Helpful Score: 6
This is the author's third book in a related Regency series. The author has a true gift for droll humor and great dialogue, but having read her second book in this series, Surrender to Sin (which I loved), I don't think this third book is her best overall effort. The plot is complex and, in the tradition of Shakespeare, filled with mistaken identities, disguised lovers, and star-crossed matches, but the whole is somewhat less than the sum of its parts. Keeping up with the author's constant references to other characters and story lines both within this book and from her other two is somewhat taxing. The romance between Cosima, the impoverished Irish heroine, and Benedict, the wealthy hero, is unconventional and, therefore, refreshing, but it was hard for me to suspend disbelief and really go with it. I strongly recommend the author's second book, but I definitely wouldn't pick this one up until you've read the first two--just too many character references to the others. A word of warning to the squeamish: one of the adult characters suffers sexual abuse at the hands of a relative--the scene is not written excessively graphically or even violently, but still--it's there.
Helpful Score: 4
I didn't realize it was part of a series so maybe that is part of the problem. But from the beginning I was not a fan of the hero or the heroine and I guess I just can't enjoy a book where I have such a dislike of both! lol
Helpful Score: 3
This was good book, a real page turner. However, the end gets very convoluted. The characters pull you into the story and keep you reading through until the end though.
