go to Italy to find out what is wrong.

Jan tells Juliet she intends to marry Mario, but his older brother Santino adamantly disapproves and intends to stop the marriage. Jan is pregnant and claims Mario is the father although she doesn’t seem to love him. Brother Santino shows up unexpectedly while Juliet is alone in Jan’s apartment, believes Juliet is Jan and demands that she agree to take the buy off he offers her to leave Mario alone. Juliet doesn’t know what he’s talking about but she’s annoyed at Santino’s nasty comments, doesn’t believe Jan would take a payoff, and decides to play along to divert his attention while Jan and Mario supposedly are off getting married. He walks in on her while she’s dressing and makes lewd comments to embarrass her.

They have dinner together and Juliet fends off Santino’s insulting demands that she take his money and acting on Jan’s behalf, refuses to leave Mario, claims she loves him. Santino slips a sedative into her coffee and instead of driving her to Jan’s apartment, kidnaps her to his remote Castillo on the coast. He takes some of Jan’s glamour outfits along but misses Juliet’s more normal clothes and leaves her purse with her passport, return ticket and money behind.

At the Castillo he tells Juliet that he has notified the scandal media that he has brought Jan to his home, expecting this will cool his brother and turn him from marrying Jan. They have several near seduction scenes and Santino, all along believing Juliet is Jan, alternately calls her a prostitute and acts as though he’s attracted himself. Santino shocks Juliet, tells her about several Jan escapades, including one time where she did a striptease dance at an exclusive party.

Juliet found Santino attractive during that first dinner and over the next two days at the castillo she is horrified to realize she’s on the verge of falling in love with him. She knows they are from separate worlds and he’s not likely to fall for her, so she fights the attraction. It doesn’t help when Santino keeps trying to lure her into bed. Juliet believes he’s after her only because she’s there and he thinks she’s Jan, available, not because he’s interested in her.

Finally Juliet has enough, decides that Jan has had plenty of time to marry Mario if that is indeed what they were doing together, and reveals that she is not Jan, she is sister Juliet. She’s dumbfounded that Santino laughs this off as fairy tales. He’s in the middle of seducing her when his mother and stepfather arrive along with a nasty aunt by marriage whose goddaughter is engaged to Mario, and who collects gossip to sell to tabloids. Santino knows this aunt would like the goddaughter to marry her son instead of Mario, but he thinks the intended marriage will help Mario grow up and doesn’t want the engagement broken. He claims Juliet and he are engaged, that the story he planted about Jan was actually a misprint and was supposed to say he had Juliet with him.

Mother is there because Mario is in the hospital after crashing his car with Jan. Juliet goes with the family to the hospital and finds Jan is quite annoyed with the set up. Mario did not marry her, she’s two months pregnant, she has no job and will lose her apartment. And now her boring, stick in the mud, less pretty sister is engaged to the rich and gorgeous Santino. Santino wants her to go along with his story that Mario was bringing Jan to a family party to celebrate his engagement to Juliet, but if Jan spills the truth, it will cause a great deal of gossip and hurt Mario’s fiancée. Jan agrees to keep silent if Santino takes her along with Juliet to stay at his Castillo.

Once the three are together Jan mounts a relentless campaign to supplant Juliet as Santino’s fiancée. Juliet finds herself pushed to the side and Santino doesn’t seem to mind this at all. In fact when Juliet joins them on the beach and insists on talking to Santino in private about getting her passport and ticket to return to her job in England, he is cold, acts as if he was interrupted and sneers at her. He says he knows why she is going and Juliet thinks he means he knows she is in love with him; she does not know that Jan took magnified Juliet’s tepid friendship with another teacher into a huge love affair.

When Santino returns to Jan on the beach he runs his finger down Jan’s spine. That evening he takes Jan to Rome and comes back a day later after his mother has visited again. Juliet tells his mother that they never were engaged, that it was fake and that she’s going home. Mother is fed up with both her sons and cannot understand why Santino took Jan to Rome. Neither can Juliet, unless Santino wants an affair with Jan.

When Santino and Jan return Jan has “all the appearance of the cat who has had the cream and intends to make the saucer hers as well.” Jan tells Juliet that she’s wearing her heart on her sleeve, that Santino is bored with their engagement and Juliet was undignified when she dragged Santino away on the beach and he didn’t want to go. “Learn to be a good loser” she advises. Santino tries to talk to Juliet but she shrugs him off and goes upstairs to her room. She’s convinced that Jan got what she wanted from Santino, either marriage or an affair.

Back in England Juliet is miserable. She now knows she loves Santino, that it wasn’t just infatuation. Walking home after work Juliet sees Santino’s car parked by her home. Jan walks in wearing an enormous diamond. She’s married and brought her husband and wouldn’t Juliet like to come and greet him? No way. Juliet tells her that is a pleasure she must forgo and wishes them both every happiness. Juliet walks up the steps and Santino comes up behind her, picks her up and carries her to her room. He’s not going to watch her walk away up some stairs again. Jan is married to a former lover and Santino wants to marry Juliet. He tells her he wants her, he has always wanted her. He even agrees to wait to marry until she works out her notice at the end of term.

Why Is the Romance Flat?

Juliet’s Side. Juliet felt she knew Santino, as though she had always known him, had been waiting for him all her life. That could be love. That could be infatuation. Both feel wonderful at first but only love lasts. She did not spend much time with Santino, one dinner where he insulted Jan non stop, two days at his Castillo where he insults and tries to seduce her, a drive to Rome, a month at his Castillo when he leaves for days at a time on business and Jan is always there.

Love at first sight romances can be completely believable – Sara Craven’s The Unwilling Wife is a good example from the man’s side – so that is not why this doesn’t work for me. The main reason is Santino.

Santino’s Side. Why did Santino allow Jan to push Juliet aside? More damning, why did he continue to flirt with her and touch her as he did on the beach when she had her bikini top off? I thought of several reasons:

  1. He’s trying to make Juliet jealous.
  2. He knows he hurt and scared Juliet and wants to give her time to grow accustomed to him
  3. He doesn’t think Juliet cares for him and wants to pay her back for it.
  4. Jan is so blatant that Santino is laughing at her internally when he allows her to play up to him.
  5. He wants to keep Jan sweet so she doesn’t spill the beans to the gossipy godmother
  6. He is physically attracted to Jan.

Santino says reason #2 is why he devised the fake engagement and implies it is why he left Juliet alone so much. Frankly, I don’t buy it. True he wanted to give her space but that does not mean letting Jan have the space – all the cream and the saucer to boot – and it certainly does not mean stroking her back when she’s lying on the beach with her top off. I think it was a combination of #4, 5 and 6.

Santino thought Jan was little better than a prostitute, certainly she was promiscuous and accepted an apartment and fancy clothes from the man she eventually marries. All along Santino thought Juliet was Jan and tried his best to seduce her into bed which says it all. Santino was too proud to allow a sleep-around to marry his brother but he wasn’t too proud to take advantage of physical proximity. Santino acted revolted when Juliet revealed she believed he and Jan had an affair and had possibly even married. Santino would never marry someone like Jan, but he was all too willing to have an affair.

Writing Style

I like Sara Craven’s style. In Moth to the Flame she lets the action and dialogue show the emotions and drive the story. We see everything through Juliet’s eyes, and there is quite a bit of introspection when she worries about falling for Santino, when she’s sickened by Jan’s behavior, when she’s desperate to get back home. The author uses Juliet’s thoughts to help explain Juliet’s reasoning and her behavior and doesn’t rely on them to make the story real.

Moth to the Flame is set mostly in Italy, either in Rome at an apartment or restaurant, or at Santino’s old Castillo. The settings are part of the story and described well enough that we can visualize them. The Castillo is built from stone by a cliff so it has some atmosphere that Juliet notes but doesn’t obsess about.

Overall

Moth to the Flame is a decent read albeit not a great story and far from one of Sara Craven’s best. The romance between Juliet and Santino doesn’t work because he spends far too much time insulting her, trying to seduce her, or flirting with Jan, and far too little time developing any connection between them.

3 Stars

I got my used paperback copy of Moth to the Flame from Thriftbooks. Amazon has copies and most likely you can find it on eBay and other used book sites.

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Bond of Vengeance – Harlequin Presents Romance by Jessica Steele

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Jessica Steele writes rather good romances that have semi-believable plots and characters. I could feast all day on her books except for one glaring problem. When her heroines worry out their man problem they think through things in a bizarre way, with illogical thinking and illogical, convoluted sentences that are hard to follow. The rest of the narrative and the way the other characters talk and think (when we can see their thoughts) are reasonably straightforward and use normal English sentence structure, not Yoda-speak. I think Jessica Steele uses this to show us that the heroine is all mixed up and miles down the wrong road.

Plot Synopsis

Keely’s widowed mom works as a housekeeper for a widower, Lucas Varley. Now she is so excited and joyful; Lucas has asked her to marry him. They love each other which thrills Keely. Keely rushes down to Lucas’s country home to find her mom is tense and worried because Lucas’s son, Tarrant, offered her money to leave, he assumed she was after his dad’s money and tried to buy her off. Keely dashes back to London and insists on seeing Tarrant in his office where she tells him off and smacks him hard. Tarrant implies that not only is her mom after a rich man, but so is Keely!

The newlyweds plan to stay at home – alone – for a few weeks but Tarrant plans to stay there too; he cynically expects his new stepmom to reveal her true, gold diggery colors and wants to be around when it happens. He’s rather nasty. Keely points out that his dad and his new wife want to be alone and tries to persuade Tarrant to leave, he agrees on condition that she spends the weekend with him at his apartment.

Clearly Tarrant is intrigued and attracted to Keely but she’s not seeing that, she sees only that he wants to humiliate both her and her mom. Tarrant insults her a few more times, they have a heavy make out session on the couch but he leaves her to sleep alone, saying he refuses to allow her to trap him. Did I mention insults? Add conceited and convinced of his own never-fail sex appeal.

Another weekend Keely decides to get her own back at Tarrant and tells Lucas and her mom the exact, literal truth, that she spent the weekend with Tarrant in his apartment and slept in his bed. She omits that she slept there alone and of course dad and stepmom have things to say to Tarrant. That makes him even madder – by this time he’s realized new stepmom loves Lucas and is not after his money – and he’s even more attracted to Keely and frustrated. He decides to forcibly seduce her and does.

A few weeks later, when Tarrant comes back from a long business trip Keely tells him she’s pregnant and says to herself but out loud, that she cannot have this child. Tarrant assumes she plans an abortion and has another fit, insists they marry. While she’s supposedly engaged Keely moves a bunch of heavy furniture around and miscarries, an all too frequent occurence in her family. Tarrant again insults her, yells at her for having an abortion, and Keely is too tired and sad to tell him the truth.

Next visit home Keely’s mom mentions that her neice miscarried and that it is sadly something that all the women in her family face. Tarrant realizes he goofed, and once again insists Keely marry him, but this time for love.

Characters

Tarrant is quite well done. We readers can see him falling for Keely, getting himself twisted in knots trying to avoid the attraction, frustrated because he wants her, angry because he thinks she doesn’t want him and doesn’t want their child. It’s almost funny.

Keely, in typical Jessica Steele fashion, jumps to all sorts of silly conclusions. For example Tarrant calls her from the airport the morning after they sleep together and Keely immediately assumes he wants her to get all of her mom visits done so he can go to his dad’s house on the weekends when he’s back without seeing her. I re-read this section and have no idea how anyone would conclude that’s what he meant, but Keely is in a swivet and not thinking clearly. She knows she’s in love with Tarrant, convinced he does not and never will love her, and her internal musings reflect this.

Mom and new husband Lucas are standard casting central characters with little development or personality. Lucas seems nonchalant when Mom mentions she suffered several miscarriages and that her sisters hae the same problem; it’s rather unnerving to see a man, who supposedly loves someone, listen to that without caring.

Overall

If this were written in straighforward English I’d give it three stars without question. Being as it is, written to show Keely’s illogical thinking, full of split infinitives (and split everything else!) it’s closer to two stars. (That sentence is my attempt to write Jessica Steele-speak. It’s a lot harder than it looks.)

2 Stars

I got my copy in a book lot on eBay and you can find copies on Thriftbooks. Many of Jessica Steele’s romances are available on Harlequin.com or from Amazon in E format, but this one, Bond of Vengeance, is not. Amazon has the comic version as of this writing.

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The Bright Side of Dark Harlequin Romance by Jeneth Murrey

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Jeneth Murrey has become one of my favorite romance authors because she writes strong-willed heroines who aren’t about to be subsumed by their equally strong-willed heroes and includes plenty of humor and romantic tension plus settings we can visualize.

The Bright Side of Dark is her only novel set in Spain and features Victoria, a 20-something English lady who wakes up in hospital with amnesia after a bad car wreck. She knows her first name, not her last, nor where she lives, why she was driving the mountain road in the dark, where she was going. Victoria has plenty of fortitude but she is anxious about who she is and her place in the world.

Victoria is fretting when the nun nursing her gets her cleaned up for a special visitor. Her husband, Rafael, has come to claim her. Victoria doesn’t recognize him at all, but she does recognize that he is dangerous, someone who would run roughshod over her and she’s not at all glad he is claiming her. Or is she? She also recognizes that he’s strong and caring and just the sort of husband she would want. Yes, she’s mixed up about this. In fact Victoria remains mixed up in her feelings towards Rafael all story long.

Plot Synopsis

Rafael is charming and insistent, brushes aside the doctor who would like Victoria to stay hospitalized another week or two, offers to build a new children’s ward and donate to the nuns’ order. Now Victoria smells a rat. She’s nothing special, yet this man who claims to be her husband badly wants her home now; she already cost him an expensive car, now a new children’s ward and a fat donation. Hmmm.

Rafael takes her home, back to his young daughter Isabel, cousin-in-law Inez, grandmother Abuela, housekeeper Pilar, assorted maids and a chauffeur. Victoria recognizes none of them but all are delighted to see her back, except perhaps Inez who makes little barbed comments all through dinner. Victoria still doesn’t understand the set up. Why did Rafael marry her? Who is Inez? How did Isabel injure her leg and can it be cured? As she learns near the end of the book Rafael hired Victoria to teach Isabela after an illness and when Isabel recovered enough to go back to to boarding school, he asked Victoria to marry him. Since she had no one and loved Isabel it was easy for Victoria to agree.

Various day-to-day events help Victoria re-establish herself in this new, unknown world and draw closer to Isabel, Abuela and Rafael. She’s still wary of Rafael although she’s starting to love him. They enjoy sleeping together and she knows he cares about her but doesn’t think he loves her. He hasn’t spoken of his feelings and Victoria is well aware he could have married almost anyone. She alternately melts with love or throws things at Rafael in a flaming temper, she just doesn’t understand him and she’s determined not to let him know how much she loves him because she’s sure he will take advantage of it to control her.

Juan, a young, spoilt son of neighbor friends decides to languish after Victoria which she finds annoying. He languishes after Inez too before she decides to move back to Madrid and resume her social life. Before she leaves Inez warns Victoria that Juan is not only spoilt but vicious, to beware of him.

Victoria, who is now pregnant, and Rafael take Isabel to England to consult with an orthopedic surgeon about her damaged leg and they enjoy touring London, seeing all the sights with an indefatigable Isabel who is especially fond of riding on the double decker buses and seeing all the umbrellas. Isabel buys souvenirs for all her school friends and people at home and has a wonderful time. Victoria enjoys it too.

The plot peak comes when Juan has a servant ride a mule 10 miles through a torrential rainstorm to deliver a melodramatic note to Victoria about his heartbreak and how she will be sorry she turned him away. She is so angry that Juan mistreated a servant and the mule that she doesn’t even bother to read the whole note, she’s disgusted he’d do that to someone for no better reason than to posture. Then it dawns on her that although Juan can’t do anything to her, he could perhaps do Rafael some mischief. She calls Rafael’s office in a panic. Rafael left his office a couple hours before but he’s not yet home and she is scared to death.

Victoria dashes out the house – in her slippers and without a coat – to her car, hops in and drives through the downpour like a nutcase to find out what happened to Rafael. Her memory comes back during the drive, she pulls over and pushes it out of her head so she can concentrate on finding Rafael. She sees him walking through the fog and rain, slams on the brakes, runs barefoot (since the slippers disintegrated and fell off back in the garage) and throws herself into his arms. He is thrilled and takes her home. She tells him she remembered everything, that she crashed the car driving back home to tell him she loved him. He explained that when he asked her to marry him, suggesting it was for Isabel, and she agreed and said they would have a normal marriage he thanked God and took what she offered.

Characters

Victoria has mixed feelings about Rafael. Right at the beginning lying in her hospital bed she recognizes him as a domineering male who would trample all over her if she gave him an inch. On the other hand “she didn’t mind being married to him in the least. If she must have a husband, he was just the sort she would have chosen.” She loves Rafael but is wary of letting him know because she’s quite certain he’ll take advantage of her feelings to get his own way even more than he already does.

Victoria is essentially kind and loving, treats Isabel as her own daughter, and Abuela as her own much-loved grandmother. She’s considerate with the servants and gets along well with everyone although she finds Inez a trial. Inez is a snob, looks down on Pilar for her peasant attitudes. Victoria shares many of those peasant attitudes and is quite happy about it. Inez is too sophisticated to show her feelings but Victoria has no qualms; when she’s happy she smiles and laughs and when she’s angry she throws things. Rafael tells her that they quarrel every couple of days but the quarrels don’t mean anything. It’s Victoria’s way to ensure she retains some independence.

Author Jeneth Murrey creates believable characters, especially Rafael and Victoria. Abuela and her maid Sancha have small vignettes that show Abuela as an older lady, considerate of her grandson and his wife, who takes care not to intrude. Sancha is devoted to Abuela and frets about small things, little treasures she has collected and she knits constantly.

Rafael is more complex. He obviously cares deeply about his family including Victoria. He makes it evident he enjoys sleeping with Victoria and enjoys her mercurial temper. He informs her that his commands to his wife are the next best thing to Holy Writ and that she cannot go anywhere unless he allows it. That’s like lighting a gasoline fire, sets Victoria off in fury. She picks a fight with him and defies him simply to make him angry, he retaliates by squeezing her hand mercilessly to the point where Victoria had bruises.

Conflicts

There is one overriding conflict and a few smaller ones.

Victoria simply cannot and will not accept that Rafael should control her. Rafael is not a bully (except when she deliberately angers him in the hand squeezing incident) and he’s not unreasonable. But he does recognize that Victoria is prone to impulse with a ready temper and lives life on emotions. He enjoys fighting with her – up to a point – and seems to say things to set her off. They have a constant struggle, not for supremacy exactly, but to balance independence with alliance. Rafael doesn’t want to control Victoria, he does want her to behave as his loving wife, to be reasonable, not go off half-cocked, not argue about everything.

It will take Rafael and Victoria their entire lives to resolve this push-pull conflict and they will enjoy it. By the end of the book both said “I love you” to the other which converts the question from one of control to give and take, the normal friction of two strong-willed people who love, respect, trust, honor each other.

We see this in how Victoria decides to give birth. She’s pretty sure the baby is coming when she smiles at Rafael and gayly sends him off to work. She knows it will take him at least an hour to first get to work, get the message and then get home (this is before cell phones) and in fact she has the baby while he is gone. As she says she “wanted to surprise him…the father is not necessary at times like these.”

Victoria compares herself to a jigsaw puzzle where the edges are done but not the middle. She tells Rafael that she feels just like the puzzle, an outline and empty, because she doesn’t know who she is or have any memory from before the car accident. Rafael tells her she’s hungry. He knows she is a real person, he realizes she’s hurting because she doesn’t have her past but he doesn’t think she should make it so important. The Bright Side of Dark is one of the few amnesia stories that are believable, and I think it’s because the amnesia is simply there, it doesn’t drive the story.

Setting

Author Murrey creates detailed short descriptions; we can visualize the setting. For example she doesn’t describe everything the family sees in London, she concentrates on Isabel riding on the top of the double decker bus to look down at the umbrellas. She describes Rafael’s home, from the austere fortress front to the warm, inviting rooms where the family lives, and she shows us the department store where Isabel and Victoria splurge on t-shirts and jeans for Isabel and Rafael buys Victoria a very expensive evening dress.

When Victoria is hospitalized she can’t see much beyond the obsessively clean rooms, the starched and clean nun/nurses, the screens the nuns place around each bed in the ward to give privacy to visitors. Still we get the feeling of a healing place that offsets rigid cleanliness with care and warmth. Two nuns and the doctor are given enough word count to make them memorable and this helps make the scenes feel real.

I contrast the detail here with the cursory treatment the modern Harlequin Presents authors give setting. The newer books are shorter and intensely focus on the two main characters, not minor players or setting or mood and I miss that. Jeneth Murrey lets all the characters have their time in the sun and includes setting to give mood and lets actions and dialogue drive the story and add humor.

Overall

I read my paperback copy while we were moving to a different country, not the best situation to enjoy subtle humor and character building. I re-read it 5 months later and enjoyed it far more the second and third time. The things that make this for me are:

  • Story comes alive with vivid characterization and funny plot
  • Humor. I laughed at some of the scenes and dialogue
  • Excellent character development
  • Likable characters, both Rafael and Victoria are decent people that I would enjoy meeting
  • Setting is always present but The Bright Side of Dark never becomes a travelogue
  • Good writing
  • Characters play off each other
  • Genuine love story, a romance that strengthens and becomes clear
  • Minor characters who add to the story
  • Plot that is simple and doesn’t get in the way of the people
  • Romantic tension
  • More showing than telling
  • Emotionally engaging

I liked both Rafael and Victoria but both had times when I wanted to smack them upside the head, Rafael when he got mean squeezing Victoria’s hand and Victoria when she decided to have hissy fits for not much.

4 Stars. The Bright Side of Dark is close to 5 stars, but just misses that high bar.

I got my copy from Thriftbooks, do check eBay, other online stores and Amazon for copies.

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The Sweetest Trap. Harlequin Presents by Robyn Donald

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I usually like Robyn Donald’s Harlequin Presents for their strong stories, interesting well-developed characters and good dialogue. The Sweetest Trap is disappointing. I made myself finish it despite stopping every few pages to do fun things like dishes and laundry. The plot was simply not enticing enough to overcome wooden characters, continuity problems, spotty dialogue and the cheesy idea of a 35 year old man seducing an 18 year old, unworldly girl.

Plot Synopsis

Cressida, just 18, sails with her domineering father all over the world, gaining him raw material for his philosophical musing/travelogue books that sell well, until her dad has a fatal heart attack off the coast of New Zealand during a dangerous storm. Cressida radios for help since she cannot handle the yacht alone and Luke arrives in his fishing launch to help her bring the yacht into shore.

Luke takes her to his New Zealand home which he shares with his mom, helps her with the inquest, financial settlements, emotional turmoil. Cressida has longed to live the way Luke does, settled in a home surrounded by country yet close enough to the ocean to sail or swim for fun. She had wanted to go to college, had never wanted to accompany her father, but he had promised his dead wife to keep Cressida with him. Now she’s unable to grieve and can feel only bitter regret.

Luke has a long time girlfriend, Paula, who visits several weekends. Luke’s mom tells Cressida that Paula has not wanted to marry Luke since it meant she would have to give up the law career she loves. Later we see that Paula does want to marry Luke and Luke tells Cressida that he had thought seriously about marrying Paula since he cares greatly for her.

Cressida is wise enough to realize she has a crush on Luke and is hoping that it is nothing more, just the usual adolescent strong feelings that dissipate in time. They are physically attracted and Luke kisses her, makes it clear that he wants more. Eventually they take her yacht out on a farewell cruise before she sells it, get caught overnight in a storm and make love. Cressida is horrified afterwards because she knows that was the worst thing to do when she does not want to love Luke and does not want to be pregnant and there’s Paula. Luke says he’ll marry her but it doesn’t sound to Cressida or to me as though he wants to.

When they get back Paula is waiting for Luke in the garage, throws herself in his arms and says “You have to help me. I think I’m pregnant!” Exit Cressida.

She ends up sharing an apartment in Auckland with a nice girl, Jan, who’s pretty fed up with guys – at the moment. Luke shows up and Cressida delivers a great self-sufficiency speech: She wants to find out who Cressida Godwin is and all she’ll ever be if she marries Luke is Mrs. Luke. He’s angry and tells her Paula has been having an affair with someone else, admits he loves Paula, leaves.

Luke’s mom calls Cressida when Luke is hospitalized. Cressida charters a plane to get there and sits with him while he’s unconscious. Paula arrives too and agrees with Cressida that one of the two of them can stay with Luke, and it will be whosever voice he responds to. Luke ignores Paula but reaches for Cressida’s hand. Paula leaves, banished to the cold reaches of discarded HP Other Women. Luke then wakes up and kicks Cressida out.

Things proceed until Luke shows back up one evening when Jan is out, informs her he loves her, won’t take no for an answer, they sleep together again and agree to marry.

Characters and Dialogue

Luke starts his role in The Sweetest Trap by jumping in the ocean during a storm to reach Cressida’s boat, grinning and having a wonderful time playing Viking. Later Robyn Donald tries to show Luke as a thoughtful, emotional, warm and kind man but it doesn’t quite work. Luke is extremely kind to Cressida, supporting her through the horribleness of her dad’s death, offering her a home, helping her gain some basic skills, but he also rides over her and ignores what she wants when it conflicts with what he wants.

Case in point: Luke asks one of his employees to take Cressida shopping since all her clothes are suited to sailing in warm weather, casual or outgrown. Cressida has some money the lawyer for her father’s estate advanced her and she intends to budget only part of that for new clothes. Luke goes behind her back and has his employee go back and get all the other things that Cressida liked but didn’t buy. True, the new things are wonderful and Cressida wants them, but her whole point throughout the story is she wants to be independent, at least long enough to prove to herself that she is a separate person and can take care of herself. Luke was disrespectful.

Let’s not even go to the age difference. The experience gap is even larger and more momentous than the age gap. Cressida went to a convent school in England when she wasn’t cloistered on the yacht with her dad. She met people yes, including a repulsive guy who wanted to buy her for a short term affair, but she was completely under her father’s control. Luke has been an independent adult for almost 20 years.

Cressida had the dubious pleasure of being in the room behind a bookcase when Paula and Luke came in and started kissing and making out. Luke claimed later that was Paula’s last attempt to show him they could make marriage work, supposedly because she didn’t want the affair with the other man. I don’t buy this. This little passionate interlude took many minutes and neither one spoke. It sounded as if Luke enjoyed having Paula try to persuade him, even if he ended up rejecting her.

Cressida has the best dialogue and develops a spine although she berates herself for being weak and easily intimidated. I didn’t think she had allowed herself enough time to discover who she was but overall she was characterized as a person we could visualize being happy. The author tells us instead of showing us a little too much. Cressida is described as feeling empty, bitter, afraid several times but we don’t really see that.

I didn’t like the huge age/experience difference nor that Cressida and Luke sleep together even when Cressida believes he is in love with Paula. She doesn’t seem able to think clearly when Luke is around with his manly self.

The big romance between Cressida and Luke is inconsistent, varying from almost completely physical to metaphysical. Luke says he recognizes Cressida as bone of his bone, part of himself, but this is after he’s tried to push her away, after he’s seduced her, after he’s hurt her, after she’s seen him first make love to Paula then later reject her, after Cressida has escaped his hand. As for Cressida it’s possible for a young lady to truly love a man so much older and more experienced, but it’s far more likely to be a short term crush. Cressida was wise to leave to find out the difference; I was not convinced that she knew what she felt even at the end.

Luke uses Paula. He tells Cressida that he’d seriously considered marrying Paula, that they both cared for the other, that he didn’t love her but knew they could have a happy life together. He keeps seeing Paula and seems to swing between chasing Cressida for physical delight and clinging to Paula for emotional comfort. He finally dumps her, which is when Paula turns to her married co-worker.

The minor characters, Luke’s mom, gossipy neighbors, the young lawyer and his wife, roommate Jan, are nice touches and all have some depth, but are essentially spear carriers, foils to carry the action. I couldn’t visualize any of them.

Style and Continuity

Robyn Donald did not make me care about the characters nor believe any of them are real people. The pace is slow. Sometimes a slow pace with a slow tension build works great with romance novels but this one doesn’t have the tension.

The novel lacks a clear emotional peak. Was it when Luke and Cressida make love in the yacht? When Paula throws herself at him begging for help with a suspected pregnancy? When Luke is in hospital and Cressida and Paula joust over who he will respond to? Is it when Cressida tells Luke she needs to be on her own to find out who she is? The ending is not the peak; in fact it simply happens. Time to sleep together, yay!

I picked a page at random, #104, right after Cressida tells Luke about the degenerate rich guy who wanted her for a couple weeks. There are 6 paragraphs on this page, all quite short. Four paragraphs are tell paragraphs, Robyn Donald tells us what Cressida thinks or describes inconsequential action. Two are mostly dialogue. That ratio is pretty typical, a bit more telling than showing and that, along with the slow pace and icky age difference make this story bland and less interesting than Donald’s usual.

There are at least two glaring and some smaller continuity problems.

  • Luke broke ribs and hurt his arm in a bulldozer accident but Cressida asks him several times about his leg, does it hurt, can he walk OK? Luke says it aches.
  • Cressida doesn’t earn a lot in Auckland yet she charters a plane to get to Luke in the hospital instead of taking the bus.
  • Luke and Cressida make love in the apartment she shares with Jan. I can see Jan having a fit when she comes home and finds them both there, especially if Cressida and Jan share a room.
  • A small problem is when the yacht sells. The buyers are getting it refitted so Luke and Cressida take it out for a last sail. The boat must have been docked near Luke’s house yet we never hear that the buyers came to see it in person. I noticed that which means either the story was weak or the problem was glaring; I usually forgive small problems in a good story.

Overall

The Sweetest Trap combines the big age and experience gap with a domineering man and girl who wants to grow up and develop a spine and personality. I think this should have caused tension and conflict all on its own, and indeed that is so. However the tension is mild and Donald does not develop the conflicts. Instead we have a lot of Luke chasing Cressida around the couch (more or less) and Cressida bemoaning that she has a crush on Luke, a most unsuitable crush object.

The story does not come together.

2 Stars, OK

I got my paperback copy of The Sweetest Trap in a lot on eBay. It is available on Thriftbooks here, and Amazon here, both new and used. I didn’t see it available in E format except in pdf format to borrow on Archive.org.

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Valdez’s Bartered Bride Harlequin Presents by Rachel Thomas

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This has an absolutely stupid plot. He and she either marry or he has to find his unknown half brother. Why? Because her dad owes his bank a ton of money and that’s what the contract he signed calls for and now the bank’s board of directors wants the loan repaid. Supposedly there is plenty of cash and property that dad can’t access without meeting the loan terms, but once that’s done dad’s skating.

Let’s see. He could have refused and let the bank flounder on without the infusion of cash or told the bank to suck it up and write off the loan since daddy couldn’t pay without meeting the ridiculous terms. Instead he and she spend time together, sleep together and eventually she talks to his mom to find out who his father had an affair and illegitimate kid with.

Everyone should be happy, right? Nope because someone (her dad) tipped off the tabloids who have lots of photos and embarrassing details and of course he blames her for the publicity. And nope because they both somehow decide they are in love and end up engaged to marry.

The plot is so convoluted and inane that it’s hard to take anything in the book seriously. I basically skimmed and read the ending.

1 Star