So this is the 2nd book I’ve read by this author, and I liked it even less than the first. I’ve heard so many good things about Johanna Lindsey, I wonder if my tastes are so different from everyone else.
Lady Rosalynn Chadwick from Scotland is on a mission. After the death of her beloved grandfather, she has no one else to protect her. She has inherited her grandfather’s entire estate, which is quite large and makes her quite wealthy. Her cousin, Jordy Cameron wants it, and will stop at nothing to get it, forcing her to flee Scotland for London, where she hopes to find a husband who will stop Jordy from coming after her. Rosalynn has no delusions, she only wants a decent husband who will protect her, after all, with her marriage contract, she will retain most of her assets anyway, and give her husband-to-be an allowance after their marriage. Attending the 3rd ball in 3 days, she is hiding from one particularly awful candidate on the lawn, when she runs into Anthony Mallory hiding under a tree. Anthony is not really attending, but making sure his 17-year-old nephew has no problems escorting Anthony’s favorite niece, Regina Eden. Upon seeing Rosalynn, the notorious rake is of course, practically obsessed with her from the beginning, naturally. After introducing themselves, Anthony immediately proposes an ‘arrangement’ and is quite persistent he and Rosalynn will end up in bed soon. She explains to him this will not be, as she has to get married, and everybody knows, rakes never want to marry. A few days later, an attempted kidnapping on the street leaves Rosalynn feeling a little over exposed, and determined to lead her pursuer, most likely Jordy’s hirelings, astray by leaving for a country party given by Lady Regina Eden. Upon arrival, Rosalynn learns Anthony is Regina’s uncle, but is determined to avoid him, as she desperately wants to get married, and feel safe. Four of her potential suitors are at the party, and she is trying to learn more about them. Anthony consistently dogs her, but she’s of course attracted to him as well, but knows she must marry and put her feelings aside. Anthony schemes to get closer, by offering to learn more about her potential suitors and reporting back to her, because he’s still convinced they’ll end up in bed, only after she’s married to someone else. For some reason, she agrees this is a good idea. After Rosalynn heads back to London, she is kidnapped in the middle of the night from her friend’s home and taken captive by Jordy, who has a shady priest on the way to marry them. Determined to escape, she jumps out of a second story window into a hay cart in nothing but her shift. Rosalynn ultimately rents a horse and takes three hours getting home. It’s there she decides to run to the country, to Regina’s home, sending her Abigail one direction, while she goes the opposite, to throw off Jordy. But instead of going straight to Regina’s, of course she has to stop at Anthony’s and find out who he’s decided she should marry! After hearing what happened to her, Anthony decides to seduce her and marry her himself, but only after telling lies about the other suitors she was considering. Rosalynn and Anthony are married in his niece Regina’s country home and she finally feels safe. After returning to London, Jordy attempts to kill Anthony on his morning ride, leaving Anthony angrier and out for blood. When he catches up with Jordy, he beats him to a pulp and forces him to leave town, explaining she’s married to him now, and he’ll never get anything from Rosalynn. Unfortunately, Jordy’s lackeys aren’t aware of this new agreement, and kidnap Rosalynn again. Did I mention Rosalynn and Anthony are arguing because she told him before they got married, he should continue with his mistresses, and when he came home smelling of a tavern wench while he was out searching for Jordy, she held it against him because he said he wouldn’t and didn’t cheat? Yeah, lots of drama about silly things. Ultimately Rosalynn and Anthony make up and are going to have a baby and everything’s peachy.
This book has received tons of great reviews from people whose opinion I tend to agree with, but not on this. I found so many things to annoy me I don’t know where to start. I like the premise of the book, and the plot, up until the constant bickering between Anthony and Rosalynn, so my complaint isn’t about the plot. Ultimately I hated the main characters.
Pretty strong words, but I did not like them Sam I Am! Anthony Mallory was a great character in the first book, I was really looking forward to reading his book, and sad to say, I am really disappointed. I think if Anthony had been paired with just about anyone else on the planet, it would have been a better book. However, I really disliked that he seemed to be just as determined and stubborn as Rosalynn in their disagreements, failing to tell her he did not have a go-round with a tavern wench, simply because he felt she should trust him. It almost seemed as he wanted to break her spirit, like a horse, to make her bend to his will, and I can’t see how that’s entertaining to read or fun to either him, or her.
Now onto Rosalynn. I can’t think of a single thing I liked about her, not her personality, or her attitude, nothing. No real reason was given as to why she was so untrusting of Anthony and others, she made it plain she wanted to get married, but kept going back to Anthony, but it was never explained why she felt so attracted to a man she was supposively so determined to avoid, the pettiness of spending his money simply because she was angry at him, the fact that she didn’t seem very friendly or loving toward her one true friend, Frances, especially when Frances announced she was getting married, she was never nice to really anyone! I could go on and on and on, but I felt she was a bitchy character, and not deserving of Anthony, let alone a book. The one time she appears kind in the whole book is to Jordy, of all people, leaving him a ton of money because, as it turns out he didn’t kill her mother and he’d been treated horribly all his life for it. She just did not make sense to me, and I didn’t want to get to know her, I wanted to smack her.
Also, throughout the whole book Jordy is seen as a horrible evil man, after her blood and her money, and is suspected of killing her mother, but nothing has ever been proven. At the end of the book, when his side is told, and Rosalynn is feeling bad for him, I kept thinking, first of all, he wanted to marry you against your will, he attempted to kill Anthony, second, why on earth didn’t you just ask him why he was upset/surprised when it was announced Rosalynn’s mother died, third, why he was upset about it didn’t exactly make sense to me, and now Rosalynn feels sorry for him? This whole part of the book was almost worthless to me.
I really can’t find much to like about this book besides the basic plot. The whole time I listened to the audio book, I wanted to throw something, or was gritting my teeth, or probably sighing heavily out of frustration. I will not read this book again, I don’t recommend it, and I’ve sorta doubtful of this author now. I will give her one more try, but it’s gotta wow me, it’s got to be better, almost anything is better than this.