Seduced

by Virginia Henley

Shorn of her glorious raven tresses and dressed as a man, Lady Antonia Lamb became Lord Anthony Lamb, desperate to keep the property entailed to her twin brother, who is missing at sea. Trapped—and liberated—by her masquerade, Tony meets her new guardian, the devastatingly dangerous Adam Savage, who has returned from his plantation in Ceylon, determined to turn the innocent "boy" into a worldly man.

A rake whose scarred face and ice-blue eyes make strong women weak, Adam Savage, legendary adventurer, vowed to take young Tony to the fleshpots of London; to teach him everything a young heir should know. But not even Savage guesses Tony's deepest secret, a masquerade destined to erupt in passionate abandon on one scorching, unforgetable night.

Genres: Historical Romance, Romance, Historical, Regency, Historical Fiction, Adult, Genderqueer

532 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Virginia Syddall was born on December 5, 1935 in England, where her father, Thomas Syddall, taught her to love history. She obtained a degree in History in the University. In 1956, Virginia married Arthur Henley. They moved to America, and now they live most of the year in St. Petersburg, Florida, and they spend the hot summers in Ontario, Canada, where they have their two adult children and three grandsons.

Virginia Henley is a New York Times bestselling writer of historical novels. Her work has been translated into fourteen languages. She is the recipient of more than a dozen writing awards, including a Romantic Times Lifetime Achievement Award, a Waldenbooks' Bestselling Award, and a Maggie Award for Excellence from the Georgia Romance Writers.

Reviews

[Lillie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm so angry, you guys, you don't even understand how much.

I read this book cause of two reasons:
1) I love cross-dressing, historical romances
2) I had forgotten how TERRIBLE of an author Henley is.

It's because of that second reason that i'm not going to give my usual full rant review(yes, i know its long already imagine if i actually took the TIME to write out my full thoughts, geesh). Instead, I'm going to condense it down as much as I can into a more digestible review:

I have some major fucking problems with this book. Most of them would definitely put off a modern day romance reader(or literally anyone with a normal moral code) and I couldn't help but wonder what in the HELL Virginia Henley was thinking. Maybe morality was different 21 yrs ago but dear fucking god, I didn't know it was THIS bad.

Someone gouge out my eyes pls.

1) The heroine is 16-17. The hero? He's fucking 32 years old. Usually, I'm not one to judge with age gap but when the hero/heroine is bordering on statutory rape territory I'm done. Historically that may be accurate but that doesn't make it right, nor is it something I want to read about. This isn’t a tragic retelling of true events, this is literally a story made up by the author who is in complete control over the ages of the characters. Aging her up would not have impacted the story in any way other than NOT making it creepy and predatory.

2) The hero has sex with the HEROINE'S GOD DAMN MOTHER. You think I'm joking but I'm not. For me it was a definite "do not pass go". I kept imagining myself sexing up my mom's current boyfriend and stg I nearly threw up in my mouth.

3) The hero has sex with a bunch of different women as well as women fantasizing about having sex with him. And you're witness to every single occurrence. Its one thing for the hero to be like "Yeh, I've had sex with a lot of women but not since I've met you" and another to actually SHOW every bloody transgression like its an X-rated episode of The Bachelor. Its not romantic. Its not cool. Its not even suave. Its deplorable. It makes the reader(aka me) think very little of the hero. DOES he love her? Or is he just pulling shit out of his ass to get her in bed? Cause from what I've read he's said a lot of things to get women in bed (before and since he's met the heroine). THAT CHEAPENS THE ROMANCE.

4) Everything is slow to the point of killing you with old age. It takes FOREVER just to get to the main characters and even more so for the main players to come into contact with each other. Every little possible fucking detail, down to the mundane, useless bullshit, was written out for the reader. Servants that had no real purpose or role in the story even got a god damn POV once in awhile and I kept thinking "is this important?" Was it? Hell, no.

5) There's no 'romance' going on. A majority of the book is information we don't need, POVs we don't need, events taking place that don't need to, all of this doing NOTHING to contribute to the progression of the story. And out of all of that? There's literally about 25% that can be considered "romance". The title doesn't even do this "romance" justice: the only people being seduced is everyone that ISN'T the heroine. If that doesn't tell you how shit this "romance" is idk what else to tell you.

6) And finally, silly ass lines like: "Delight was awed by the Leopard, for she had let down her love juices twice before he found release." Delight is a prostitute and the Leopard is fucking Adam Savage OUR HERO. I shit you not. And... "let down her love juices"?????! WHAT? DOES THA TEVEN MEAN??!!!??!?!??! I've read some pretty eye roll worthy lines in romances but there are so many in this book that are just so damn stupid I swear I got an aneurysm in my eyes from rolling em so much.

This book is a prime example of why most of today's society thinks romances are racist, sexist, bodice rippers, meant for old ladies that own 23 cats and live by themselves. Its books like this make me wonder how the genre even survived. There's so much morally ambiguous and historically inaccurate bullshit going on in this book, i wouldn't recommend it to a fucking illiterate blind woman.

I'm going back to my modern day authors, cause this was TRASH.

[Becky (romantic_pursuing_feels) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Plot/Storyline: 📖📖📖
Feels: 🦋🦋
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋💋
Sex Scene Length: varies, but 🍑🍑🍑 on average? – there is a long first one.
Bells in the vagina – ding a ling!: 🔔 (one and sadly it’s not the heroine)
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 - this may vary for you - some scenes were on the shorter side but I still counted them. There were other scenes between the hero and a brothel worker and the prince and his mistress that I didn't count as flames (I only count main character sex)
Humor: Yes, I wouldn’t say it’s a lighthearted book at all but there are scenes that made me laugh out loud

(These are all personal preference on a scale of 1-5 (yours ratings may vary depending what gives you feels and how you prefer you sex scenes written, etc) except the Steam Scale which follows our chart from The Ton and Tartans Book Club .)

Should I read in order?
I think this is a stand alone novel – though I’m curious if she gave Anthony a story?

Basic plot
Anthony and Antonia are 16 year old twins that have just lost their father. They are placed under a guardianship, a man they’ve never met who lives in Ceylon (Sri Lanka). When Anthony goes overboard on a ship and is presumed dead, Antonia takes his place as the heir to keep their inheritance from their greedy cousin. The guardian turns up to take things in hand – guiding “Tony” in his future.

Give this a try if you want:
- You must be okay with various content warnings – they are included at the end under a spoiler warning.
- You’re ready for a slow burn – the actual hero and heroine don’t meet until after 100 pages, and it takes much longer for him to realize she’s not actually a man
- Heroine dressed as a man trope – one of the longest done and most convincing ones of this plot I’ve read
- Older hero trope/underage heroine – the heroine is SIXTEEN here people – not sure how old the hero is but he was her father’s friend and I’m assuming he’s in his 30s
- You also have to be okay with the hero kissing and touching the heroine’s mother before meeting the heroine and falling in love with her instead. Yep.
- Scarred hero – he has a knife wound that runs from his nose into his upper lip and it’s commented on numerous times
- Don’t know the exact year – but it’s just prior to the Regency – George III is talked about being mad and the prince discusses a regent bill being proposed
- You’re all right with some random head hopping including the prince and his lover – they have a number of random sex scenes throughout the book
- Guardian/ward trope
- Some world travel/road trip romance – scenes take place in London, in the English countryside, Ireland, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Italy, France...
Higher steam - there's lots of open door sex scenes that vary in length. They are pretty explicit - 90s explicit (You'll find some fun euphemisms here - love milk, anyone? )

My thoughts:
Wow, was this book a wild ride. It’s my first Henley in decades – I know I read 1-2 of hers in high school but can’t recall anything about them.

I loved parts of this book and hated parts. It was so, so, soooooo slow in the beginning for me – I am anxious for the hero and heroine to be together and find myself getting so bored/annoyed when they aren’t together interacting a fair bit – they don’t even meet for the first 130 pages or so and it was starting to drag. When they were together, it was amazing. But then I started really itching for Adam to realize Antonia was actually a woman. It just went on. And on. And on! It was almost at 400 pages before Adam realized Anthony was Antonia. It was a very long time to wait.

The book really seemed to pick up once he realized she had a vagina. I liked it more because they were interacting as a couple and having more meaningful discussions (and more sex!). I really loved a lot of their scenes together – I was prepared for Adam to be an absolute jerk but he was usually quite tender, playful and protective with her – and I just ate that up! I loved that he admitted he loved her – fairly freely – it was at the end of the book-ish (remember he thought she was a man for 400 pages!) but then he was open with it and I loved that. The heroine would tell him his eyes were as Blue as the Bay of Biscay and it was funny how it always lead to kisses and sex.

Sadly, there was just too much that I didn’t love in this book to raise the rating to 4 stars. I probably really really loved about 100 pages or so. The rest was getting super irritating and it’s a lot to forgive in a book that’s over 500 pages.

There was something compelling about the writing to me though – I did find myself wanting to read it and I hid away from the kids and my husband most of the day. I didn’t love the random sex scenes of the prince and his mistress – I’ll admit I just started totally skipping those. I don’t care about them and wasn’t interested in that – it wasn’t long parts but there was a handful of them and they just didn’t make the most sense to have in the book to me.

I was a touch annoyed with a few things with the plot – I just could not buy that the hero had spent all this time with the heroine and never has a clue that she was a man, other than thinking him effeminate at the beginning – until just out of the blue, he sees her napping and realizes it. The build of this discovery had me so anxious and wanting something more from it (after 400 pages! 400 pages, have I mentioned it took that long???) that I was just rather let down by the whole thing. THEN the fact that he just randomly realizes she’s the same woman as the one in Italy?? That also drew my eyes towards the ceiling – I recall him saying something like green eyes? Brunette hair??? Come on...it was just too convenient for my taste, so I was disappointed in both of those big reveals.


Here’s a few random parts that I wanted to note from the book


Some problematic aspects:
-Parents had taken an administration position with the East India Company and lived in Madras, India
-Hero is a plantation owner (Leopard’s Leap in Ceylon. He’d worked his way on an East Indiaman to buy wood for his father who was a cabinetmaker
Describing Adam’s plantation

“The men who had become proficient in English were promoted to overseers and given an umbrella as a badge of office. The Leopard, as the plantation workers also called him, was a hard taskmaster who ruled with an iron hand. He would put up with nothing that displeased him. Punishment was both swift and harsh. He was never lenient, there were no second chances. Mixed with their fear of him, however, was a healthy dose of respect. There was not one task on the entire plantation that he could not do himself and do it better than any other.

More about the plantation

When the Dutch owned the plantation, the workers had all been native Sinhalese. They were an attractive people but extremely cunning and indolent. If they did not wish to work on a particular day, no power on earth could make them. When Adam had been in India he had witnessed how the natives manipulated the English by their own form of blackmail. They would sit on a step and fast to get their own way or threaten to disembowel themselves or even dash out their children’s brains.
When Savage took over he dismissed the Sinhalese workers and released them with darker-skinned Tamils, who were far more industrious and willing to do labor. Savage allowed them their own customs unless those customs offended him, in which case he forbade them. In the East a woman was barren until she bore a son, then her husband was permitted to take a second wife. Concubinage was normal, so he did not interfere. A female must marry as soon as puberty was reached or she became the prey of all males in her caste.
Kirinda was the only Sinhalese woman on the plantation. She became a twelve-year-old widow during his first week and marked for sati. He saved her from burning on the funeral pyre by taking her as his personal body servant.
The other practice he abolished immediately was the murder of female children at birth. Savage insisted they could be taught to work for paid wages.”

Some sexual negativity the heroine’s mother experiences

“A wave of guilt swept over her. It had nothing to do with her recently deceased husband. Sex always made her feel guilty and dirty. She had thought the act of the animals disgusting and was fearful that the primitive mating, coupled with Savage’s virile presence, might sexually arouse her.”

More on the hero

He’d risked his sanity, enduring the soul-searing loneliness, until he’d learned to become one with nature, and he had risked his life innumerable times hunting down rogue elephants that trampled his plants, stalking panthers that ate his livestock, putting down insurgence from natives determined to burn him out and rid the land of the white man.

Nope, don’t like this

“Eve was an avaricious little bitch, like most women.”

And the hero does call the heroine a bitch multiple times too. Don’t like it. (Eve is the heroine’s mother.)
Not sure how I feel about this – of course life and death is one situation but the alluded to godlike status of her white plantation master is yuck

Adam plopped the strong-smelling carbolic soap back into the bowl and stood up. His dark head almost touched the beams. “I want you to nibble on this dry biscuit and sip this wine slowly. I swear by Vishnu your stomach will not reject it.”
She knew she should not drink forbidden wine, yet she must obey his orders. She knew in her heart that her master was a more potent god than any Hindu god or goddess.

Some possibly hurtful gender stereotypes for today’s readers

Adam saw the down upon the pretty face and was secretly appalled at how effeminate he was. For the first time he felt anger toward his late friend Russell. Why couldn’t he have taken his son with him to the Indies? He had been left with only a grandmother and a sister for companions. He had been totally deprived of male role models. Savage’s resolve hardened. By Christ, he would make a man of him!

And I was shocked at a mention of STDs! I kind of liked it being called out actually – but they go to plenty of other brothels and I just thought it laughable about how he thought certain places were so clean – but not those dock workers

“That’s better,” Savage approved, “there’s no call to look down your aristocratic nose at the whores of the docks.” Savage had an afterthought. “But never fuck one of them. Syphilis is rampant down here.”
--------------------------------------------------------
“Who shall I fuck?”
Savage measured Tony with a glacial stare, wondering if he was being mocked. Then he realized Lord Lamb hadn’t the faintest notion who was fuckable and who wasn’t. Splendor of God, he was a milk-faced innocent!
“Most young men wealthy enough to have servants usually gain their first experience by tumbling a serving maid or their tenants’ daughters. Yours seemed willing enough.”
--------------------------------------------------------
“The cost of a mistress can be prohibitive, especially to a young man like yourself, so there are houses, commonly known as brothels, where you pay the madam in charge for a female companion for an hour, an evening, or an all-nighter. You pay for her sexual services. In a high-class house the females are usually pretty, extremely inventive in ways to please a man, and most importantly, they should be clean so you don’t come down with a dose of the pox. London caters to every taste and pocket.”

Not sure exactly what year but this pins it as just pre-regency

“When Prince George caught Savage’s quizzical glance he explained, “M’father’s quite mad. That’s why they are preparing a Regency Bill for me. I should have been Regent years since, for he’s been mad for quite some time.”




Content Warnings:

😟Problematic content – hero is a plantation owner and worked his way up in the East India Company, scenes of plantation work
😟Animal death - hero finds a monkey that fell and broke its back – he shoots it so it won’t have to suffer – red ants are already trailing towards it, hero also must kill a leopard that attacks the heroine
😟Animal cruelty – villain sabotages one of the horses saddle that causes pain and cuts to her body
😟Light drug use – smoking ganja
😟Gambling addiction – heroine’s mother suffers from it
😟Racism – heroine’s mother is content to smuggle and have opium sold saying “But they are only Chinese peasants.”, also the villain uses the term ‘wog’ on a servant
😟Mining precious resources and minerals from other countries and benefiting from them/England benefiting from them
😟Child trafficking – hero remembers almost losing his life trying to free such a ‘cargo’
😟Detailed scene of a boat capsizing and almost drowning
😟Rape/sexual fear – villain has a sex scene with his mistress where he penetrates her with the handle of a sword and it’s done to instill fear, he also sexually assaults a child with a pistol and pulls the trigger inside her – it’s unloaded
😟Gender stereotypes – hero is disappointed in how ‘effeminate’ the heroine is, believing her a man and will ‘make a man out of him’
😟Cigar use
😟Touch of homophobia – hero has taken a bullet and wants to elude the authorities. They come to his ship and he puts Tony (who’s still a boy) in his bed and goes to talk to the cops letting them know they’ve interrupted his bedroom activities “’He flushed as he recalled telling Tony to climb into his bunk, then deliberately allowing the French authority to believe they were homosexual lovers. Tony’s anger after the man left told him clearly she understood the disgusting implication, but she’d stayed and nursed him through a bad night.”
😟Physical abuse – hero does hit the heroine when he thinks she’s a man and being unbearably rude, heroine does slap the hero
😟Gun shot wounds/duel
😟Arson resulting in a large fire on the plantation – no deaths


Locations of kisses/intimate scenes – I stopped counting the sex scenes with the prince and his mistress so there’s more scenes of that than listed

Pg 35 – a kiss between the hero and the HEROINE’S MOTHER
Pg 42 – more kisses between hero and heroine’s mother
Pg 63 – an alluded to/vague notion of sex between the villain and his mistress
Pg 71 – sex scene between hero and a woman at a brothel
Pg 78 – more kisses between hero and heroine’s mother
Pg 118 – villain sexually penetrates his mistress with a sword handle
Pg 171 – an erotic dream the heroine has about the hero – no kisses or sex though
Pg 244 – sexual scenes of the Regent with a woman he’s chasing
Pg 319 🔥 – heroine disguises herself and entices the hero to take her virginity (he thinks she’s some random woman in Italy) – kisses, breast play, fingering orgasm for her, blow job for him
Pg 408 🔥 – missionary sex – virginity loss for her (some pain)
Pg 419 – outdoor sex – short (not a full page), and pretty vague
Pg 424 🔥 – oral for her, missionary (it’s on the short side, but I counted it as a flame)
Pg 435 🔥 - sex (angry sex??)
Pg 454 – kisses/touches that are stopped by heroine
Pg 483 🔥 – blow job – it’s quite short, about a page
Pg 529 – vague short sex
Total pages 532

[Simona · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second half was so, so good that it totally salvaged my faith in Ms Henley's works. The fireworks between H and h are mega explosive, the plot also moves at a much better pace in the second half and we finally see our fierce h, Antonia, blossoming into a woman who realizes that her love and trust in her guardian is not misplaced and she would face down any scandal with him by his side.
The first half was needlessly prolonged by descriptive details for every small thing. It had its moments which kept me going forward.

The book's sex scenes are one of the best I've ever read. The author's description of their night together in Venice takes tens of pages where we see a reluctant, seasoned veteran giving into the demands of the young lady bent on corrupting herself and sends both of their world rocking with the experience.

Adam Savage, once again Ms Henley chooses an apt name for such a strong character, is nearing 35 years and after amassing a fortune by dealing in tea and rubber in Ceylon, is determined to get back to England to gain a title, start a dynasty and get some reforms to salvage his soul for some of his criminal deeds.

Lady Antonia Lamb, loved the symbolism of a lamb facing down a savage, is sixteen and is getting ready for her first season. She and her twin have lived a sheltered, but adventurous life in their country estate. Ms Henley lets her character shine when she loses her twin brother in a sailing accident and starts a ruse of imitating her brother to stop her scoundrel cousin from inheriting.

From thereon, we see Antonia travel through the world of men in disgust, wonder, outrage, amusement and indulges in every shenanigan, even surviving a duel. As a guardian, Savage pushes Antonia around as her feminine frame makes him think Lord Lamb needs to toughen up. We see Antonia match every challenge head on and it's a great ride as she gains all the worldly knowledge. But it's her inner frustration with her growing infatuation with a strong, masculine Savage and her inability to let her female desires to be in his strong arms.

The only fault in the book are the side stories and needless prose about architecture, historic details about artists and a lack of plot direction in first half. But the guardian-ward relationship is wonderfully done in the second half and fits all my needs of having an innocent succumbing to a virile force with all the inappropriateness being explored.

[skein · Rating 1 out of 5]

It is ironic that books are composed of words, because words cannot express how godawful this book is. THIS IS IRONY, people. Not fake mustaches; not retro furniture. THIS.

Nothing about it is worthwhile. Even title -- so promising! -- raises expectations that it fails to deliver. NO ONE IS SEDUCED. Not the virginal heroine Antonia and certainly not her disgusting skank of a lover, who beds approximately fourteen other women in the course of the plot before getting around to noticing Antonia. I am sure he has the pox.
Also? Her lover? His surname is Savage. And he sleeps with her mother.

... I could go on (there's a lot to work with here), but why bother?





(I did give one star for the term "manroot", which almost makes up in apt hilarity for pages & pages of tender clefts and tiny buds and, ohmygod, love milk.)

[Mojca · Rating 5 out of 5]

Little did Lady Antonia Lamb know that the sailing trip with her twin brother Anthony would turn out in an attempted murder and her brother's disappearance. To prevent their estate falling into the greedy, unscrupulous hands of their cousin Bernard, she decides to impersonate her brother.

At the same time, the twins' legal guardian – so named by their father, Adam Savage, leaves his plantation in Ceylon for England, to set up a home there, take care of his wards, and plan his marriage to Antonia and Anthony's mother.

Taking "Tony" under his proverbial wing, Adam vows to turn the boy into a man, never guessing his ward's secret, while Antonia, despite feeling liberated by her disguise, can't help the growing attraction she feels for the rake with a "scarred face and ice-blue eyes".



Seduced is a great book, though the length is tedious at times. Maybe it could've been shorter than its 532 pages, but cutting pages would probably have resulted in severe cost in characterization and that most important interaction between characters.
As Antonia's feelings for Adam develop through the book, so does the reader's perception of him, and the two of them. It is a slow development, but that's what gives it that extra semblance of reality.

Obviously the one thing suffering mostly by the book's length and character definition and interaction was the plot. After a great start, the pace slowed and picked up again only for the great final showdown.

Seduced is a great mixture of intrigue and romance, exotic settings like Ceylon and Venice during il Carnevale, sensuality, and that special drop of mystery that comes with a he-is-really-a-she twist. And it is all bound together by Ms. Henley's ability to take history and fiction and blend it all together into an excellent novel.

The two leads are your typical HR hero and heroine, but Ms. Henley succeeded in gifting them with that much-needed, and often neglected, life-likeness. Despite their obvious "perfection", they're still humans, they feel joy and pain, suffering and elation. Their interaction from the beginning of the book could be classified as foreplay. One heck of a long foreplay, that makes the final act of surrender so much stronger and scorching.
There is no doubt in the reader's mind that the author loved these two together, that they are meant for each other, and the reader can enjoy their connection and their love fully before the book ends, which is not standard HR template.

[Geo Just Reading My Books · Rating 5 out of 5]

O intensa poveste de dragoste, ce te tine cu sufletul la gura. Amuzanta si alerta, plina de situații care te baga in ceata, si totusi, misterul este rezolvat la final!

[Darbella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Old school! Expect it to not be today's PC standards. Major spoilers: When we first meet the heroine she is 16. Further along in the book she gets to "Seduce" the 32 year old Hero who happens to sort of be romantically involved complete with giving her mom an engagement ring and plans to marry her mom when he gets back. After deciding his is going to marry the heroines mom we experience his trip to the pleasure house.
The hero is never really completely honorable, but he tries to be mostly. He does not trade in human trafficking, ivory, and opium anymore, and he is trying to change government to help the common people.
However, he does not believe the heroine that she (who is running around as impersonating her twin brother who may have been killed by the villain) until after several attempts on her life. He has sexy time with the heroine and does not know it is her, and is shocked to learn that he showed her inside of brothels, how to smoke, drink swear, etc.
But the worse thing he did to the heroine was to start having sex with her and not telling her that he was engaged to her mom. Our heroine by the time she reaches her mom's current home is already months pregnant by our hero and of course is upset when the mom catches the heroine off guard by telling her that she was involved with the hero. The hero basically tells the heroine that his relationship with her mom is none of her business and even more shocking is in the last few paragraphs in the book after they had married. The hero lies to her by saying something like do you now believe me that your mom and I did not have a relationship and our young heroine says what kind of fool do you take me for? She says that the hero is right and it is none of her business and they go into hea mode. (I would have preferred that he had not attempted to lie to her.)
After having said all that I really enjoyed it so there is that. I think it is best to go into this one with eyes wide open.

[Auj · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was really hard to put down. Very compelling and interesting and kinda hot too. Though the love scenes were very metaphorical for me; I didn't really absorb them too well.
I thought Antonia and Adam were very good together. It's 532 pages but definitely worth every page.

I thought Roz was really funny. There was one part of the book I kept laughing. I think it was with John Bull's inability with the English language. And of course, the mom was a bitch but at the very end, seemed to redeem herself a little bit.

I'm definitely down to read Virginia Henley's other novels.

********************
Reread: What pisses me off is how that conniving bitch Dolly fleeced Adam out of money. Antonia should have been like, "I didn't even fuck her!", but maybe she didn't say that because if she was really a male, she probably would have already. I didn't like when she hung out with Dolly in the first place, inviting her to the race. That just spelled trouble. Why mingle with an actress friends with Angela, who is associated with your nemesis?

Another thing that confused me is why Adam bought Half-Moon townhouse (I think it was called) if he had Edenwood. At times, I thought maybe he hadn't moved in to Edenwood yet because it wasn't fully furnished, but that's not hard to do. In the beginning, when Adam met Tony, they seemed to be living in Edenwood together. And then Adam went to his Half-Moon townhouse, which I did not get. And where will he live, at his castle or Edenwood? Edenwood's gorgeous, one of a kind, and he spent a ton of money on it.

[❤️MaLu_Reads❤️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Description
Antonia and her twin brother Anthony take a boat trip to the sea, but the hole trip truns out to be a very well planed "accident" , a murder attempt by their cousin Bernard, who wants to take their fortune. In the aftermath of this accident, Anthony is lost, and Antonia takes his place, to prevent Bernard to succeed in his plans. So Antonia disguises herself in her twin brother Anthony.
Adam Savage is a very rich guy, powerful, gorgeous and sexy as hell. He is Anthony's and Antonia's guardian, their father best friend, and he is engaged with their mother. So Adam takes "Anthony " under his wing to make him a man...but Oh my. ..what a man became himself, after Antonia release's her charm over him and puts her hands on him.
My review
Well this was a great journey hot and full of fun and mistery. Yeah it is a long book, but i didn't get bored. I liked the strength of Antonia, her determination to not let Bernard win and most of all how she conquer Adam.
I didn't like their mom...she is a real B**ch, and I'm very glad that Adam picked Antonia over her mother.
So....if you're looking for some historycal romance, with very hot and funny stuff, this is the one, but get ready for a long ride
⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 5 Hot ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Stars

[Nisha · Rating 4 out of 5]

There was a lot I liked about this book. Unfortunately, there were things that also detracted from it. Like Tony's mother and Adam's attitude and thought during the beginning of the book, the immense detail, the dumb villain.

It's a great story, implausible, yet so fun to read. I loved Tony's male experiences. I didn't like Adam at first. Mostly because he wanted to marry Eve. I came to when we learned more about him.

I wish the author bothered to write a little about Anthony's experiences and given more though toward the language of the time period. Sometimes, I felt that it didn't match. Mixing in a foreign culture is always hard to do in this genre. Being Indian, and Tamil for that matter, I was entertained at parts and during others, found it slightly racist. It goes with the time period, but still. Maybe I'm too American or something. Ok, actually the only thing I had real problems about was when he called that prostitute 'Delight'. What the hell? Maybe its like 'Lola' but in the Indies.

The diction was also a little trashy, but I can forgive that. Overall, fun read.

[FlibBityFLooB · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was interesting, but it had potential to be much better -- if only it had been about 150 pages shorter and had lost the purple prose. At 530 pages, the author tended to dwindle on and on in useless details instead of focusing on the fun parts of the book. The interesting parts were with the heroine playing her twin brother and living as a young man in Georgian England. Too bad the editors didn't help cut down some of the useless bits. Also, you could definitely tell this was an older style bodice ripper type of romance based on the sex scenes and flowery bits. I mean, come on... who honestly would use the words "LOVE MILK" ? Oh well. :)

Someone may ask, why are you giving this book 3 stars if you found it to be so tedious to read at times? The answer is because I happen to love a good gender-bender storyline. That, and one of the characters dies from a legion of leeches. I kid you not. WHEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!

[britta ⋆˙⟡]

Dnf H sleeps w her mom, not for me

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an... odd book. There was part of me that wanted to rate it a four, while other parts scream that it really should be a two. There were so many things that had me shaking my head and wondering if I should finish it.

Antonia
This girl was a study of contradictions. On one page she would be vowing that she hated posing as a male and then two sentences later she would be thinking about how happy she was as her brother. In the same vein, one minute she would be gushing over ladies fashions and missing dresses while then turning around and admiring how well she liked her male attire and mentally rolling her eyes at what the silly girls were wearing. Even her diary is a perfect contradiction of her thinking, though at least in that regard it is acknowledged when Adam read it and saw that every page started out with how much she hated him and all of her suppositions on what dangerous things he had done, only to then end each and every entry gushing about how much she loved him.

She wanted him today, she wanted him tomorrow, she wanted him forever. He was all males rolled into one, father, guardian, friend, lover, husband...

Adam
He was... odd. I counted well over ten times places where he was describing himself as a father to the "male" Tony. Okay, fine, he had to rearrange his thinking when he suddenly found out that he was dealing with a female instead of a male, only to then find out that the female he'd been dreaming about the past month was she as well... And what a revelation:

Ann Lambeth! No trace could be foud because Ann Lambeth was Antonia Lamb! The thought was regugnant to him. He was suddenly blazing angry. Far more angry than he'd been at discovering Tony was a woman. The devious little bitch! It offended ever sensibility! Christ Almighty, he was engaged to her mother! He was Antonia's guardian. She was probably going to be his daughter. It was tantamount to incest! A guardian sleeping with his ward breeched every code of honor. It was morally corruptible.

And yet, less than ten pages later, the very next day, he's saying WTF and bedding her like there's no tomorrow within the knowledge of her de facto chaperon and all of his house servants. He takes on a care-less attitude about the whole deal while thinking to himself:

Savage silently contemplated what he had don. There was no turning back now. What was done was done. Shamelessly, he has no regrets. She was extremely young, but age had nothing to do with it [by this time she has turned 17 and he is either 32 or 33]. They were two of a kind. Though society would be scandalized that a guardian should be intimate with his ward, he doubted that they would be ostracized. He was too damned rich and she too well-born to be seriously censured. In any case he didn't give a damn about the so-called ton, except for Antonia's sake. He felt extremely protective of her, yet she was so outrageous, he doubted she gave a good goddamn either. Now that he had known Antonia, he was horrified to think he might have married Eve. He wished he had never become romantically involved with both mother and daughter, but he could not undo the past, and long ago he had learned to live with the fact that he was a dishonorable bastard.

All the Rest
There should probably be some form of significant difference between the hero and the villain. Here there was practically none and the only concrete lines that could be drawn between the two are perhaps sexual kinks including weaponry and laziness vs hard-work. In fact, I am sure there were several scenes featuring the hero that have been featured within the same context except with the villain doing and saying the things.

Tony's mother makes a VERY unconvincing 180 at the end of the book and even apologizes for telling Tony that SHE was planning on marrying Adam. Her grandmother seemed content with only making token protests to her only granddaughter running around London dressed as a male, and yet seems scandalized once Tony's a girl again. To top it off there was the gaping hole in plot of how Adam was under the impression that Antonia had drowned and yet EVERYONE ELSE seemed to be under the impression that she was off on a holiday in Bath...

[Elis Madison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not long after they learn of their father's death in Ceylon, Antonia (Tony) Lamb and her twin brother Anthony (also Tony) experience a few too many accidents.



Well, rather more serious than that. The kind that could kill a guy (and not just from embarrassment). And enough of them to start the family wondering about their cousin Bernard, who would inherit the title and estates (and pitch the gals out on their butts) if Anthony were to cock up his toes.

When a combination of sabotage and a freak storm ends with Anthony lost at sea, Antonia decides to pitch-hit for her twin. She dresses as Anthony and assumes the title, convinced Tony will return to claim his place. Yeah, there are more sensible ways to keep the murdering title-grabber out of the game (and it's pointed out later), but this is the way Antonia picks. And natch, this makes her the target of Bernie's plots.



Adam Savage, a friend of the twins' father, is now their guardian. In India, he makes a play for their beautiful, avaricious, frigid mom before he heads for England, leaving her to consider his proposal while he's away.

He arrives to find that the new Lord Lamb is a ponce—seriously, this boy is girly all over. Adam sees it as his job to make a man of the lad, and his solution to the problem is to introduce the kid to booze, tobacco, and loose women (because these are the benchmarks of maturity for a Georgian man).



For some reason, Antonia's granny doesn't see fit to protect her granddotty by "outing" her before the "guardian" can wreck her reputation by, oh, I don't know, dragging her around to brothels and showing her what the menfolk really get up to after the ladies withdraw and leave them to their port (C'mon, mates, let's stand around the chamber pot and have a huge group piss before we talk in the crudest possible terms about all our recent conquests!).



Tony (f) is shocked at times but also appalled by the stark differences between the way young men and young ladies are educated. Girls are rigidly kept so stupid innocent they're easy prey for lechers and fortune hunters, while boys are encouraged to expose themselves to every source of venerial disease known to man before they pick a nice, noble virgin for heir-bearing purposes. An enlightened Tony sets out to grab life (and a certain guardian) by the balls



A few logic problems bugged me the biggest of which is a spoiler the other Tony is in fact alive and in Ceylon with their mom—and of course Bernard turns up there. And for whatever reason, that Tony has completely forgotten their suspicions about the guy so that he practically offers himself up on a plate to his would-be killer. But on the whole I did think the female Tony's masquerade was a lot of fun, and I enjoyed her insights. So I'll give this one 3.5.

[Brian Sirith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Can't rate it cause I skimmed. Worse than I have skimmed ever. Should have been half the size. Might change the review if I read it properly. Based on my inadequate reading though...

The author is so slow she's impossible to read. 6 paragraphs about the hero taking a bath. His everyday, nothing-happens bath. He washed his face and hair, gave the servant the soap, she washed his back, gave him back the soap, he washed... can someone slip on the darn soap? Can someone use it in some perverted way? Can it be poisoned? Why am I reading about a bar of soap otherwise?

And that wasn't the worst of it. Every mundane bit is detailed, everything is told, told, told not shown. When you're skipping pages and pages, you end up missing the plot too. Its not enjoyable. So... I can't really say if the story is good, it seemed good but I did not enjoy the book. I'm certain I missed quite a bit while trying to avoid two page descriptions of a field.

[Jessica · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was one of the first romances I read as a teen, which I recently rediscovered (thanks twitter sleuth) and it didn’t exactly hold up. In fact, it’s a hot mess of a story where you can more or less feeeeeeel character choices being driven by the needs of the story (like the hero’s bizarre engagement to his dead buddy’s wife, like why) rather than any personal motivation that would make sense. There are also a boat-load of rambling, unnecessary plot threads and superfluous secondary (and tertiary!) characters. The main characters take turns being intolerable so it’s hard to root for them. It’s more of a “might equals right” kinda story, even if you overlook a lot of the icky colonialism that populates the story. Blech.

[Crystal · Rating 3 out of 5]

So. Many. Details!!! I skimmed so many paragraphs. The author could have cut so much out of this book that just wasn't needed.
I wasn't the most comfortable with the main character wanting both a mother and a daughter. Didn't sit right with me.
I did love the sex scenes! They were definitely hot. I also love gender bender stories but this one was different in that in all the time she was masquerading as a male, he never had any perverse thoughts towards her. Would have been nice to see more of that.
All in all, it was a good read.

[Amarilli 73 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Prima parte carina, seconda surreale.

[Martika · Rating 2 out of 5]

Este libro lo leí en el 2007, y tenía buenos recuerdos de él. Lo he vuelto a leer y es increíble con los años y la experiencia de lectura como algo que te pareció bueno ahoro no lo es. He decidido no volver a releer para que no me empañe los buenos recuerdos de algo que me gustó en su día

[Tyna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Masca inocenței are o intrigă bine conturată, dialoguri incitante, umor de situații, romantism și puțin mister. De asemenea, autoarea este foarte atentă la detalii și parcă ne simțim transportați atât în Anglia cea conservatoare, guvernată de reguli stricte bine definite, cât și în locurile exotice unde are loc acțiunea cărții – în îndepărtatul Ceylon, unde simțim din plin parfumul Orientului, la Bordeaux, unde savurăm vinurile franțuzești și șampanie, la Sardinia, cu clădirile de un alb strălucitor și acoperișuri roșii de țiglă, în stil mediteranean, sau în Veneția, unde suntem seduși de atmosfera misterioasă și romantică a lui Il Carnavale. Acțiunile fiecărui personaj sunt bine motivate, pricepem foarte bine caracterul fiecăruia și ce anume l-a determinat să ia o decizie la un moment dat. Povestea de dragoste este foarte pasionantă și seducătoare, cucerindu-te prin ineditul ei.

Recenzia mea:

http://www.delicateseliterare.ro/masc...

[Lizzy · Rating 2 out of 5]

The premise of this book is what really intrigued me. A woman pretending to be her brother who finds herself falling in love with her guardian - who is trying to teach his "male" ward to act like a typical London gentleman.

The story itself was definitely entertaining, but it was the style of writing that frustrated me with this novel. So much of this book focused on providing too much detail about events and characters and environments that were hardly essential to the storytelling. This book is over 500 pages, but I'm certain that a more concise and entertaining novel could be created from this book with only about 300 pages.

[Gwyn · Rating 1 out of 5]

Guys.... I can't .... I just can't. I gave this book 80% because I really wanted to love it, but it is GOD-AWFUL! The premiss was so fun, but the writing was bad and it was about 200 pages too long. I couldn't finish it. So much side plot I didn't care about, and Antonia is annoyingly indecisive...... save yourself the trouble and just read 12th night (which is what I should have done...)

[*CJ* · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars because I LOVED the plot(one of my favs in historicals) and their chemistry and sex was OFF CHARTS (HOT HOT HOT!!!)
Deducted one star because--her age, his sexual history with the mother and that slap.

[psclnka · Rating 5 out of 5]

Antonia Lamb was before her time.............she would have done well in 2013

[K · Rating 1 out of 5]

*snort*
*cackle*
*cringe*
(My reactions to this book, in a nutshell.)

[Romanticamente Fantasy · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Antonia non aveva mai visto un uomo nudo. Ovviamente sapeva che il maschio di tutte le specie aveva un organo sessuale ben diverso da quello che erano le sue parti intime, ma non aveva mai provato ad immaginarlo. Era davvero troppo innocente per raffigurarsi lui sotto la cintura. Con l’occhio della mente lo vide nella vasca con Fiore di Loto nuda, e le sue guance s’infiammarono al punto di farle chiudere gli occhi, pregando per un po’ di compostezza. In un solo giorno da quando aveva conosciuto Adam Savage, aveva avuto più pensieri molesti riguardo agli uomini di quanti ne avesse avuti in tutta la vita. Cosa le stava accando? Sembrava quasi che la forzata esteriorità maschile, avesse reso molto più femminili i suoi pensieri e il suo corpo."

Antony Lamb ha ereditato il titolo dal padre morto a Ceylon, che il giovane non vedeva da dieci anni, e l’annuncio della morte mette sulle sue tracce il cugino Bernard, prossimo nella linea di successione, che vede finalmente la possibilità di ereditare il titolo, se al giovane capitasse un incidente. Dopo vari tentativi infruttuosi, sembra essere riuscito nel suo intento: una gita in mare è stata fatale per il giovane lord, il cui corpo non viene ritrovato, Antonia, la gemella di Antony, è assolutamente certa che dietro la morte del fratello ci sia Bernard e non è intenzionata a lasciare che i beni del fratello vadano al suo assassino, per questo si finge il gemello, vestendosi con i suoi abiti, e data la loro somiglianza e il periodo di lutto, tutto sembra riuscire abbastanza bene. Ma le cose cambiano improvvisamente all’arrivo a Londra di Adam Savage, uno degli amici che il padre aveva a Ceylon e che è stato designato come tutore dei suoi figli. Savage è intenzionato ad essere un ottimo tutore per più di un motivo; ha infatti conquistato una colossale fortuna ma ora ciò che vuole è un titolo e una moglie che possa far brillare Edenwood, la splendida dimora che si sta facendo costruire. Eve, la vedova del suo amico e madre dei gemelli, non ha tardato a fargli capire che, una volta ottenuto un titolo, lei sarebbe più che disponibile ad essere quella donna, e Savage sembra pensarla allo stesso modo, nonostante abbia già scoperto quanto sia fredda e priva di passione. Al suo arrivo però, scopre che Antonia risulta dispersa e che il suo pupillo è decisamente carente sotto il profilo mascolino, perciò non gli rimane che occuparsi personalmente della sua educazione. Questo porterà una ragazza che è sempre stata protetta, nel misterioso mondo maschile, e mentre lui intende farne un uomo, Antonia si troverà sempre più intrigata da quell’uomo passionale e vigoroso che è il suo tutore. Ma Bernard non è disposto a farsi scivolare il titolo fra le dita e per la giovane donna il pericolo si farà incalzante.

Virginia Henley fa parte come Bertrice Small di una particolare cerchia di scrittrici di storici, non ci sono mezze misure con loro, o le si ama o le si odia. È fuor di dubbio che i loro storici siano infarciti di scene di sesso ben descritto e pieno di particolari: all’uscita, nel 1994, era davvero un libro che poteva essere considerato hot, forse uno di quelli con il maggior numero di scene di questo genere in assoluto, e vi renderete conto che le recensioni che troverete in rete sono assolutamente discordanti. Dirò subito che io ho amato moltissimo gran parte dei suoi libri, alcuni fanno parte dei miei indimenticabili e li rileggo spessissimo; questo, pur non facendo parte di questa categoria, l’ho riletto con discreto piacere. È indubbio che il sesso sia davvero eccessivo, ma alcune scene sono particolarmente intriganti e all’epoca non si leggevano spesso, come quella della gheisa e del campanellino o quella che avviene a Venezia. Savage stesso è un personaggio assolutamente sopra le righe, sembra aver fatto di tutto e di più e non sempre in modo legale, dalla miseria più nera è diventato ricchissimo al punto, che può comprare dal Principe Reggente un titolo, e si sta costruendo in Inghilterra una delle dimore più sontuose del ton. Un uomo pieno di cicatrici e dal grande fascino, passionale ed esperto, per quanto il tutto sia esagerato, è un personaggio che non si dimentica. Antonia ci regala invece la parte più divertente, nei panni del fratello: verrà concupita da giovani donne della servitù, sarà accusata di essere il padre di un ipotetico bambino, imparerà a fumare, guidare un tiro a due, ma il clou della sua educazione sarà lo scoprire con sgomento che l’attività cui si dedicano gli uomini dopo cena, mentre le dame del ton si dedicano ai pettegolezzi, non è disquisire di politica e grandi eventi ma qualcosa di ben più fisico e disgustoso.

Non è uno dei migliori libri di questa autrice, i miei preferiti rimangono sempre “Il corvo e la rosa” e “Anima e corpo” ma rileggerlo mi ha ancora una volta divertita nonostante l’assurdità di certe situazioni, e un libro che riesci a ricordare negli anni, vale sempre la pena leggerlo, anche se magari proprio finirà per non piacere, ma questa naturalmente è sempre un’opinione strettamente personale. Per me una delle grandi firme del romanzo storico, e uno di quei nomi sulle cover cui non so resistere.

Lucia63 - per RFS

[Mauser · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nel romanzo della Henley si bilanciano due parti distinte. Una, ironica e divertente, racconta le disavventure di Antonia nei panni del fratello in tutta una rosa d'esperienze tipicamente maschili dell'epoca (ingresso ai club, giro per postriboli, taverne del porto, a fumare e bere con gli uomini, ecc), in questa parte si ridacchia senza ritegno sia dello sconvolgimento di lei di fronte alle succitate esperienze sia dello sconvolgimento del selvaggio Adam Savage proprio di fronte ad esso.
L'altra parte, che vorrebbe essere la storia d'amore, quella profonda e piena di sentimento e dubbi e difficoltà, è invece meno coinvolgente perché sa di puzzà di melenso a un chilometro di distanza e non si fa mancare nulla del finto drammone con scene tipo "concediamoci questa notte insieme che sarà l'ultima e non potremo perchè devo sposarmi/partire/farti da tutore/renderti rispettabile/eccetera.
Il tutto inframmezzato da scene inutili ai fini narrativi (quella del diario, i personaggi secondari inutili che hanno intere pagine di discorsi, stereotipi assortiti).
Questa mancanza di sincronia, questo stacco netto a due terzi del romanzo è perchè dopo un po' anche la fantasia del descrivere ogni più eccentrica moda georgiana finisce e bisogna ultimare il libro. e allora? Massì, mettiamoci qualche clichè: ecco quindi la madre bellissima che bistratta la figlia perchè invidiosa, il servitore indiano saggio che parla male l'inglese, il servitore inglese che fa il cuoco che c'è in tutti i libri della Henley e si chiama sempre Burke, il parente che vuole il titolo ed è disposto a tutto per averlo, il ballo in maschera, Venezia, I'esotica india, l'oppio...
I protagonisti di questo romanzo, forse più che in altri libri della Henley, sono esagerati in tutto. Antonia, che è una ragazza un po' viziata ma abbastanza a posto all'inizio, si trasforma nel giro di mezzo romanzo nella perfetta tenutaria di un bordello, una ninfomane di prima specie incapace di tenere sotto controllo istinti e libidine quando il maschio alpha henleniano è nei paraggi.
Lui... cosa dire delle esagerazioni di lui? Ha fatto di tutto: il contrabbandiere, il mezzo pirata, il rivoluzionario, il commerciante, il lord inglese ma anche il bambino povero dei bassifondi. Di donne ne ha avuto a centinaia (sic!) e la sua cultura sessuale è quasi enciclopedica. Nessuno ne ha fatto né ne sa più di lui.
La Henley ha la tendenza all'esagerazione, è da dirlo, tutti i suoi personaggi sono così, ma questo è l'unico che non ha nemmeno una voce non smarcata nella lista dei possibili trascorsi da eroe da romance.
Tra i due è scontro tra volontà di ferro che culminano sempre, sempre, sempre in focosi amplessi pirotecnici. Sfrondando di qualche unità le scene in cui lui e lei iniziano da una litigata e finiscono per rotolarsi nel letto la narrazione ne gioverebbe in quanto a scorrevolezza, mentre leggevo e per l'ennesima volta l'autrice si dilungava a dire quanto era macho lui e donna lei, tra me e me pensavo: oh no, di nuovo! Il problema di certi romanzi è che si abusa della scena d'amore.
Finale frettoloso.
Complessivamente promosso, anche se per non uccidere i due protagonisti bisogna impegnarsi perché a volte le loro paturnie fanno davvero venire il nervoso.

[Sumi38 · Rating 3 out of 5]

The sex was good. Seduced was about he highborn lords and ladies all right but not the sedated lives of wives and daughters but the mistresses, actresses and harlots. About the dissolute set of Carlton house and their pastimes.
The H was the anti hero: he came from the gutters and you don’t discover at the end that he was the lost child of a noble family. He was disgustedly rich. New money mind you, that he earned himself with his physical labor and some other less savory means. His sexual energy knew no bounds to the point that he shagged everything with a skirt. Sometimes several at the same time. His ambition knew no bounds : he wanted a palace he built one, he needed a chatelaine, he got engaged to one highborn lady who wanted his money, she asked him for a title, he bribed the regent to get one, he wanted power, he bought a seat in the commons. His last achievement achievement to “corrupt” a 16 year old, his ward. He believed it was a boy and it turns out it was a girl. He took her to brothels, to gaming hells. He gave her cigars and let her drink until she got sick. He gave her the Kama sutra and other books like it so she can learn sexual techniques. She let her run free with the Carlton house set, so she run phaeton courses, had indoor shooting contests, go to boxing matches and watch broad sex farces. He got a bit of remorse but ended up initiating her to sex himself. Never mind he was engaged to her mother.
Surrounded but all this sexually charged atmosphere no wonder our 16 year old was sexually starved and her ward became her idol. All that freedom in a single shot. No supervision whatsoever, her grandmother was a joke, her mother abandoned her 10 years before and his father recently dead.

So I found the plot refreshing but the writing not so much. It was hashed and too long. Too many things happened. One minute they were in Ceylon, the next in Venice, then in Ireland. I got dizzy. They didn’t left a vice unexplored. The secondary characters and subplots were too much and not interesting : the twin, the grandmother, the servants were only extras.The subplot with Prinny was abandoned in the middle of the book and I never knew why it was there to begin with (To justify the purchase of a title with the jewels for Maria? ). The murder plot and the villain were ok. I’d have preferred not to involve love in the equation because it was not credible. Also there was no need to redeem the hero the heroine wanted him warts and all. He was a delicious wicked character. The heroine childish. and spoilt but then she was 16.

[bersabea giudice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anni e anni fà, quando divoravo qualsiasi romance storico che mi capitasse a tiro, Virginia Henley era sicuramente in cima alle mie preferenze, e questo libro era uno di quelli che mi sarebbe tanto piaciuto leggere allora ( non ricordo se era solo introvabile o proprio inedito in Italia ), sono passati decenni, ma alla fine finalmente l'ho letto.
Non so cosa mi sia successo, forse sono solo cresciuta e ho cambiato gusti, o forse, nonostante lo aborro, il politicamente corretto ha messo comunque radici in me, fatto stà che questo libro mi ha scioccato per alcune cose e situazioni.

-Savage, il protagonista, è un concentrato di mascolinità tossica, passa la metà del tempo ad occhieggiare qualunque donna, giovane o matura, ricca o povera, nobile o cameriera, per lui non fa differenza.
L'altra metà del tempo la passa ad irretire e corrompere un timido ragazzo di 16 anni, portandolo in bordelli, bische, e in mezzo a compagnie molto poco raccomandabili.
Francamente non so come la protagonista abbia potuto, anche solo provare attrazione per questo personaggio viscido e un pò volgarotto.

- La differenza di età tra i 2 è troppa, soprattutto se si considera che lei è una sedicenne quando lo incontra, e comunque minorenne quando entrano in intimità.

Il libro l'ho trovato anche un pò noioso, lo stratagemma di Antonia di vestire i panni del suo gemello, secondo me è durata troppo, nel momento in cui lei si è svelata lui è capitolato subito, e il finale è stato troppo frettoloso, manca un bell'epilogo.

[Skittles Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.75 holy OG books stars!

Antonia Lamb is one of the wards of Adam Savage. She disguised herself as her twin brother when he was believed to be dead so as to save their titles and home against their sneaky evil cousin.

Adam wanted to train Tony on how to be a man- so he unwittingly initiated her to “manly” activities like smoking, racing, whoring and gambling. Charming, eh? Of course the whole time our poor heroine has been falling in love with him and was suppressing her desire for Adam.

To be fair, this book has really funny dialogues, especially those from John Bull and the English people, and the bawdy limericks are awesome.

I’ve never read about such a wanton heroine, btw. This book has described her sexual awakening and is steamy. There is also the forbidden angle since 1. She is his ward 2. He initially wanted to marry her mother. It’s truly twisted.

Again in this book, I find the heroine annoying (again, because this is my second VH book, and AGAIN, the heroine’s supremely irritating!), and also very immature. She stomped on a servant’s foot because she was unhappy. That kinda struck an angry chord in me.

But VH has a way of writing her stories; it can be dragging with the atmosphere set up but all in all I understand why she is a popular author of her time. I wanted more grovelling at the end so I’m sticking to 3.75 stars.