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Rightful Possession Romance by Sally Wentworth

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I’m reviewing Rightful Possession because I wanted to understand how Sally Wentworth make the story work when it should not. I’m going to analyze the story events, characters and structure in this long review because Rightful Possession is the essence of a successful Harlequin romance.

5 Stars

The plot here is straightforward but the romance and the story are not. Basic plot is:

  1. Genista is an airline hostess (flight attendant), a job still semi-glamorous in 1978 when Rightful Possession is published. Genista shares a flat with Lynn, her best friend and fellow stewardess.
  2. Genista’s brother Kevin invents stuff but has no money sense. An acquaintance tells him he can get his invention tested but the “friend” says he can’t access his money until tomorrow and can’t Kevin find the cash today and get repaid tomorrow. Kevin embezzles the money from his employer’s payroll, figuring he can repay the money the next day and never hurt anyone. Of course the con man runs off with the cash. Kevin is jailed in Paris after employer files charges.
  3. Genista flies right over to her brother, hears it’s only a small amount of money, goes to see the company owner, Marc. Marc refuses to let her brother off, and when Genista offers repayment herself, explains that Kevin’s “small amount” was 10,000 pounds, an enormous sum, roughly $200,000 in today’s money. Marc tells her to stop wasting his time and Genista loses it, tells him off. (She’s exhausted by this point after working the entire previous day and night.)
  4. Marc offers her a deal. He needs a hostess who understands and can work with international business people, who speaks multiple languages. He’ll marry her in “an almost business deal”, where she shows up to do her wifely duties then fades away until he needs her again. Genista assumes “business deal” means hostess duties, not sleeping with him but Marc means the full wifely shebang.
  5. He insists on Genista replacing her wardrobe with deluxe designer outfits, marries her, then they go to his Greek island for a few days. There they have the major disagreement as to her duties. Marc agrees to give her another day to get used to the idea.
  6. Genista escapes the villa, walks to the small port and gets passage off the island with a fisherman while Marc is out sailing. Unfortunately fisherman can’t leave until evening and Marc discovers she’s gone and manages to catch them in mid-sail, drags her off and drags her to bed.
  7. Genista tries to tell him she’s never slept with a man before but Marc won’t believe it given the reputation stewardesses had (this is about 10 years after the sleazy Coffee Tea or Me?) and rapes her. Once he realizes she told the truth he tries to court her, show her what love can be, but she refuses to respond and he loses patience and rapes her again.
  8. Once Marc’s asleep Genista goes out to the beach, swims out in the bay, gets a cramp and is in danger with tide carrying her out. Marc rescues her and accuses her of trying to drown herself; Genista tells him yes, she’d rather die than spend another night with him. He is horrified.
  9. They go back to his French chateau and she picks up her hostess duties. Marc promises to leave her alone.
  10. Housekeeper Madam Hermant tries to undermine Genista, refuses to take direction on a dinner party, until Genista tosses that aside and insists on taking over. The next parties are great fun and Marc is pleased and Genista begins to enjoy this aspect of her job. Marc is always affectionate at these parties and praises her to his guests, which disgusts Genista because she sees it as hypocrisy.
  11. Marc buys her a diamond bracelet and she has to face facts. She’s stuck with Marc and 5 years is a long time to hate anyone. She lets go of her hate – still dislikes and distrusts him – but decides to make the best of things. This is the major turning point.
  12. Genista discovers she can slip off the watchdog chauffeur by going to the beauty salon and slipping out the back door. She meets up with both Lynn and her brother this way and tells them she had to marry Marc for repayment but doesn’t tell either of them about the rape or how much she detests him.
  13. It helps that Marc’s old friend Ally shows up, pays extravagant compliments and offers her friendship.
  14. Things proceed in a more-or-less normal fashion. Genista enjoys her work and is beginning to see Marc in a better light although she still despises him for raping her and pretending to care about her in public. He’s always cordial in private but reserved. Genista starts to see that they could be reasonably happy together, although the sex part is still a wall between them.
  15. Genista pawns her bracelet to give Kevin money for his invention. Madame Hermant finds out and makes trouble.
  16. Marc takes Genista back to the island where she realizes she’s falling for him. They kiss and he starts to make love to her until she tenses up and he lets her go before going back to the village. She has mixed feelings now, wanting something more than a dreary business relationship but not quite ready to love.
  17. Marc’s former fiancée, Adrienne, shows up. Marc avoids her at parties but Madame Hermant tells Genista that Marc and Adrienne are waiting only for Adrienne’s husband to die before they marry. This puts Genista’s wakening feelings on ice. Marc gets hurt in a polo match and Genista runs to the first aid room where she sees Adrienne and Marc passionately kissing.
  18. Brother Kevin shows up. He sold his invention and can pay back Marc and redeem Genista’s bracelet. Genista has a special party for Marc the next day on a jet, gets her passport and arranges with Lynn to help her get away at the airport. (This is long before the days of strict security and passengers walked on the tarmac.) She leaves her bracelet and cash and bank statements for Marc and gets away. She resumes her stewardess job.
  19. Two months pass and Adrienne’s husband dies. Genista writes Marc’s lawyers to offer her cooperation in a divorce to set Marc free to marry Adrienne. Marc has been chasing around North Africa looking for Genista because he thought she went with Ally, but with the letter he now knows where to find her. He gets on a flight with her and manages to corner her to talk. He reveals he is in love with her and has been.
  20. Happy ever after.

As said, straightforward plot. She yells at him, he coerces her into marriage, forced sex, anger and hate followed slowly by tolerance then liking then finally love, other wannabe woman, escape, finally he finds her and they settle all. So why does Rightful Possession work? And how does Wentworth manage to make the transition from #7, marital rape, to #16, dawning love feel realistic?

The Set Up. Sally Wentworth uses few pages and incidents to set up the situation and introduce the characters then goes right into the story and lets events and people unfold. She makes every event work to advance the plot and the story.

She tells us nothing and shows us everything by actions and dialogue. For example, when Genista escapes the villa she walks several miles over rough country to reach the port, showing us she is determined and not easily cowed. When Marc thinks she is softening towards him he calls her his little love and says how he has been longing and waiting for this. (Of course he says this in French, thank you translation programs!)

We get clues that Marc cares for Genista because he publicly acts to cherish her and he is patient and tolerates her unrelenting hostility. We can’t tell for sure whether he’s just putting on an act, which Genista believes for several months, or whether there is actual caring. Our beliefs mirror Genista’s. At first we see Marc as hypocritical, then as potentially caring for her, then again even more odious after Genista sees him and Adrienne kissing at the polo match. We still wonder, because after all this is a Harlequin and they are supposed to have happy endings, but how will Marc push this one by?

How indeed. Sally Wentworth has created a believable about face for Genista with a loving husband who simply can’t or won’t tell her how he feels. After Marc finds Genista gives the slip to her chauffeur/bodyguard, he tells her that he fears kidnap. Genista says that is silly since he wouldn’t pay a ransom for her. Marc points out that the kidnappers wouldn’t know that but the telltale is that he takes such a violent breath that his cigarette glows bright red.

Handling the difficult part. However do you go from despising and hating the man who forces you – rape – to falling in love with him? Even after re-re-rereading Rightful Possession I’m amazed that Sally Wentworth pulls this off. A few things help make the transition believable.

Wentworth grays out the actual rape; in fact jumps right from Marc draging Genista off the boat to Genista leaving bed to go to the beach. She remembers the aftermath when Marc tried to make up for raping her before once again losing his temper and forcing her. She recalls his at-first tender and caring and remorseful actions and how she was tempted to respond with zero details. (Thank you.) Genista recalls the second time when Marc tried to make love to her in deeds and words with mixed emotions.

Wentworth created Genista as a sympathetic, credible, realistic person. She’s mature and wise enough to realize she cannot go on hating Marc for 5 years, that it will rebound on her as much as on Marc. She doesn’t trust him or believe he is sincere, but she learns to enjoy his company and relax with him.

Ally and others see Marc as a wonderful caring man and eventually Genista “sees him for the first time as a devastatingly charming and handsome man”. When your friends like and respect someone it’s hard to keep seeing only their faults; that gives Genista time to reflect on her hostess job, her time with Marc, Marc himself and face the brutal encounter.

Is this Stockholm syndrome, where a captive tends to sympathize with their captor, even to allying with them? I did not read it that way. Genista stayed with Marc out of a sense of honor, not because of force or emotional maniuplation, she never pities him or sees him as a victim, she make a conscious decision to stop hating him. She was never ignorant of his faults nor did she have bad feelings towards people who wanted to help her leave. When Lynn offers to help her Genista considers it but stays only because shes feels obligated to repay Kevin’s debt not because she likes Marc or wants to be with him or feels sympathy for him.

Stockholm victims tend to emotionally align to their abuser, to appease them, to behave to the abuser’s requirements. Genista never stops being free in her mind and she continually escapes via the hairdresser dodge to spend time as she pleases. After the first horrorible night together Genista never sees herself as a victim, and once Marc promises to leave her alone she stops feeling any self-pity. Once Kevin can pays his debt she is joyous, she can be free.

Using the story and plot together. Given the story is the people and the plot the actions, Wentworth weaves these together so one props up the other and both are stronger. Marc’s actions – leaving Genista alone, buying her a beautiful bracelet as a gift, praising her to his friends, relinquishing her to Ally’s care, having fun together, spending time together, endless courtesy – come through as caring. We see him through Genista’s eyes and how she responds to his actions and the attitude she infers to him.

It sounds simple to combine story and plot but few authors do so successfully in any genre. Perhaps it’s easier in romance where readers expect a plot to move along a more-or-less predetermined arc, because instead of seeing conventions as a straightjacket, authors can use them for the skeleton and spend their energy building muscles and blood. Wentworth has written several other excellent romances where she uses similar approach, notably Betrayal in Bali, letting the standard plot be the template and using her imagination and skill to fill it in and create a believable, excellent novel.

The Characters Genista, Marc and Ally are three-dimensional, well-developed people. Often authors sketch the secondary characters and do little more even with the two protagonists, but Wentworth makes us see them as individuals. Wentworth lets the plot and dialogue do the work to exposit the characters; there are few inner musings or “well, here’s what happened when I was six” discussions.

It’s easy to identify with Genista, a woman trapped in a nightmare marriage, who manages to step beyond the horrible events and turn her marriage into something worthwhile that she and Marc enjoy.

Genista realizes that she can choose how she responds to Marc, how she thinks about and faces up to the fact husband raped her. She does not hide her head in the sand or pretend it’s not deadly serious, a terrifying, horrible thing, but she is adult and makes her choice to at least tolerate Marc and try to make something out of her enforced marriage.

Immediacy Sally Wentworth makes us feel like we are right there, part of the action, not watching a play. A couple of my favorite romance authors do this very well. Wentworth makes this happen here and it helps us thaw along with Genista and to turn what was originally 5 years of hateful intimacy with a man she detests into a tolerable, sometimes enjoyable life and friendship and later into love.

Wentworth avoided common plot tropes. Genista does not get pregnant, she does not run away, instead leaves only when she can pay the debt, Other Woman Adrienne does not visit Genista to gloat and threaten, no one dies, Genista is happy that her prior boyfriend is marrying her best friend, no one gets clunked on the head and loses their memory. I was slightly surprised that she did not get pregnant from her one night with Marc and believe that made for a much stronger story. Wentworth was able to pare the story down to Marc or no Marc, love or hate.

Was the govel sufficient to justify a happy ever after? Marc laid his heart on the line when he took Genista to the hotel and he made it clear he was horrified that his actions drove her to attempt suicide (as he thought it). He never really apologized although he did make it clear he regretted trying to force her, realized it backfired then and would backfire every time. Is that a sufficient grovel? That’s up to you. I would have liked more and stronger regrets.

Summary Even after reading Rightful Possession several times I’m in awe at how Sally Wentworth made Genista’s transition from victim to loving wife seem so real. I’m even more in awe that she made the conversion from rape to love feel real.

House of Mirrors – How to Be a Second Choice – by Yvonne Whittal

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How would you like to be your husband’s second choice? To marry the man you love, and have loved for years, knowing he will never love you, that he gave his heart to a manipulative woman who deserted him when he needed her most?

Plot and Story Synopsis

In House of Mirrors Yvonne Whittal confronts this situation, although here the beloved was never the spouse, only Grant’s much desired girl friend Myra. Myra who manipulated Grant with her beautiful face and body and who deserted him when he lost his status as revered surgeon due to a serious hand injury. When story opens Grant is bitter and alone and hiding in his cottage in rural South Africa where his former neighbor Liz, seeks him out. Liz has loved him for years, way back when he was pursuing her older sister Pamela and still loves him. She comes over, finds his cottage is a pigsty, that he doesn’t cook or eat much, that he’s angry and hurting from losing Myra and his career. (Apparently it never occurred to him that he could practice medicine or teach even with a bad hand.) He tells Liz to go away, that he doesn’t need her or want to see anyone.

Grant is sulking.

Liz is a breath of fresh air for him; she is eminently practical, she comes over every day, cleans his house, cooks his meals, washes his clothes, gives him company when he wants it but never burdens him with her feelings or says much about herself. Eventually Grant kisses her and discovers that he isn’t quite as dead or numb as he thought, Liz responds to him and he wants her. He says he wants her physically but in fact he is looking for stability and comfort and knows instinctively that Liz is that.

The proposal scene is funny. He asks her to marry him, she tells him a marriage proposal usually comes after a declaration of love. He admits he has no love to offer her but he needs a wife. Liz the blunt then says he needs a woman in his bed, which he agrees with. He also says she’s lively company (oh my, a compliment!), a good cook and irons his shirts. Wow. Be still my heart. Of course he can offer her a good life, in material terms, and he can offer her physical passion and why isn’t that enough?

Liz tells him she wants a lot more, she wants love. Then, unlike 99% of all Harlequin heroines, she tells him she loves him and she wants him to love her. He insists he cannot give her love, but he will give her respect, companionship and the physical side of love. She points out she must be a glutton for punishment and accepts.

This is the crux of the story from her side. She loves him, she isn’t just in love and she has no illusions about him or what he feels for her. She knows she risks a life of pain married to someone who feels little for her and she isn’t stupidly optimistic about the chance his feelings might grow. She hopes he might but she doesn’t expect it and she marries him with her eyes wide open.

She knows she has the right to expect his fidelity. He won’t tell her what he thinks about Myra – it’s none of her business, which is a danger sign – and Liz worries he is using her to forget the woman he really wants. Myra is in Paris but could return at any time and Liz isn’t sure that his respect and desire for herself would prevent him from turning to Myra. This second conflict starts subtly, mostly inside Grant and Liz, a foreshadowing.

Liz challenges Grant to have another operation and therapy on his hand. He regains his dexterity and career and is once again the successful, well-known surgeon.

Things go well until Myra shows up and Grant falls apart. He begins staying out at night, sleeping apart from Liz, when they do make love he is tender, almost desperate. True to Harlequin etiquette, Myra makes the classic Other Woman visit, tells Liz to make everyone happy and fade off into the sunset, that Grant is hers once again. Liz, no weeping doormat, tells Myra that all Grant has to do is ask her to leave, but that she is not running when things get tough, a direct hit since Myra ran out on Grant before.

Myra comes home one afternoon after having the doctor confirm she is pregnant, ready to share the good news with Grant but worried that he might feel compelled to stay with her only for the baby. Not to worry. Grant is home early to tell her that although he never wanted to hurt her, blah blah blah, he “needs to be free to sort himself out”. He married Liz when he was “at his lowest ebb” or as Liz says, he knew Myra would not have him then and Liz was better than nothing.

This is where Grant’s complete lack of self-knowledge peeks out. He denies that he made do with Liz or that she was there to help him pass the time. He refuses to discuss Myra even when Liz tells him that Myra never loved him and never will, but he is concerned where Liz is going and wants her to have the car he gave her. In fact Liz was right. Grant did make do, he did use Liz when she was good enough, better than nothing, and now he’s getting the first intimation that she may be more than that and that he’s making a horrible mistake. But since he’s clueless and lets Myra manipulate him, because he wants to believe Myra is the sweet, loving person he wants her to be, he lets Liz walk out.

Liz goes home to her sister’s house, has a miscarriage, refuses to talk about Grant and goes back to writing her children’s books. Sister Stacy blasts Grant through the phone a few days after the miscarriage, tells him to leave Liz alone.

Eventually Liz stops hating Grant and goes to the cottage when she knows he will be there. They have a big reconciliation, Grant grovels, gives a heartfelt apology, says he realized he was facing an abyss of misery the day after Liz left when he suddenly could see Myra as the cold, selfish person she is and rejected her.

There’s a mini-epilogue a few months later, where Liz tells Grant she’s pregnant and Grant says he ran into Myra and once more confirmed that Myra has no hold on him.

Characters – Liz

Yvonne Whittal did a marvelous job here letting us see the heartbreak of being second best, without tears or self-pity, and she used the plot and dialogue to advance Liz’s and Grant’s stories.

Liz’s story is of loving without being loved, of providing endless support both emotional and physical, of losing what is most dear to her, Grant and then the baby, of dealing with grief without becoming bitter. The plot mirrors Liz’s growth and evolution from a girl who wants to help a man she’s always respected and loved to a wife deeply in love with her husband, through rejection and loss to being redemption for Grant.

Whittal made me connect with Liz and ask myself how I would feel to be second best, and a poor second at that. Lots of romance novels have a theme of the heroine thinking she’s not who the hero wants, but usually either the heroine or other woman imagines this, or the hero doesn’t want anyone, neither heroine or Other Woman or he’s making up his mind. In House of Mirrors the conflict is real, tangible and happening now. We see it and we feel it.

Very few Harlequin heroines will risk admitting their love. Either they fear the hero will manipulate them or they let pride get in the way or they can’t face rejection or mockery. Not Liz.

Liz has courage. She handles the hurt and rejection with grace and character. It takes losing her baby, and hearing the obstetrician believe it was due to stress from Grant rejecting her, that turns her love into hate short term. She couldn’t have hated him if she had not loved him.

Myra on the other hand, does not take rejection with any character. She wants to be the one who dumps, not the one dumped. She visits Liz and preens looking into the mirrors all around the room yet she has nothing to offer anyone beyond exterior, physical beauty.

Characters – Grant

What to say about Grant. He’s dumb and cruel, selfish and shows no appreciation for Liz throughout the story. Early on, when Liz visits the cottage he sits at the table, smokes and drinks coffee and watches her wash dishes and cook and clean up the mess – his dishes, his meals, his mess. He doesn’t help her. (Later Liz remembers when they were first married at the cottage he would help her dry the dishes. Big whoopie deal.)

Liz mentions she wants to continue writing children’s books, which is how she earned her living. Grant says in a bored voice, “You can please yourself. You can write your little stories or you can be a lady of leisure.” Time to whap him alongside the head, Liz!

He values her passionate response to him but he seems not to realize that the passion is mostly because she loves him and wants to give herself to him, to be as close as possible, to have that wonderful emotional connection.

A few weeks after they marry Grant decides it’s time to go back to the city and informs Liz. She has no idea where she stands with him, and braves her uncertainty to first ask him whether he’s taking her along, and then to tell him he should discuss ideas and plans with her while he’s considering them, not just inform her of the result. She tells him she wants to be part of his life, not to cling or embarrass him, to be more than the woman he sleeps with, that she wants to share the ups and the downs with him. He ruthlessly pushes her away, tells her she married him knowing what he offered and she could leave if she didn’t like it. He is almost proud of not offering her anything beyond physical desire. He slams out of the cottage. Later he has enough sense (barely) to be glad that she’s still there when he returns, but he still lacks basic awareness to ask himself why he is glad, why he worried she might have left. He feels a lot more for her than desire, but that’s all he will admit.

Grant tells Liz that he didn’t try to seduce her before marriage because he “wanted a marriage, something stable and solid” and he knew he could have that with Liz. She takes it as a huge compliment which puzzles Grant since he doesn’t see her stability and integrity as special, doesn’t realize he admits he could never have relied on Myra for anything nor built a strong, stable marriage with her.

Grant still is clueless when he brings her to the house that Myra decorated. The house is full of mirrors, a metaphor for the relationships among the characters. Myra cares about Myra so she likes the mirrors to show herself. Grant cares about Myra and wants the mirrors to show her. Liz has no vanity and doesn’t like the mirrors at all. Grant has enough consideration and common sense to use a different set of rooms than the ones he shared with Myra but he fails to see that the house itself is a problem for him and Liz, and that Myra permeates every room.

Sloppy Seconds? Settle for What You Can Get? Or Hold Fast to Your Principles?

What happens here? Does Liz decide that she’s always second best and dump Grant in disgust? Does she settle for what she can get, make the most of a delightful physical relationship? Or does she love Grant with all she has and work to build something, however lopsided, with him? She doesn’t settle. She values what she has, she appreciates it and she uses it as a base for a true relationship in marriage. Too bad Grant doesn’t value that relationship when shiny object Myra shows up; he’s a magpie, dumping what he has for the elusive new thing.

Liz uses her principles to guide her. She loves Grant, so she goes to his cottage and takes care of him. She loves him and wants him and knows she can offer him a happy marriage so she says yes to his proposal. She loves him but she won’t borrow trouble when Myra comes sparkling in his path, but when he says he wants his freedom, Liz gives it to him. She spends the entire book giving to Grant, giving him care, good food, clean house, ironed shirts, love, passion, encouragement, strength, integrity and finally, freedom.

Real Life?

Why does House of Mirrors appeal so much to me? It’s the fact that being second best/also-ran/loser is so hurtful and how Liz and others respond to this.

This idea of being #2 bothers me when I think of people who have remarried after their spouse died. It’s easy to imagine that the new spouse might feel second best, especially when someone compares them to the deceased. No one likes to feel like a loser in any field but it must be devastating in marriage. Making this even harder for Liz, the other woman is alive and pushy and wants Grant and knows how to use her looks and history to charm and manipulate.

Liz handles this perfectly. She is a strong person, willing to tell Grant she loves him and what she wants from him, yet she backs off when he tells her to not demand what he won’t give. She loves him and gives him everything she can, practical help, loyalty, commitment, even freedom when he wants it. I admire her.

Yvonne Whittal writes novels set in South Africa. Her heroines are strong and courageous and willing to risk themselves to keep their integrity. House of Mirrors is so far the best I have read by this author.

5 Stars

I thank Archive.org for providing this novel in pdf format to read online.

The Iron Man by Kay Thorpe, Trip to Africa Gone Bad

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The Iron Man was a good news/bad news sort of book. On the good side we have Kay Thorpe’s writing, meaning the book flows well, the dialogue and interactions move the story, she includes setting and she does not rely on inner musings to tell us what is happening to Kim and Dave. The characters are well done, although I couldn’t identify with either, and there are several conflicts that must be solved and sticky situations to wade through to achieve the trademark happy ending.

On the bad side Dave is a hard guy to appreciate and Kim is a bit of a goof. Dave is iron on the outside with a spine of steel and is opportunistic, decisive, dominant but not nasty. Kim is silly enough to come to Sierra Leone in the early 1970s without a return ticket on the off chance that her fiancé had an accident/amnesia/complete loss of contact. She is convinced fiancé Chris would never ever in a zillion years simply drop her without writing to tell her the romance was off.

Kim has all of 20 pounds (somewhere under $1000 in today’s money) to her name, not enough to get back home and not enough to keep her while she looks for Chris. She gets up to the mine in the mountainside to find him, expecting a joyous reunion. (Yes, she’s that naïve!)

Dave fired Chris some time before when Chris got into a fight over a married lady and took off with said lady. Kim can’t believe that Chris would do this and goes willingly with Dave back to the capital, Freetown, to find Chris. Chris tells Kim it’s over and he won’t come home or drop Mai. Now she’s stuck with no way to get home.

Dave says he’s returning to England in 5 weeks and suggests they marry until then so she can travel with him at company expense, then they will separate and he will help her get on her feet. Kim infers he means a platonic marriage and accepts. Dave of course means nothing of the sort, thus the first conflict.

Dave is hard and unemotional – of course he has emotions but he doesn’t yield to them – and Kim is impetuous and often lets her feelings drive her, thus a second conflict and one that will endure.

Kim and Dave forge a tenuous relationship as she makes a home for him, insists the servant man clean the cupboards and improves the cuisine and he manages to relax with her. They are beginning to get along almost as friends when they go to Freetown for a weekend and meet Dave’s friends on the beach. Friends include Karen, an obvious former girlfriend, who makes it clear she’s interested in Dave and intends to get him. (It isn’t clear why she wants him, she doesn’t love him and she doesn’t need his money and she’s not interested in following him around the world to mining camps. But this is a Harlequin Presents so take it as given that all the girls want Dave.)

Old fiancé Chris shows up wanting money. Kim and Dave make a sordid bargain where Kim will stop pretending she doesn’t want him in exchange for Dave helping Chris escape the country and Mai’s relatives. This isn’t exactly a conflict but sand in the wheels of their friendship.

Dave runs the mining camp and is hands on. When a landslide blocks the road, incidentally blocking Karen in at the camp, Dave gets in the bulldozer to clear it out and the dozer turns over and crushes his arm. He lies to Kim that his arm is merely broken, tells her to go home, that he wants Karen, not her.

This third conflict means that Kim must confront Dave and tell him she loves him and she is convinced he loves her too. She’s on some shaky ground here! Dave rejects love to stay strong and invulnerable and now, with his arm in bad shape, he’s even less willing to admit emotion or accept Kim.

Kim pushes him, finally loses her temper and calls him a coward and not worth her bother and he finally admits he wants to believe she loves him. The story ends here but it’s obvious Kim and Dave have a long, hard road, albeit a happy one, because Dave now has a bad arm and a wife to consider when the next job looms. He’s a skilled engineer and leader but staying in a softly civilized country is a big change after traipsing around the world. Plus he’s not used to having another person love him or to admit to any emotional weakness. Kim’s a strong person despite being emotional and impetuous – witness how she took the rough camp and terrible weather and scorpions and lousy food in her stride – and she’s determined to drag Dave out of his heart’s hidey hole and I think she will succeed.

Please note the story is set in Africa in the early 1970s. Dave and Kim respect the natives and treat them as people but the book refers to Africans as “boys”, part of the baggage in any novel set in this time frame.

Kim Thorpe writes detailed and believable settings. Here we are in the hot mountains in a tropical climate, just before the rainy season lets loose. There are bugs, spartan living conditions, a gravity-fed shower and it’s hot. The rain makes mud everywhere and landslides and potholes and the road is full of deep ravines filled with gooey mud. The author doesn’t belabor these things but we can see them and think that we’d not be nearly as cheerful as Kim.

My favorite romances make me feel like I’m right there, they have a sense of immediacy and movement. The Iron Man doesn’t quite manage that. I felt more like I was watching the story than living it.

I got my paperback copy on eBay in a Kay Thorpe lot (so far my only eBay book purchase that had damaged books) and you can probably find this on Thriftbooks. Archive.org has a pdf copy you can borrow but there is no version for an E reader.

Rating this is a bit of a six of one, half a dozen of another. The plot was nothing outstanding, the setting was excellent. Characters were a mix with the minor characters being 2-dimensional and the main characters reasonably well developed although not terribly sympathetic.

At first I thought Kim was a dope but her better qualities grew on me in retrospect; I realized that it takes a fine character to cheerfully accept mud, heat, bad food and primitive living conditions! Dave has many great qualities but he hides his compassion and I wonder about fidelity.

Because I couldn’t identify with any of the characters or feel like I knew them, or that they are real people, I’m rating this

3 Stars

A Cinderella for the Greek – Julia James Light Romance

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If you are in the mood for a light, almost frothy romance, try A Cinderella for the Greek by Julia James. (Paid link) It is mostly enjoyable but not a story that will move you or will linger in your mind.

Ellen is tall, rather large-boned and teaches gym to a local school. Her father died a year ago and she has been busy fending off his greedy widow – her stepmother – and her equally greedy stepsister. Both disparage her, call her names, mock her, all the usual Cinderella treatment. They went through her rich father’s money and now all that is left is their valuable English manor home, and some of the remaining art and antiques. The two are shameless, stealing even Ellen’s jewelry.

Max develops property and tours the house, thinking to purchase it as an investment, but realizes when he arrives that this could be a home. The steps encourage him and do not tell him that they own only two thirds of the house. Ellen cooks and serves lunch, then corners Max to say she owns a third and will not sell. This is her home.

The steps claim Ellen has never accepted them and refuses to sell just for spite. Max discovers Ellen is not fat but incredibly in shape, an athlete and decides to sweep her off to London for a makeover and a ball. (See where the Cinderella title comes in?) Things progress from there. Ellen and Max hit it off and spend a few weeks together travelling, enjoying each other’s company and sleeping together.

Max tells her he did all this to show her that there is life beyond her home and to entice her to sell to him. He is not being entirely truthful of course because he also has fallen in love. He asks her to buy out her steps and she explains that she has no money, that they took everything, spent an enormous fortune before her dad died and now are ghoulishly stripping everything left. Max is dumbfounded. Ellen leaves. She later decides Max was right and agrees to sell. When she arrives to sign her sales agreement Max surprises her and proposes for a happy ever after.

A Cinderella for the Greek could have explored the stepmother/sister resentment or why Ellen was such a doormat that she even allowed stepsister to appropriate her pearl bracelet. It does not. Author Julia James lays out the situation and proceeds to tell the story straightforward, giving us plenty of Max’s viewpoints to show us how he thinks Ellen is and how he wants her to be.

Overall this is a light, enjoyable story but not one I could recall even the day after I read it. Max is the best character, interesting, willing to help, manipulative, kind, loving, certain he is right and knows everything, self-confident. Ellen is more two-dimensional, not a fully-realized person and the steps are stock characters.

I did appreciate that the “Greek” in the title refers to Max having a Greek father. For a nice change we don’t get all the heavy-handed, heavy breathing me-boss/you-female nonsense that too many Harlequins offer.

2 Stars

I purchased my copy from Harlequin.com to read via Glose E reader. Amazon and Barnes and Noble both offer E versions and you can purchase paper copies new from all three retailers or check eBay and Thriftbooks for used copies. There is a comic version too. All Amazon links are paid ads.

Bought with His Name – Penny Jordan Harlequin Presents

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If you like romances about nasty guys and stiff-spine ladies with soft spots for their friends, then you will like Bought with His Name (paid link) by Penny Jordan. Unlike many Penny Jordan heroines, Genista is well off, attractive, self-confident most of the time. What she does suffer from is a too-strong adherence to friends and an even stronger dislike of rude, arrogant men.

Gen meets Luke at a party where he is over the top taken with her while she is both attracted and repelled by his handsome arrogance. She flirts and more or less leads him on until she’s ready to leave, at which time she turns him down flat in front of others. That was her little way to get her own back for all the icky stuck up creeps out there! Sadly, he’s not taking no for an answer and follows her home, tries to force her to let him into her apartment before she outwits him. Gen thinks that’s the last she’ll see of this obnoxious guy until the next morning when she finds he owns the company where she works. Luke thinks she’s having an affair with Bob, her boss and good friend.

Gen is ready to resign until Bob confides his wife Elain faces breast cancer. Luke cons her into going on a supposed business trip with him where he blackmails her into marrying him by saying he’ll tell Elaine that Gen and Bob are having an affair. Gen really doesn’t want him upsetting Elaine (who is also her friend) so she goes along with it. Of course that night Luke realizes she’s a virgin, but he keeps on pushing the “I’m going to tell Elaine” button to keep Gen.

We have the requisite Other Woman, who is finishing with Luke’s married brother and now turning back to Luke. Then Gen realizes she’s pregnant, decides to leave, gets into a car accident, goes back to Luke’s home to recover and Luke says he’s ready to break up. She’s waiting for the taxi to take her back to her own life when Luke comes in, confesses undying love and has a ready to hand explanation for the Other Woman.

Wow! That’s some plot! Now let’s look at the story here.

For some reason Luke simply cannot believe Gen is not having an affair with Bob. His friend told him so and it’s obvious that Bob and Gen are good friends and of course Gen cares enough about Bob and Elaine that Luke can blackmail her. But there is no obvious reason that Luke should continue to believe this over a couple months. Bob brings some papers to Luke’s home and stays to talk to Gen – of course Luke walks in – but Jordan doesn’t describe one incident that would give credence to the Gen/Luke affair. Luke simply won’t accept that Gen hasn’t fallen for him and uses the supposed affair to explain that to himself. Gen denies it but Luke keeps interrupting her to put his own interpretation on her.

Gen is harder to understand. I understand and applaud wanting to keep a sick woman free from worry but there really wasn’t a good reason for Gen to not tell Luke the situation, that she didn’t want to upset Elaine especially with a pack of lies about a non-existent affair. Gen says that it isn’t her place to tell Luke this, but who in their right mind would accept marriage to avoid divulging something private? Gen must have been more intrigued with Luke than she realized or than author Jordan lets us see.

Luke is weak in some ways. He doesn’t accept that he made a mistake about Gen, instead gets angry with her for not telling him she is a virgin and hasn’t been sleeping with Bob. He yells at her for deceiving him, even worse than the usual Harlequin Presents stuck up guy behavior!

After a month or so Gen realizes she’s falling for Luke. I’m always skeptical about the forced seduction to love conversion – either there was some element of love initially or the guy really went above and beyond to court the girl later – and Bought with His Name doesn’t remove my skepticism. Luke is dynamic, interesting, an excellent lover but he’s cruel, hurtful, distrusting. She falls for him within days of marrying him, and how could that happen? Luke accuses her of wishing he were Bob every time they make love, every time they talk. He does almost nothing to change her mind or emotions.

Penny Jordan tells intense stories that usually go so fast that the gaps in emotional reality fly right by. She is just as intense in Bought with His Name but with Luke constantly throwing Bob in Gen’s face we get dashed with the cold water of reality too often and because of it, Bought with His Name is simply not plausible or as good as other Penny Jordan romances. I originally gave this 4 stars but after re-reading to write this review all my little niggling concerns about the romance are still here and the romance has too many holes to be compelling.

3 Stars

I purchased a paperback copy from Thriftbooks and you can find copies on eBay. Read the pdf from Archive.org. Amazon has a Kindle version combined with The Sicilian’s Bought Bride by Carol Marinelli into one E volume or you can purchase the same E book from Harlequin to read via Glose.

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The Billion-Dollar Bride – Real Stinker by Kay Thorpe

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I read this stinker of a Harlequin Presents last fall through Hoopla and now got the paperback version in a book lot on eBay. Ugh. Much as I enjoy Kay Thorpe’s writing The Billion-Dollar Bride is boring, pretentious, stupid, with an on-again/off-again “heroine” who dumps her loving adoptive family to embrace the mega-rich lifestyle that her grandfather-by-blood has left her.

See, her nasty old grandfather forced his unwed daughter, heroine’s birth mother, to give her up for adoption but now has second thoughts and wants forgiveness. In the meantime birth mom and birth grandma died and good old grandpa remarried and adopted his stepchildren, making his adopted son the heir to his fortune and boss of his companies. (He gave stepdaughter – whom he also adopted – money but no affection.) He decides to leave his “real daughter” (our heroine) an enormous fortune provided she marries her step/adopted/no-real-relation brother, the aforementioned company boss and stays married for a year.

At first our heroine is all set to renounce any inheritance and fly back home to England, but when she discovers the number of zeros before the decimal point she dumps that for a bad idea, stays in California, marries the hero and embraces the life of the idle rich.

So we have the step/adopted daughter, the step/adopted son, the blood/but dumped daughter and 2nd wife all in a happy circle. The most interesting character is the step/adopted daughter who is furious at getting a tiny pittance (OK, to you or to me it would be a lot of money!) compared to the heroine. Does the heroine give any of her new riches to this lady who is now her sister in law? No. Does our heroine act responsible for the company positions she inherited in any way? No.

Do we like the heroine? No.

Is the writing style up to Kay Thorpe’s usual standard? No.

Is the hero a delightful hunk we can drool over? No.

Is there tension or any romantic suspense. No.

The setting and minor characters get a lick and a promise, definitely not up to Kay Thorpe standards. The Billion-Dollar Bride is part of Harlequin’s Welocked! series, which includes some excellent reads so I was doubly disappointed.

1 Star

Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Harlequin all have E and paper versions of this stinker and you can look for used copies on Thriftbooks and eBay. Personally I advise you to skip it!

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Count Valieri’s Prisoner by Sara Craven Harlequin Presents

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Oh boy. You know the author is good when you read right by the idiotic plot because you care about the characters. Count Valieri’s Prisoner (#ad) is the story of (surprise!) Andrea, Count Valieri, an Italian businessman, and Madeline Lang, an English researcher for a television company. Madeline is engaged to Jeremy Sylvester, an up and coming man with a driven autocrat for a father. Andrea detests and despises Jeremy’s father and wants to use Madeline as leverage to force him to document how he framed Andrea’s father for embezzlement. Andrea uses the bait of a soprano who suddenly stepped away from music to entice Maddie to Italy where he holds her in his mansion.

At this point you are rolling your eyes and thinking Melodrama! Stockholm Syndrome! Inane Plot! but don’t. Hold your fire and read this. Count Valieri’s Prisoner (#ad)is very good!

First Maddie is no whiny Wilma. She’s tough and uncompromising with Andrea at first, tells him that eventually he’ll have to let her go and then she’ll press criminal charges. She knows that Jeremy’s dad won’t pay a penny for her release, and since Jeremy himself has no money she tells the Count he’s not going to get anything he wants out of this, only a world of hurt when the police arrest him.

The Count holds her in a bedroom with trompe l’oeil scenes and doors that confuse and disorient her and he hid her clothes, leaving her nightgowns and robes to wear. Her room is in a high story so escape is difficult. Nonetheless Maddie persists and manages to get to an abandoned village where – guess who! – is waiting for her. She has encountered a big snake and a wolf by then so Andrea looks pretty good in comparison.

Andrea and Maddie develop first a reluctant friendship, then a type of love for each other, but both are tiptoeing around the fringes of emotion when Andrea takes Maddie to meet his mother. Mom is the singer Maddie came to Italy to interview; Mom is also the lady who’s first husband – Jeremy’s dad – betrayed. Needless to say, Mom isn’t too happy with Jeremy’s family and although she likes Maddie, she and Andrea suspect Maddie is as bad as the family she intends to marry into.

Eventually Andrea convinces Jeremy’s dad that he has incriminating documents and unless dear old dad confesses all in writing and gives up his expected knighthood, Andrea will release everything. Dad complies and sends a toad flunky to bring the papers and get the girl. Maddy takes one look at Toad and decides to make her own way home.

By the last week of her imprisonment Maddie agrees Andrea is justified and once past that hurdle she allows herself to feel the emotional connection and physical attraction that flows between them. However, Maddie is still engaged to Jeremy and still convinced she loves him and will marry him, faith sorely tested when Toad arrives, not Jeremy. She is dumbfounded when Andrea pushes her away to go back to England and he never acknowledges the emotional connection she feels so strongly. She leaves.

It is only when she’s back home she sees Jeremy again and this time he’s pressuring her to marry now, at once. And his mother, who is going to be the mother-in-law from hell, has told the dressmaker to finish the wedding gown NOW. By now Maddie is confused. She believes Andrea. Maddie’s getting suspicious about Jeremy and she’s wondering how much he loves her when he never tried to come to her, and she’s wondering how much she loves him if she could fall for Andrea. She visits future mother-in-law and learns that Jeremy isn’t just a passive dupe with his dad, but a real, bona fide contributing partner and he knows all about the corruption and theft years ago. And it doesn’t bother Jeremy a bit.

Now poor Maddie is in a bad spot. The Count is gone. He pushed her aside and onto a plane. Jeremy is gone. The man she loved didn’t exist and she cannot love the man he is now. Of course a couple months later the Count comes to London and professes eternal love and they have their happy ending.

Let’s look at this story as story.

  • Plot is ridiculous. Who would kidnap the future daughter-in-law of the man you want to destroy? Anyone else see any flaws with this plan? Especially since it should have been obvious to the Count that father-in-law cared nothing for Maddie and Jeremy was not all that keen either.
  • Setting and clothing choice are gothic. A room with painted doors that don’t open? Satin nightwear?
  • Characters are lively and engaging; I was sympathetic to the Count even before learning why he kidnaps Maddie and of course Maddie makes a great heroine, a girl who wants to run her own life and doesn’t roll over either for Jeremy or Andrea.
  • We feel the emotional connection between Maddie and the Count.
  • Somehow the overall story works. It just does. Yes, the plot is nuts but the combination of goofy plot and great characters and strong emotional interactions makes Count Valieri’s Prisoner another winner from Sara Craven.

4 Stars

I got my Ebook copy from Harlequin.com, reading it on the Glose app. You can get the Kindle Ebook from Amazon and the Nook book from Barnes and Noble too. If you prefer a printed book then look at Barnes and Noble or Amazon or used books from Thriftbooks.com or eBay. All links are paid ads.

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Caribbean Encounter Kay Thorpe Harlequin Presents

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Kay Thorpe writes with plenty of verve and imagination, she combines setting and plot and character with good pacing and writing to create novels I almost always love to read. Caribbean Encounter is very good but I had a hard time liking the people and the revenge element.

Alex had almost been in love with Ian when he told her he was married; she, shocked and only wanting to get away, joined the ship Andromeda as a singer to escape. Clay is the cruise director and is Ian’s brother in law and he knows all about Alex. Except he doesn’t know, not the truth. He thinks Alex is one step up from a tramp and out to catch a rich husband. He warns her off the crew and warns her off the kind, older man who spends time with her. Clay sets himself up as the all-in-one arbiter, determined to punish Alex for chasing his brother-in-law.

The weakest part of the story is that Alex falls hard for Clay almost immediately, realizing how she feels when Clay’s attitude badly hurts her. Anyone would want to clear their name in this situation, especially with a nominal boss, but Alex doesn’t tell Clay anything, wanting him to realize based on her actions that she’s not a man chaser.

I have a very hard time with the whole you’re-a-bad-person-so-I’m-going-to-punish-you schtick. Sure Clay can judge Alex, although it’s a weakness to judge based solely on second hand accusations, but to be so self-righteous to think it’s his job to hold her accountable? I don’t get it. It’s normal to want someone will reap what they sow but it’s wrong to take delight in it or to be the instrument of vengeance oneself.

The romance is a bit weak. It just happened. Both characters are attracted to each other even though neither wants to be, and most of their interactions are each trying to get by the other. I didn’t feel love building as much as physical attraction compounded with being frustrated with themselves for caring about someone they distrust.

Minor characters range from barely there to also well-developed, with the exception of Clay’s sister, a self-entitled, vindictive brat stock character. Glenn, the older man who spends time with Alex (leading Clay to assume Alex is after a rich husband. Sigh.) gets short shrift. Alex sees him as delightful but someone who truly wants their dead wife or facsimile, and not someone that she would want to marry. Pretty insightful and a good plot device to use a foil to Clay to show Alex’s judgement and integrity.

It’s a tribute to Kay Thorpe’s skill building characters, setting and plot that we can read right through events we don’t like and still enjoy the story.

Thorpe set the cruise in the Caribbean, hopping from one port to another, islands and Venezuela’s capital Caracas, and Alex goes on several shore jaunts telling us about the magnificent beaches and hills and scenery. I enjoyed reading about places I’m not likely to visit. Thorpe shows us these through Alex’s eyes and we experience the sunny beaches and the Caracas hills through her vivid observations.

Overall Caribbean Encounter is a good book, I enjoyed reading it although the romance itself is somewhat lacking. The setting and good character development compensate, making this a strong

3 Stars.

I purchase my paperback copy in a lot on eBay and you might look there or on Thriftbooks as well as Amazon for used copies. There isn’t an E version other than the pdf available on Archive.org.

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One Stolen Moment – Rosemary Hammond Harlequin Presents

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I’m not sure how One Stolen Moment got into the Harlequin Presents imprint because nothing much happens and the romance is barely there. Claudia is at her brother’s home recovering from a serious car crash that left her unable to walk before months of intensive therapy. She had been a prima ballerina until the accident and now she can never dance again; she limps. Julian is an widower artist living near her brother’s home and has a daughter.

Claudia and Julian are immensely attracted to each other but he is emotionally crippled from his wife’s death in a car crash and not willing to consider any long term commitment to a woman who is crippled physically. In fact he rejects Claudia.

The story proceeds along with Claudia making friends with Julian’s daughter, while a former co-worker at her dance company drives up to Seattle to court her. (Just once I’d like the nice guy to win and not the jerk.) Julian and Claudia try to avoid each other but finally they end up in bed together, leading Claudia to see a future together for oh, about 5 minutes. She walks out of the bedroom into the kitchen to find Julian and his voluptuous agent Sharon together and obviously more than fond of each other. Of course eventually they get the problems cleared up, the hopeful other man and other woman disappear and Julian and Claudia plan to marry.

One Stolen Moment is SLOW. Glacial. Ponderous. Boring. I didn’t much see any reason for the two people to fall in love, much less fall into bed and then marry, nor is the plot at all interesting. Romance and characters are not compelling.

Author Rosemary Hammond makes her settings come alive (too bad the characters don’t) and we can almost feel the grassy farmland on the San Juan island, see the foggy mornings. She writes good descriptions of people and how they act, how they dress, she just doesn’t have a good set of characters or plot to work with here.

Overall One Stolen Moment is 2 Stars, readable but nothing at all special and nothing to make me want to reread it.

I purchased my paperback copy on eBay, where you will usually find copies of this author’s novels, and it is also available on Amazon and Thriftbooks in paperback format.

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Bittersweet Revenge Rosemary Hammond Harlequin Presents

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Yes, another revenge romance. And this revenge is particularly stupid, which is a shame because the rest of the story is quite good. Ten years ago Val and David had been high school best buddies, dating and falling in love. The year she was a senior, Val’s parents died in a drunk driving car crash and Val left the small California town to live near Seattle with her aunt. Val knew David drank too and had become concerned with it, and after her parents died she was unwilling to continue in any romance with David.

Now, 10 years on, Val is back for her high school reunion and has a good heart to heart with David before he leaves the party, drinks and dies in a car accident. David’s brother Michael, a successful cardiologist, blames Val for this because she broke David’s heart 10 years ago. Oh, give me a break! What sort of brother would expect any 17 year old girl to remain in love once she moves away after her folks die and she doesn’t see the guy any more? And what sort of brother would blame her for dumping the guy when he consistently drinks too much, especially when her folks died due to drinking? And who would be anything but glad that his alcoholic 17 year old brother wasn’t planning marriage??

But Michael did blame Val. It was her fault David drank for the last 10 years, and obviously she must have upset him so much at the reunion that he drove off drunk. Clearly Val is responsible and clearly she must PAY!

The whole revenge thing makes no sense whatsoever. It’s a darn shame Hammond included it because it detracts from an otherwise solid romance.

Val and Michael have chemistry plus similar interest plus genuine liking going for them, and Michael decides to forego his seduction/dump revenge but unfortunately for them both, Val finds out his plans after they sleep together and before he tells her that he’s moving to Seattle where she lives. Val can’t quite believe that he intended to tell her and based on his earlier accusations figures he is lying now and had planned revenge all along.

Incidentally, what is with the whole seduction-as-revenge thing anyway?? Does it make any sense to you that a guy who believes he’s top of the walk and perfectly positioned to be judge, jury and executioner, would decide that he wants to sleep with a woman he despises? No? It doesn’t make sense to me either. Plus the idea of turning lovemaking into punishment is icky.

Hammond creates good characters including Val’s best friend and employee, and the Other Woman and Other Man, neither of whom have much to do with the story aside from causing worry and concern. The dialogue is good and Hammond uses dialogue with internal musings to move the story along and give us glimpses of Val’s feelings and hurt. She tells the story entirely from Val’s point of view so we see MIchael only as Val sees him, an ever-evolving portrait.

Hammond writes reasonably well. I had a hard time getting through this novel but that’s because I couldn’t get past the idiocy of wanting revenge for a high school romance gone bad, especially when there were excellent reasons for the romance to end and it wasn’t Michael’s romance anyway. The pacing is a little slow and there isn’t a ton of plot here.

Overall Bittersweet Revenge is good, a solid entry in the Harlequin Presents Romantic Revenge category, but it’s not great and I found it slow. Let’s be generous and round up to

3 Stars.

I got my copy from eBay, where you often can find Harlequins in good condiiton, and Thriftbooks and Amazon both have the print version. Bittersweet Revenge is not available now in E format. I didn’t see it on Archive.org.

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