I am a long time Mary Balogh fan, back to her first titles for Signet. I wanted to like this book better, I really did. But I couldn't.
I have never been crazy about the Big Family Reunion scenes featured in all her recent books. They're boring. The stories of those couples have been told; I think one can assume they all lived perfect lives and had lots of perfect children and nary a serious problem to be dealt with. These scenes never go to further development of those characters. I don't need the nose count on the perfect children.
But the real problem with such scenes is that they interrupt the current couple's story. In this book they stop it dead. All those bossy women and complaisant husbands descend en masse at one point, and the story of Harry and Lydia went on the back burner for many pages. I felt like wallbanging the book.
Balogh has said that her readers tell her they want these scenes. I say don't listen.
The Harry and Lydia story has some good things to it - Lydia's "stifled" first marriage, her desire not to be owned again, the gradual emergence of her true personality; Harry's further maturing; the hero worship that goes on in some congregations - but it's very cluttered up with family machinations and tea drinking, so I found many pages I wished I could skip.
Five stars for Harry and Lydia, but too many boring parts overall.
I have never been crazy about the Big Family Reunion scenes featured in all her recent books. They're boring. The stories of those couples have been told; I think one can assume they all lived perfect lives and had lots of perfect children and nary a serious problem to be dealt with. These scenes never go to further development of those characters. I don't need the nose count on the perfect children.
But the real problem with such scenes is that they interrupt the current couple's story. In this book they stop it dead. All those bossy women and complaisant husbands descend en masse at one point, and the story of Harry and Lydia went on the back burner for many pages. I felt like wallbanging the book.
Balogh has said that her readers tell her they want these scenes. I say don't listen.
The Harry and Lydia story has some good things to it - Lydia's "stifled" first marriage, her desire not to be owned again, the gradual emergence of her true personality; Harry's further maturing; the hero worship that goes on in some congregations - but it's very cluttered up with family machinations and tea drinking, so I found many pages I wished I could skip.
Five stars for Harry and Lydia, but too many boring parts overall.
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