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Book Reviews - Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction - By an Adult for Adults

The Christmas Eve Bride by Lynne Graham – Not Much There

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Doesn’t the title, The Christmas Eve Bride, sound like a romantic courtship, wedding and honeymoon? Instead this is a hurried little story about Amber, now working as a gardener for a rich couple who live near her married sister, and her former love Rocco. Amber was deeply in love with Rocco and mentioned to a former school friend that they were together; the school friend then embroidered this into a juicy tell-all tabloid scoop.

Rocco didn’t even give Amber a chance to explain, he dumped her and told her not to call him again or he’d file stalking charges. A week or so later Amber discovered she was pregnant, her employers fired her and she couldn’t get a job that paid enough to raise her baby. She eventually ended up working as a gardener on an estate near her sister because the job came with a small cottage. Our story opens with Rocco visiting the estate and spotting her, assumed she was there researching for another tell-all story. Various insults and kisses later Rocco asks her to move to London to be his mistress. He knows nothing about her baby but is exhilirated to discover they had a child and quickly falls back in love with Amber and they marry on Christmas Eve.

The basic problem here is the story and characters stay just that, not real people we can imagine being. There is no immediacy, no sense of empathy. I can imagine a man being glad to discover he has a child – but only after he gets over being flabbergasted, dismayed and angry. Yet author lets us think that Rocco is surprised, yes, but delighted.

Add to the weak characters to the silly plot and you have a book that is barely readable, certainly nothing worth spending a couple of hours on. So why did I read it? It was part of a bundle borrowed on Hoopla and it was a very fast read on New Year’s Eve.

I reserve 1 Star ratings for books I couldn’t finish, so let’s be generous,

2 Stars

The comic version of The Christmas Eve Bride standalone novel is available on Amazon; I didn’t find the bundle.

Full Circle – Rosemary Hammond’s First Harlequin Romance

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Rosemary Hammond wrote well over 40 romances under the Harlequin and Harlequin Presents brands and Full Circle is her very first, debut novel. It is set in Seattle and the San Juan islands, as are most of her other books, and features two characters, Katie and Luke, who tend to live in their own heads, making trouble for themselves and each other because they don’t think to listen to each other.

Luke and Katie lived next door on an island and were soulmates from grade school on, meant for each other and both expected to marry. It’s not clear whether they actually had promised anything but both felt committed. Unfortunately Luke, four years older, was at Stanford studying engineering, playing football and working, and seldom made it home nor did he write. Katie was still committed but went on a few dates with Brian, and sadly Brian kissed her the first time and Luke saw it. Luke then walked off and refused to talk to Katie or listen to her or read her letters.

Ten years on Katie is a legal secretary and Luke comes from a high-flying New York legal practice to lead an anti-trust civil suit, and Katie is assigned to help him. They clash. Luke kisses her silly then walks off, claiming he just wanted revenge for her dumping him. Things proceed from there, with him alternately yelling at her to type stuff and making out. Poor Katie thinks it’s all in pursuit of his revenge.

Full Circle is not a bad novel but it isn’t very good either. Had I read this first I wouldn’t have bothered to purchase several Rosemary Hammond books and probably wouldn’t have bothered to read many on Archive.org either. Keeping in mind this is a first novel here’s the parts I liked and loathed:

Like: Hammond uses beautiful settings and makes us feel like we’re there. Excellent, atmospheric descriptions of the beaches and older homes in the islands.

Like: The other woman is vain and silly but not malicious.

Neutral: The overall plot of former girl/boy next door getting back together. There is some emotional tug of war going on in both of them although it’s not shown very well.

Loathe: Katie realizes she still loves Luke but she doesn’t say anything. When he’s kissing her senseless and carrying her upstairs she doesn’t ask whether it’s for love, simple sex or revenge. She assumes it’s revenge. It’s not crystal clear to readers but Hammond hints that Luke is not seeking revenge after the first incident.

Loathe: Both characters let pride get in the way of happiness and future joy. Katie knows she still loves Luke but ignores him at work and does her darnest to send keep-away signals. Luke is just as bad, watching her constantly but never saying anything.

Really Loathe: What the heck did Luke have as grounds for revenge anyway? He wouldn’t talk to Katie after seeing her with the other guy, jumped to conclusions, then held on to his anger for ten years. Katie had just as much reason to be angry as Luke.

Really Really Loathe: The whole revenge thing. I don’t care for revenge plots much – they have to be something special to be any good – and this one makes even less sense than most.

Hammond shows us Katie’s point of view only, and she uses inner thoughts more than verbal dialogue or action to build her character. That’s OK but it leads to a weaker romance than had she shown us Luke’s mind or used other characterization techniques.

Overall I was a bit bored reading this. I’ve a stack of Rosemary Hammond romances and am slowly working my way through; some are excellent and some less so. It took me a couple weeks to get through this because I kept picking up other books to read. I couldn’t relate to either character and the plot left me cold.

2 Stars

I got my paperback copy on eBay and Full Circle is available in print format on Amazon and Thriftbooks.

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Bought for Marriage Harlequin Presesnts Romance by Margaret Mayo

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This is not a good book. The writing style is juvenile with go-nowhere dialogue and short, choppy sentences and little to no description, no setting and poor characterization. I did not believe the romance.

The novel has a lot of sex scenes and some are explicit. Outside of sleeping together the hero and heroine have little connection – there is a mention of her enjoying his company but that’s it – and there is virtually no sense of them becoming a family or caring about each other.

The plot is Harlequin Presents goofy la-la. She’s half Greek, half English and her Greek dad used devious methods to keep her with him while growing up. Now she’s grown up and still lives with Dad and works for him too, even though she knows he’s a pretty bad egg, mean and selfish to the bone. Good ol’ dad is going bankrupt so like any good smart dad sends his gorgeous virginal daughter to ask his dearest enemy for a bazillion dollars (or Euros as the case may be) and just as any dear enemy would do, our hero takes one look at gorgeous lady and says sure thing, sweetums, but you gotta marry me too. One thing progresses after another, all in this same vein.

So the story lacks any depth or believablility, the characters are 2-dimensional at best, there’s too much kissing and not enough caring, we never see or read much about the lovely Greek locations (aside from noting gardens exist) and the writing style is aimed at mid teens. Other than that this is a lovely novel.

So why am I reviewing it when I’ve a stack of others that I’ve left high marks on Good reads? For one thing I almost liked this the first time I read it, about 6 months ago, and gave it 3 stars on Goodreads, which is funny because I recalled it as not good at all and have avoided Margaret Mayo ever since. For another, Bought for Marriage is part of the Forced to Marry Harlequin E book bundle which I purchased and I try to review what I buy. (I’m behind over 60 books but who’s counting.)

I recommend you avoid this novel unless you are really tired and really bored and just want something fluffy to keep you going for a couple of hours.

2 Stars / 1+ Star

I read this first as a standalone pdf on Archive.org. Amazon has the Forced to Marry bundle in Kindle and the standalone novel Bought for Marriage is available on Kindle or, more expensively, in hardback or paperback.

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Taken Over by Penny Jordan

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I like books about people, books that have an emotional connection among the characters and to me. Too often romance novels are sex scenes draped with a thin plot and characters who don’t feel real. I finished Betty Neels’ romances and have looked for more romance authors who create people to care about.

Taken Over is the first Penny Jordan novel I read and the reason I am reading my way through our library’s digital editions of her books. She is unlike Betty Neels in many ways, writing much racier stories with far more emotional turmoil and many of her heroines are fearful and unwilling to take a venture. However some Jordan novels are quite good, rich in emotional content and with the same sense of immediacy and presence that I love in Betty Neels.

Taken Over tells us about Cassie, a brilliant lady who used her math skills and imagination to write top computer games (this takes place over 30 years ago so the terminology differs) and leveraged this into a small, innovative and profitable company. Now she fears her firm is ripe for a takeover. (We aren’t told why/how someone could take it over without her consent but then Taken Over is a romance, not a business text.)

Joel Howard approaches Cassie with a buyout offer and a lot of attitude. He is rich, good looking and used to beautiful ladies wanting him and Cassie wears drab clothes and hunches. He’s snarky and scary so Cassie rejects Joel’s offer and in fact looks for an alliance with a rival firm, whose owner just happens to have an unmarried son willing to marry Cassie in order to secure her company. Not wanting his company to fall to number 3 in the games industry, Joel kidnaps Cassie and forces her to marry him.

Things proceed with plenty of tension as Cassie and Joel fight their own physical and emotional attraction to each other. There are plenty of conflicts. Cassie and Joel don’t want to fall in love, don’t even want to like each other. Joel is insulting and crude yet somehow still caring and Cassie’s danger bells aren’t enough to warn her to keep away. We readers get to follow along and it is an enjoyable ride.

The turning point is Joel’s estranged mother shows up and sweeps Cassie back with her to Florence, where mom plays fairy godmother and teaches Cassie how to dress and present herself. Turns out that Cassie looks pretty good when she’s not wearing beige or hunching! Joel arrives under pretext of stepdad’s birthday party and takes Cassie home. He wants her to hostess a cocktail party for him. Hmmm.

Joel comes home with a migrane and Cassie helps him with it and then end up making love. Like most Penny Jordan heroines she’s too unsure of herself to believe Joel actually meant to make love with her or that he cares about her or wants her. And also like most PJ heroines she’s too proud to hear Joel say anything demeaning and she plows ahead, telling him she didn’t mean anything, blah blah blah. Both are miserable and once the cocktail party makes it clear that Joel no longer has to worry about financing Cassie decides to leave before he kicks her out.

Once more mom-in-law makes a fortuitious appearance and plays good fairy and finally Cassie and Joel fess up to themselves and to each other.

On the good side Taken Over has:

  • Strong characters who are most appealing and likeable
  • A heroine who is extremely smart and uses her brains to help herself
  • A believable and flawed hero
  • Enjoyable side characters, especially good fairy mom-in-law
  • A bit of a Cinderella flavor which I am a sucker for
  • A marriage of convenience that plays off against a strong, but unacknowledged sexual attraction. (I love love love MOC novels with tension between the spouses.)
  • Beautiful descriptions of settings in English country home, London and Florence
  • A great kidnapping move
  • Excellent, believable romance

On the down side Taken Over has a heroine whose tortuous lack of confidence got a bit annoying to read about and who’s awfully quick to get her licks in first after they sleep together. (This by the way is a standard Penny Jordan moment, which I didn’t know until I read more of her books.)

4 Stars

Taken Over is available in E format on Kindle and via Glose from Harlequin. Amazon and Thriftbooks have the paperback version and you can read it for free on Archive.org

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The Forced Marriage by Sara Craven – Revenge Romance

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The Forced Marriage features an outstanding romance between Flora and Marco plus some funny lines, lots of emotion, a wonderful grovel and good side characters. The downside is that this is a revenge romance although neither we nor Flora realize it until about two-thirds through the story.

Marco is rich and drop dead sexy gorgeous and he just rescued Flora from a mugger. Things proceed from here…

Flora is engaged to nice, safe Christopher but she’s starting to wonder whether this is a good idea. You see, Flora is not particularly attracted to Chris and manages to avoid sleeping with him despite him pressing her. Flora’s best friend Hester chides her and challenges her to think this through: Should she marry a man she’s lukewarm about? A man whose main attraction is safety and security? Plus Chris hasn’t been quite the same since he returned from a Caribbean holiday.

On the other hand Flora’s mom likes Chris and Flora’s sister wants her obnoxious son to wear a page boy suit and be a ring bearer at the wedding. And Chris claims to want to marry her. What’s a girl to do?

Answer: Sleep with the warm and loving guy who beat off a mugger. Then run off to Italy with him and live in his spiffy country home, send Chris back his ring, tell Mom and sis to tough it out. Things proceed some more. Now Flora and – apparently Marco – are deeply in love and Flora is sexually entranced by him and thanking her stars she didn’t marry Chris.

Dum-da-dum-dum. Marco goes away for business, leaving Flora behind, ripe for his godmother’s nephew to wreck nasty mischief. Godmom’s evil nephew drags Flora off to see the godmother – who is the evil fairy, not the good one – and godmother informs Flora the whole thing was a set up. Marco was taking revenge on Chris and incidentally on Flora because Chris had a fling with godmother’s niece Ottavia with whom Marco had been engaged and left the niece miserable, high and dry. Marco didn’t give a rip about losing Ottavia but his godmother nagged him and nagged him to seek revenge.

Here’s where this great romance leaves me cold. I can dimly see why someone – preferably Ottavia herself or possibly her brother – might want payback from Chris for leading her on, promising marriage then disappearing – but at what point does this affect Marco? Instead of telling Ottavia to grow up, that holiday flings are notoriously short of permanence, to be responsible for her own behavior, Marco agrees to go along with the scheme.

It gets even sicker. Flora had been engaged to Chris when Chris was flinging with Ottavia, and that makes Flora the injured party, not Ottavia. But no! Ottavia is injured because Chris preferred Flora. Cockeyed logic to me. Dopey.

GRRR! At this point I’d seriously consider taking Marco and tossing him over the villa wall! Flora comes close. Evil godmother has a nice plane ticket for Flora – after all she doesn’t really want to stick around and talk to Marco before decamping in high dungeon, does she? – and Flora goes back to London, to fatigue and yep, morning sickness.

Flora truly loves Marco and even after discovering his rat-ness longs to be with him, misses him, would happily go back, but she believed Bad Godmother’s unsaid story too, that Marco never loved her. In fact Marco did and does still love her and comes for Flora, to ask her to marry him. In fact he says he was coming back to his villa to fess up and offer marriage the afternoon evil godmom spilled the beans. Flora tells him off and kicks him out, but not to fear, the proverbial phone call plot twist intervenes and Marco learns he’s a daddy-to-be. Now he insists on marriage, thus the title, The Forced Marriage.

Flora goes along with it, heart broken by Marco’s deception and miserable. She adopts a stray mutt, leading to more lighthearted moments that lift our spirits (and Flora’s) during this time of sadness and mourning for lost love.

Since this is a Harlequin our happy-ever-after is guaranteed – good! – and eventually both spouses learn to trust each other and in their love.

What I liked:

  • Flora is strong-willed, perfectly happy to ignore Chris and her family, (even sister with the pageboy suit) and willing to cope with single parenthood if need be.
  • Flora truly loves Marco, Marco truly loves Flora; the romance is real.
  • Sara Craven includes lovely descriptions of the Italian setting along with the grittier London flats.
  • Marco grovel is sincere and heartfelt.
  • Evil Godmother doesn’t come to a sticky end but she does get turned out of Marco’s island and life
  • The emotions are strong and feel real and Sara Craven builds a sense of immediacy, it is as though we are there, participating, not watching.
  • There are some funny moments. I love how Flora’s stuck up sister whines about who will pay for the pageboy suit that Flora never wanted to see anyone wear, much less her obnoxious nephew.
  • Flora’s best friend Hester is great. Sara Craven uses dialogue between the two to explain some events and thoughts but Hester is a character all her own, not a plot device.

What I don’t like:

  • Did I mention this is partly a revenge plot? OK, it is a revenge-that-backfired plot, but still. I detest this revenge stuff and I don’t see how it can motivate such behavior.
  • Flora never points out to Marco or anyone else that she is the injured party – twice in fact – not Ottavia.
  • Flora flees Italy without talking to Marco because she believes the nasty stuff from evil godmom.

4 Stars. Would be close to 5 stars if not for the ridiculous revenge motivation.

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Amazon has The Forced Marriage in print version as does Thriftbooks and Archive.org has the pdf of the book.

Dark Remembrance by Daphne Clair

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Daphne Clair always writes novels with plenty of emotion, connecting readers to her story as she develops connections among the characters. From reviews on Goodreads, readers either love Dark Remembrance or hate it, some citing the thread of violence that underlies Logan’s pursuit of Raina as a reason to hate the story and others citing Raina’s deliberate denial of any feelings for Logan as a reason to dislike her and the book. I liked it quite a bit despite both.

Logan’s best friend, Perry, had left Raina a widow with small child when he took one too many chances when flying. Perry always expected Logan to take care of Raina in his absence, despite knowing that Logan was fiercely attracted to Raina. Now with Perry gone Logan is taking steps to make Raina his wife, and finally Raina accepts after sitting up all night with son Danny who’s sick with whooping cough. (??? We’ve had vaccinations for whooping cough for years! But this is Harlequin where medical facts don’t always drive the story.) Anyway the little boy is sick all night, Riana is exhausted and she knows Logan is right when he insists that both Raina and Danny need him.

The rest of the story is how Raina deals with her own, long-suppressed desire for Logan, how she comes to love him and how she eventually forces them both to admit to love.

There is some light violence in Dark Remembrance. Logan is forceful and pushes Raina into marriage and on their wedding night he goes ahead even when she does turns off after he says something stupid. Later he admits he thought about forcing her, but decided that he couldn’t live with himself if he raped her. He’s a man who’s been in love with someone unattainable – his best friend’s wife – for four years and he’s nearly desperate with longing and wanting, and her constant rejection is tearing him apart.

Raina is attracted to Logan, but she’s scared to admit that she was attracted even when her husband was alive, and cloaked it behind animosity. Logan said it best, that he hated that she was so loyal to her dead husband but he honored her for it too. She decides to marry Logan for her son’s benefit, reluctant to admit she wants to marry him for herself too. Raina is torn between loyalty to her dead husband, love for her son, attraction and caring for Logan.

Over the course of a couple months of marriage Logan courts Raina, softly and steadily convincing her to give him and their feelings for each other a chance. She decides to go see him at work and have it out in the open, but when she arrives Raina can see Logan and his secretary Angela embrace through the frosted glass door. Of course she runs back to the car and tears away, earning a speeding ticket. After that Raina is colder and less caring, less open, and when she hears Logan and Angela at a party she assumes they are having an affair. She is hurt and angry and that helps her realize that yes, she loves Logan. But now she thinks he stopped loving her.

Raina’s young son Danny is part of the glue that tugs them together since they have to be friends in front of him, and of course, both adults love the boy. The two are committed to staying together, keep stumbling towards some sort of emotional rendezvous, and eventually reach their loving happiness.

Daphne Clair writes with so much love for her New Zealand countryside and cities that it makes me want to go there. Dark Remembrance is less of a travelogue than some of her novels; this time she shows us a few places, quiet lakes, lovely beaches, busy cities, mountains, although without the loving detail she provides in other novels.

4 Stars

I read this in on Archive.org and Amazon and Thriftbooks both have paperback copies available as of mid-November 2020.

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The Shifting Sands – Kay Thorpe Romance in Algeria

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The Shifting Sands is set in Algiers, written in 1975, after the Algerian war for independence; hero Andre and other characters are French, and heroine Ruth and the other man Paul Brent are English. I continue to enjoy this book, even on a third read, partly for the great setting and partly for Kay Thorpe’s writing, but mostly for the convincing emotional development.

New to Algiers, young Ruth convinces Andre to take her along on his flight to a distant, tiny desert village where her father lives, but they crash in the Sahara miles off course and with insufficient supplies to allow them to walk the 60 miles to the village. This part of the novel is riveting as they must head to a tiny, almost dried up oasis to replenish their water before hiking further. Andre knows how to keep them alive through sandstorms, desiccating heat and bitter nighttime cold. Eventually they reach the village mission, but Ruth’s father is dead and she is very ill with a fever. Andre tells her Ruth father is dead and they will marry; she’s too ill and desolate to refuse.

The reason I like The Shifting Sands is that Ruth’s feelings follow a trajectory that make perfect sense. When Ruth first meets Andre she is overwhelmed and and she feels inadequate and gauche. After the crash she’s still overwhelmed – he saved their lives – and ready to fall in love, but he’s a bit aloof and she’s still terribly unsure of herself, especially compared to beautiful Simone.

Ruth hears some obvious gossip that exacerbates her lack of confidence to believe that Andre is really not interested in her. Andre gets bossy and possessive and forbids her to talk with a young Englishman Simone brings to a party, annoying Ruth who gets her back up and pushes Andre away. Simone makes a lot of trouble between Andre and Ruth, but goes so far that Ruth must confront her own growing feeling for Andre.

Kay Thorpe writes The Shifting Sands from Ruth’s point of view, making it hard to see exactly what Andre thinks. He’s extraordinarily possessive and jealous, angry at Ruth for talking to Paul or dancing with him – despite his own dances with Simone – yet he talks down to her, calls her child, tells her he wants a wife and not a ward but he doesn’t share much about his business or personal life with her. When he proposed he told her he would wait for her, they could live as brother and sister for a while. However he gets impatient quickly.

Andre takes her for a drive along the coast one day, which Ruth enjoys and begins to feel loving towards him, but then ruins it by taking her to the casino, then to dinner where Simone poisons first Ruth and then Andre with her lies. Andre tops the evening off by telling her to go ahead and despise him, before coming “purposely towards her” in her bedroom so that they have no grounds for annulment.

Nonetheless we can infer something about his feelings. Either he’s uncommonly possessive and untrusting or he’s hurt by Ruth continually backing off from him. One evening just a couple days after they returned to Algiers from the desert he comes to her room and puts his hands on her shoulders, tells her how lovely she is, little gestures like that that could mean he feels something for Ruth beyond duty. Yet it’s so easy for Simone to twist how Ruth sees Andre’s behavior; she tells Ruth Andre married her only for duty, that Ruth should do the right thing, leave Andre to set him free since his sense of honor will not allow him to initiate a separation.

Had Ruth been less unsure of herself or Simone less believable Ruth could have dispelled the nastiness. Simone started her little taunt by claiming that Ruth obviously had set out to entrap Andre, which Ruth most certainly had not done, and had Ruth talked to Andre about this, or been able to consider it dispassionately she could have realized that if Simone was so wrong about Ruth she may have been wrong about Andre as well. Andre too is caught in Simone’s net of cruel lies and doesn’t take time to talk to Ruth before deciding he needs to consummate their marriage to make an annulment impossible.

Eventually Ruth and Andre manage to realize how Simone has twisted and manipulated events, that they truly do care about each other, and they have the requisite happy ending.

Kay Thorpe writes well – as you can imagine when you realize she took a basic romance plot, a short 154 page novel, and made it into a compelling, enjoyable story about two people who find each other. The desert of the Sahara is a metaphor for the arid waste both Ruth and Andre have in their hearts before they come together. They escape the Sahara by dint of Andre’s leadership and Ruth’s determined slog and they conquer their heartaches by trusting each other enough to tell the truth in a moment.

It’s also a tribute to her skill that the short scene where Andre comes “purposely towards her” has more emotional punch than a lot of authors manage to get with paragraphs of lurid encounter. That simple phrase makes us think about what must come next.

4 Stars

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Amazon has several copies of the paperback edition in stock but unfortunately this is not available on Kindle or via Harlequin on Glose. I got my copy of The Shifting Sands from Thriftbooks and you can read a pdf version from Archive.org or check eBay for paperbacks.

Accompanied by His Wife by Mary Burchell – Gentle Love Story with Complicated Plot

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Mary Burchell’s romances are a lovely step back to the days when Harlequin published novels full of real people with real lives and heartfelt feelings. She reminds me somewhat of Betty Neels who also wrote emotional novels that are clean and fulfilling. Both authors chose words and syntax that are more complex than some contemporary authors, resulting in interesting books.

Accompanied by His Wife dates from 1982 and features main characters Patricia and Michael, plus 6 side characters including Michael’s mother, his wife Pat and Patricia’s former almost-fiancé Phil. Somehow Mary Burchell uses those 8 characters to show us two kind, gentle, highly moral people who hold themselves to fierce standards of right and wrong.

Patricia agrees to pretend to be Michael’s wife because real wife Pat left Michael on their honeymoon before before he came to see his mother who is very ill. Patricia and Michael like and respect each other from the get go but there is no hint of romance initially. In fact the two share a room and bed with zero impropriety; in fact Patricia is shocked that anyone would suspect Michael of taking advantage or of herself to respond to it.

Burchell uses Patricia’s interaction with Michael’s young cousin Deborah to show us Patricia’s character: calm, insightful, truthful. Patricia sees past Deborah’s acting up and doesn’t try to hide anything when Phil meets them at the zoo. Similarly, when Phil shows himself to be anything but a good guy Patricia has no problem choosing the straight and narrow, throwing his proposition back in his face, determined to be self-reliant, especially in preference to a sordid affair.

The plot is fun, a little different from most Harlequins but what makes the book work is the complete consistency in Michael and Patricia. Patricia is willing to be the accused Other Woman if wife Pat sues Michael for divorce, despite the hit to her reputation, if it means that Pat cannot bleed Michael for money. Michael is perfectly happy to give Pat a large sum if she will allow him to divorce her, thus leaving Patricia free from scandal. It’s pretty clear that both are falling in love but Patricia is rather slow to see it.

I enjoyed this very much. It was a relief to find a romance that packs so much emotion and character in with quality writing and a clean plot free of sex scenes. So many of the contemporary Harlequins are written for a mid-high school reading level and have more sex than plot or character. We can’t beat some of these older romances!

4 Stars

I got my copy from Thriftbooks and you may find copies on eBay. As of mid-November 2020 Amazon does not have this in any format.

Taken by the Pirate Tycoon – Romance Daphne Clair

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Taken by the Pirate Tycoon uses some of the same characters and back story as The Timber Baron’s Virgin Bride but isn’t as enjoyable. Samantha owns a construction business that deals with Bryn Donovan’s lumber company and she and he are good business friends. Samantha would have liked a closer relationship but the two never dated nor had there been any indication that Bryn felt anything more than friendship.

Bryn’s new brother-in-law, Jase, sees Samantha give Bryn a kiss in the receiving line at his wedding and the momentary look of regret on her face, and jumps immediately to suspect that Sam is out to destroy his sister’s marriage and that Sam and Bryn had a past affair. Neither is true but that doesn’t stop our dashing pirate hero!

Frankly the book left me cold about this time. Jase takes Sam out a couple of times, to the beach, to his family’s home, and they develop a business relationship, all the while he believes she hankers after Bryn. Jase himself is intrigued with Sam’s icy exterior that he suspects covers a warm and vulnerable personality, but it doesn’t stop him from continuing to suspect an affair.

Sister Rachel tells Jase that she saw Bryn kiss Sam – when he kissed her on the cheek – and Jase blows this up to Bryn making love to Sam in his office and goes on a tirade with Sam. This is where I’d tell the guy to take a hike and it is hard to see how Sam could continue falling in love with him.

Eventually things resolve themselves but Jase never apologizes for his nasty suspicions. The story is OK but not particularly satisfying. Unlike some of her earlier novels Ms. Clair does not develop the characters very well or with any depth. I didn’t feel as though Sam or Jase were real people or that I was right there with them as we do with the best romances.

There is also nothing particularly enticing about the setting. Bryn visits Jase’s farm family home and it seems nice but not memorable or even interesting. Since I’ve never been to New Zealand I enjoy reading about the scenery, about the beaches and small towns and cities and mountains and it’s simply not there in Taken by the Pirate Tycoon.

Taken by the Pirate Tycoon is OK but nothing special. I bought my copy from Thriftbooks and Amazon offers both the Kindle and paperback editions.

2 Stars

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A Man of Means Romance by Kay Thorpe

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Ugh. The story is reasonably good – Kay Thorpe knows how to engage us with her characters – but this is another novel of a 35 year old man and a 17 year old girl. That’s just icky.

True, Dana truly loves Mark is determined to grow up and be the best wife she can be, but… The story runs about 4 months, a month before marriage and 3 months after, and it’s clear that the two have serious issues together. Their biggest problem is that Mark doesn’t think he should be in love with Dana, that he knows she is too young and he’s a bit ashamed of desiring her.

The problems escalate because Mark’s younger brother Brendon falls for Dana too, and bewildered by Mark’s attitude and lonely, Dana enjoys Brendon’s company. Brendon tries hard to steal Dana from Mark, at which point Mark virtually rapes Dana, then somehow seduces her immediately after. (Double yuck!)

Brendon brings in another complication with Marion, the girl both he and Mark had considered marrying. Marion acts decently – we don’t get any of the scenes with her acting seductive or proprietorial – but Dana now is convinced that Mark doesn’t love her and never will love her. And now she’s pregnant. Pregnant by the man who doesn’t want her for his wife.

Or so she thinks.

Most of the pair’s problems would have gone away if Dana had something to do besides sit around home, she’s even tired of reading. Brendon is no fool and takes solid advantage of her boredom and how useless she feels. And of course if Mark could ever bring himself to tell Dana how he really feels, but this is a Harlequin Presents so no hero ever says what he means.

Kay Thorpe writes well and creates believable characters, even those with a huge age discrepancy, and we can feel desolate and lonely and rejected along with Dana. A Man of Means is not one of Thorpe’s best but it is pretty good, quite enjoyable.

3 Stars

I got my copy from Thriftbooks, and at the moment Amazon has a copy of the paperback and the pdf version is here on Archive.org. I don’t see a Kindle version except of the comic book version.

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