Royal Passion

Royal Princes of Ruthenia #2

by Jennifer Blake

Mara Delacroix, a beautiful Louisiana belle,is blackmailed into seducing Roderic, the gypsy prince of Ruthenia. Eventually she will be called on to betray him in some unnamed way. She pretends to fall in love with Roderic after stumbling into a gypsy camp where Roderic is staying. He in turn falls for her and takes her to Paris, where he installs her as his mistress. Together they entertain such luminaries as George Sand, Alexandre Dumas and Honore Balzac. By the time the blackmailer arrives to tell Mara how to betray the prince, however, she has fallen deeply in love with him!

Genres: Historical Romance, Romance, Historical, Royalty, France, Historical Fiction, Ebooks

375 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1985

About the author

A pseudonym used by Patricia Maxwell.

Jennifer Blake has been called a “pioneer of the romance genre”, and an “icon of the romance industry.” A New York Times and international best selling author since 1977, she is a charter member of Romance Writers of America, member of the RWA Hall of Fame, and recipient of the RWA Lifetime Achievement Rita. She holds numerous other honors, including two “Maggies”, two Holt Medallions, multiple Reviewer’s Choice Awards, the Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times BookReviews Magazine, and the Frank Waters Award for literary excellence. She has written over 60 books with translations in 20 languages and more than 30 million copies in print worldwide.

Jennifer and her husband reside in a lakeside Caribbean-style retreat in North Louisiana where they often entertain family and friends. Always a gardener, she spends much of her time encouraging her garden to bloom with her favorite daylilies and antique roses. She also enjoys walking her two dogs, Buffy and Lucky, and indulging in needlework, painting, and travel.

Reviews

[Misfit · Rating 3 out of 5]

"You are saying that if I don’t do as you ask, you will harm Grandmère?”

This book is the sequel to Royal Seduction, which I liked a lot, and revolves around the son of the H and h in that book. The heroine is from Louisiana (her father was a secondary character in the first book) and visiting France with her grandmother, who gambles too much and is now being blackmailed by the evil baddie and Mara is forced to pretend amnesia and wiggle her way into Roderic's house and bed.

I didn't care for this nearly as much as the first book, I just didn't really warm up to the main characters, nor was there much of a romantic element. The events surrounding Roderic's reason for being in Paris revolves around certain political events of the time, and despite Blake's efforts to keep the reader up to speed, I was very lost most of the time and there were some info-dumpy moments that dragged on and on. I didn't really buy into the romance of Roderic's younger sister and how easily her parents accepted that marriage.

On the plus side, Blake always excels at her historical settings with the clothes, customs and food so the reader gets a good feeling of being right there. Rolfe and Angeline and Andre from the first book, and always welcome to see the HEA is still there.

[Birjis · Rating 3 out of 5]

And finally I caught this copy. I did not enjoy much as I enjoyed Royal Seduction. Mara seems so lame and boring, Roderik doesn't seem so outcoming. But I still love the dialogue of the Prince as his father The King Rolfe (even the name is so swooning). If I could hear them with an accent!
Royal Seduction compelled me to re-read but Royal Seduction doesn't seem so tempting.

[Elis Madison · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the villain, Nicholas DeLandes:



This is how his mind works:



Cuz this is his plan, see, he wants to do something dastardly involving Roderic, the Prince of Ruthenia, and his wee little plotting mind comes up with a brilliant plan: "Let's lure a little old lady to gaming dens and wait until she loses a lot of money. Let's involve her granddaughter Mara, a young lady from a good family in New Orleans, which happens to have a loose connection with the Ruthenian royals. We'll blackmail Mara by threatening to hurt her grama (not sure why they bothered to lure Gma to gaming dens and wait for her to rack up debts, since they could've threatened to hurt the old lady just as well without bothering). Mara will fall right in line.

Mara, an innocent(ish) miss who just barely escaped a disagreeable betrothal, is dumped on the road near the gypsy camp where the prince hangs out. She's to find her way to the camp and pretend she's lost her memory, worm her way into the prince's bed, and get him to go back to Paris (where she and Grama have been living large, so it's NOT likely anyone will actually, oh, I don't know, recognize her and spill the beans). She's to gain his trust (because she's like the worst actress on the planet, so Prince Roderic couldn't possibly suspect she's lying about the memory thing) and then get him to accept a certain invitation to a certain soiree where he's to be in a certain place at a certain time (now, here's the twist—it ain't what you're thinking. Nope, when you find out what's meant to happen here, it may cause some of the neurons in your head to short out under the stress of trying to figure out why he had to be in that exact spot rather than just about anywhere else on the planet in order for the plot to work—indeed, you might wonder why it would fail to occur to the villains that they might rather have him anywhere else on the planet).

Oh, and while you're thinking you might also wonder why an unschooled virgin who doesn't want to do this is exactly the best person to handle the deception, seduction and betrayal of a jaded prince without giving herself away.



And then there's the prince's logic, at least what it seems to be for the first 4/5ths of the book. He doesn't believe her "I lost my memory" story, but he puts her in charge of running his household and handling his household accounts, because of course she can be trusted with his cash. And naturally he assumes that her kin, when he finally finds them will be just fine with the public perception that she's his mistress. No marriage bait here.



Sure, to his credit, he resists actually bedding her. Because when the two of them insist there was no nookie despite fairly blatant hints to the contrary, everybody will believe them.

Yeah, this story makes all kinds of sense.



To be fair, some of this is actually explained later in the book, but even so, there were so many holes in the logic I was just…



And then there is the cover image—at least for the Kindle version. Does the heroine HAVE to look constipated?



Instances of head-hopping (abrupt POV shifts), info-dump (long segments of backstory/history), and lengthy exposition ("he was disappointed" instead of describing his feelings in a way that we feel them with him) also figure to make this a less than stellar offering.

OK story, not one of Blake's best. 2.8 stars.

[Chelsea · Rating 2 out of 5]

More reviews available at my blog, Beauty and the Bookworm.

Royal Passion has much to offer over the first book in the set, Royal Seduction. However, I was still less than pleased with it as a whole. The plot follows Mara, a young woman from Louisiana who goes to France with her grandmother following a bout of depression. While there, her grandmother gets into some trouble and Mara is conned into bargaining away her "services" in order to get them out of their sticky situation. Those services? Seduce the prince of Ruthenia and make sure he's in a certain place at a certain time.

Roderic, the prince in this book, is the son of Rolfe, the prince from the first book who is now King of Ruthenia. Roderic is much less rapey than his father, which is good, but I still didn't really like him. He was extremely manipulative, and at the end of the book I still wasn't sure if he was being truthful and sincere with Mara or not, and consequently his emotional investment in their relationship came across as a bit...blah. Mara was extremely stubborn, to the point of it being unbelievable; she made some choices that I doubt even the most stubborn young lady would make, especially in the middle of the nineteenth century. The cadre is present again in this story, though of course sporting a different bunch of characters. They were all very enjoyable, as was Roderic's sister. It was hard keeping track of them at some points, but they lent a good deal of comedic effect to the story.

I'm not sure what the whole point of the "gypsy" characters was. It was kind of random, and didn't actually really ever tie together satisfactorily. The explanation given--that the kings of Ruthenia were some kind of patrons to the gypsies--was half-baked at best. And considering how little they actually played into the plot, I think the book could have been serviced just as well by Mara simply stumbling into a camp of Roderic and the cadre, rather than a camp of Roderic, the cadre, and the gypsies.

And now let us get to the part that really bothered me. The politics. Blake spends an awful portion of the book info-dumping on politics in France at the time of the story. She attempts to weave the fictional country of Ruthenia into all of this, but it doesn't take exceptionally well. Instead, it diverts attention from the primary, romantically-oriented plot and onto this weird, boring subplot. I found myself skipping large chunks of the book when this happened, and really would have been much happier without that whole plot. I feel like the manipulation aspect could have been just as easily implemented if the subplot focus had been on something other than politics on a massive scale. This really, really took away from the book for me; I shouldn't have to skim huge chunks of a romance novel in order to get to the romance plot. Overall, probably at least a hundred pages of this book could have been chopped.

[Romanticamente Fantasy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vanilla91 - per RFS
.
Bella e selvaggia è un romance storico di Jennifer Blake, edito da Mondadori per la collezione “Gli Introvabili”.

Il libro è stato pubblicato per la prima volta nel 1995 e ho ritenuto giusto fare questa precisazione perché un trascorso di quasi trent’anni anni è impossibile da non considerare.

L’autrice ci racconta la storia di Mara e dell’erede al trono di Ruthenia, Roderic. Il primo incontro avviene in modo studiato, in un campo nomade tra le colline francesi.

Mara finge di aver perso la memoria e, grazie a questo espediente, spera di conquistare l’attenzione del bel principe al fine di diventarne l’amante. Non è a cuor leggero che la giovane tesse il conturbante intrigo, ma sotto minaccia: il suo unico obiettivo è infatti salvare la vita dell’amata nonna.

Sedurre il reale non è affatto semplice, dato che Roderic è un uomo scaltro, abituato agli intrighi di corte ed è un po’ restio a credere alla storia dell’amnesia e della bella sconosciuta cascatagli per caso tra le braccia.

Tra i due gli scontri di volontà e astuzia fanno ardere una bella scintilla, destinata a diventare un fuoco di passione.

Fenici, questo bel romanzo non si legge con la solita facilità e leggerezza associata ai libri del genere. La storia è ampiamente approfondita, in dettagli e descrizioni.

Il gioco di seduzione tra i due protagonisti si dipana in maniera molto molto lenta, perché intervallato da ampie parentesi della scena politica e sociale del periodo in cui il romanzo è ambientato.

Rispetto ai canoni più moderni, le scene di intimità descritte sono meno frequenti, accennate in maniera rapida, mentre viene prestata un’attenzione scrupolosa a ogni tappa dello sviluppo del rapporto tra Mara e Roderic.

Ampio spazio viene dato anche ai comprimari che, in alcune scene , diventano addirittura attori protagonisti. È stato davvero interessante conoscere tutta la famiglia reale di Ruthenia!

Ho apprezzato la caratterizzazione di entrambe le figure principali; Roderic è molto coerente nel suo ruolo di erede al trono e pur essendo molto attratto da Mara non agisce mai spinto solo dalla lussuria e, al contempo, lei, pur provando sentimenti, non rinuncia mai alla propria dignità, non si trasforma in un’amante che frigna per avere attenzioni e riconoscimenti. In sostanza i momenti in cui i protagonisti si lasciano andare abbassando le difese sono preceduti da focosi sconti di volontà.

La storia ha anche una forte componente umoristica. Le situazioni comiche non mancano e la dialettica del re e del principe di Ruthenia è davvero particolare, estremamente forbita, pomposa e prolissa, capace di strappare molti sorrisi.

L’età del romanzo si riflette sicuramente sul numero elevato di pagine, sulla presenza di pochi discorsi che vengono abbondantemente superati da descrizioni, introspezione e analisi. In questo modo la storia perde un po’ di leggerezza e fluidità, ma sicuramente regala al lettore un romanzo più completo e sostanzioso.

Devo ammettere che per questa lettura ho impiegato più tempo del previsto, ma è stato stuzzicante imbattermi in un racconto con tempi ed espedienti narrativi diversi da quelli attuali e quindi maggiormente in grado di sorprendermi. Il fatto che Mara e Roderic antepongano spesso la ragione al sentimento ha aggiunto alla lettura una tribolazione piacevole, la curiosità urgente di capire quando tra giochi politici e di potere i due protagonisti avrebbero avuto il loro meritato happy ending. È un libro che consiglierei di gustare senza fretta, perché, seppur con uno sviluppo lento, è una storia davvero piacevole e romantica.

[Amarilli 73 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Premetto che non ho letto il primo volume di serie (che, a quanto pare, aveva come protagonista re Rolfe di Ruthenia, padre del principe Roderic, e aveva avuto al tempo grande successo), ma dalle continue menzioni me ne sono fatta un'idea abbastanza precisa. Tuttavia, questo seguito del 1985 si è rivelato in ogni caso pesantuccio e con una trama con più di un buco logico-narrativo.

Si parte da Parigi dove, in un accampamento di zingari, è in corso una serata danzante con ospiti il principe di uno staterello balcanico (bellissimo e "maschio") e la sua guardia d'onore.
All'improvviso, una giovane viene sbattuta giù da una carrozza e si avvicina di soppiatto, sapendo di dover fingere un'amnesia per poter sedurre e incastrare il principe.

Ma perché si è giunti a tanto? Definire le quaranta pagine successive contorte è poco.
La vita della ragazza, tale Mara Delacroix, ci viene raccontata, letteralmente, sin dagli inizi in Louisiana, senza risparmiarci gli innumerevoli avvenimenti per cui è stata spedita dall'America a Parigi, alla vigilia dei moti rivoluzionari del luglio 1847.
Mara è già abbastanza viziatella e sprovveduta, ma a Parigi un oscuro individuo ha appositamente teso un trappolone per l'allegra nonna ludopatica di lei, al fine di ricattarla. Ora, già il fatto di pretendere che la fanciulla si trasformi in Mata Hari, quando si vede a colpo d'occhio che non è né scaltra né seduttrice, la dice lunga sulle possibilità di successo del complotto.

Ma, d'altra parte, non è ben chiaro cos'abbia in mente lo stesso principino, il quale, senza indugio, riserva alla straniera smemorata una fiducia eccessiva, senza interrogarsi sui rischi. D'altronde, il lettore continua a chiedersi come fosse credibile che Mara e il principe non si fossero mai conosciuti prima, visto che frequentavano il medesimo ambiente altolocato.
Insomma, per me è tutto un "ma come, ma perché" e ho digerito a fatica tutte le successive avventure sgangherate.

Senza contare che, complici circa trentacinque anni in mezzo, i dialoghi risultano talora retorici e stucchevoli. Con tanto di "mia dolce tentatrice, luce dei miei giorni", da parte di lui, e "Roderic, amore di principe" in risposta da lei. Si chiude il libro con la voglia di togliersi la spolverata di zucchero di dosso :)

[Andrea AKA Catsos Person]

Listened to audio/kindle combo from KU. Though this book wasn’t as good as the first of this duology, the writing and period detail were excellent. The narration was not contemptible, but not first-Rate. I’ll give a pass for the mediocre narration because I’m grateful to the author for reasons:

1) for making her old titles ebook and audio (it seems readinable to not go to the expense of top-tier ($$$$) narrator’s for such old titles.

2) For NOT rewrighting/updating her old books

3) putting her old books in KU

[Liv · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are so many things I loved about this book and especially the love story between Roderic, Prince of Ruthenia, and Mara Delacroix. This book was great because it is about the second generation of the marvelous characters of the first book. Roderic is the son of Angline and Rolfe, who is now the king of Ruthenia. Now, Roderic is just irresistible, gorgeous and why shouldn't he be?--He is the son of Rolfe, and beautiful Angline, at that!

Roderic is handsome and strong-willed like his father, with an intellectual appetite for debate and wit. He is cultured, well-learned, and very much the people's prince as he can comfortably interact with gypsies and nobility alike. But, he is also like his sweet mother Angline. Roderic is gentle and kind to women in a way that his father wasn't (Rolfe has always been too rough around the edges...LOL). Roderic is a gifted musician and he's just very sweet! I was happy about the love development between Roderic and Mara. Mara is a brave young lady who loves her family and tries her best to protect them. She's lovely and a perfect match for Roderic...just because :-)

One of the aspects of the first book that I felt was disconcerting was Andre's story (Mara's father). Therefore, with the love between Mara & Roderic, I felt as though he had somewhat of a second chance for happiness (at least in the next generation). Some aspects of the last part indicate that Andre seemed pretty content & happy. I hope he found a HEA.

Annoying parts of the book:
If I wanted to go back and read or listen to this book again, I would be pressed to find the best and most applicable parts because there was so much nonsense and density of details that were meaningless in the end. Seriously!!!! I wish the editor would have noticed that & the author!-What were they thinking???? There were so many parts that I had to forward and skip over because it was either boring or just not applicable to the main characters or main storyline.

In addition, there were many parts of the love story that were just disjointed. There are weeks that pass in which, as a reader you kind of forget that this book is about the love development between Roderic and Mara. You wonder if Roderic forgot about Mara and vise versa. However, then the author throws you a bone, and provides a great scene between the leads.

Even though there are many confusing aspects of the love development, at the end of the book Roderic explains it all....then it all makes sense. But, ugh....the author could have done a better job with such an important love story.

4 stars just because I love Roderic and Mara....and not because this book was well executed.

[ANGELIA · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read the first book in Jennifer Blake's "Royal" series, and it was pretty good (though flawed), so I decided to check out this second book, and my opinion's the same. it's a good story, but there was more than one flaw that should have been corrected.

While the first book starts out with a case of mistaken identity and the H holding the h hostage, this one starts with a hidden identity, as the h, Mara Delacroix, feigns amnesia, in order to get close to the H, Prince Roderic of Ruthenia, (son of the H in the first book, who's now the king) in order to seduce him and use her wiles to get him to a specific social function, that king Louis Philippe of France will be attending. She's not told the reason for this and is being coerced into the deception by the villain of the story, who threatens the life of her grandmother if she doesn't obey him.

So, the deception goes on, though Mara's attraction to Roderic is all too real, as are the feelings he has for her, though he doesn't trust her, or entirely buy her story. It's soon a question of who's playing whom, as a mutual seduction occurs.

There's another cadre group here, whose exploits are just as renowned, though less fighting than in the first book. (One of the cadres is a woman, Trude, who's adept at swordplay, shooting, and other necessary skills, and fights her feminine nature, as well as her feelings for Roderic, while another cadre member falls for her.) You get a good background of history and the political situation of the time, between Loyalists, Bonapartists, Reformists and others all vie for power, with much suspicion, spying, and conniving going on. Gypsies play their part in the tale, one in particular, Luca, who loves Roderic's sister, Julianna. Rolfe and Angeline figure in the story as well, also Mara's father and grandmother.

There's a lot to the story, or I should say a lot of potential, but sadly, it all falls flat, including the events at the reception for the king, where the story was all leading up to. It was exciting enough, but not as much as it should have been and the same for the aftermath.

This is also true of the secondary relationships. Julianna and Luca could have had a separate book, but instead their story was condensed and too easily resolved, especially with her father's opposition to the match. Angeline, the h of the first book, isn't given too few scenes, not to mention interaction with her family. She and Rolfe are hardly together at all, she doesn't have many words with her son, and I don't think she and her daughter even spoke to each other at all, which was just silly. When Mara's father shows up (Andre, the rejected suitor of Angeline from the first book) he and Angeline barely speak, even though we're told at the start of the story that he never really got over her. We're also told that Mara possibly inherited her late Irish mother's second sight, and get hints of that possibly being true, but nothing comes of it.

Time that could have been spent on character interaction was wasted on silly stuff, such as a long (and I do mean LONNNNNNNNNG) tour of Versailles which was just downright BORING! A few words of description here and there are okay, but pages? Come on!

The world of literature makes its appearance, as time is spent at social gatherings with Balzac, George Sand and Dumas (both father and son), with one funny scene where two dogs go berserk and send Dumas fil off balance and sprawling on Mara's lap, which did not exactly amuse Roderic! While it's entertaining, all this stuff is hardly necessary to the story.

There also more cadre nonsense, like a rather dangerous boat race, that Mara gets roped into and ends up nearly drowning, before being rescued by Roderic just in time.

Then, there was the equally silly interlude, when Mara, Julianna and Trude were out shopping, and find themselves set upon by a mob from the peasant class (retro Revolution mode) and at first are fleeing for their lives, but then just happen to run by a shop that's displaying sword canes, and what do you know??? The three of them are able to hold off a mob of 30+ people!!! (Really???? Buy the Brooklyn Bridge, anyone???) Are we really supposed to believe that Mara and Julianna, who have only recently been taking fencing lessons from Trude, are going to have the skills to tangle with a vicious, stone hurling mob? Had they been equal to Trude's prowess, it still would be ridiculous! Had they been three men, it still would be ridiculous! They should have been hurling stones back at the riotous mob, now that would have made sense!

Equally ridiculous is a later scene where Mara, in fear for Roderic's life, diverts attention by throwing a sword, which lands right in the villain's heart!! (WTF!!!!) Please, DON'T INSULT MY INTELLIGENCE!!!

Roderic and Mara had a lot of issues between them, so I doubt a sexy Gypsy dance could easily resolve them, but what the heck?

There was too much filler in this book, and not enough substance.

Again, you have a good story, but one that could have been a lot less flawed.

[Charlie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the second book in the Princes of Ruthenia series and it didn’t do the same for me as the first book. It doesn’t live up to the first book, but it is by far tamer than the first book.

Mara Delacroix is the daughter of Andre Delacroix, Angeline’s original love-interest in the first book. She and her grandmother are visiting France, where her grandmother falls to the seduction of the gaming hells. Thankfully, the debtor, Nicholas de Landes, offers a simple solution: seduce Prince Roderic and heir apparent of Ruthenia in order to gain intel and then ensure he is in a specific place at a specific time. In order to get them out of this sticky situation, Mara agrees. What other option does she have? Not to mention, Nicholas has already ensured her compliance by taking her grandmother hostage and threatening to harm her. A savior turned villain in one breath.

This book relied heavily on Ruthenian politics, which wasn’t foundationally wasn’t made real clear for this made-up country. That is the reason Roderic was in Paris, allowing Mara to set this plan in action.

The plan all begins with Mara being thrown from a moving carriage into the woods near a gypsy camp for Roderic to find her. Mara isn’t really given any direction before this. So, she claims amnesia. Except she’s a terrible liar and Roderic doesn’t believe one bit of her lost memory story. In order to find out what she’s playing at, he instills her in his household as his housekeeper!

Then all kinds of things start happening. There are of course encounters between Roderic and Mara, there’s political intrigue and rebellion, as well as some additional romances that happen.

One thing I didn’t like was there didn’t really seem to be a romantic line to the story. It was largely all because of the plot line. But, the historical setting – and the clothes! – were spot-on for the time.

Not one I will re-read.

[Isabel Luna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Me ha precido una historia mucho mejor y más interesante x la situación de Mara y el conflicto de lealtad q le genera con Roderic; pero en generla me gusta la forma q se plantea la relación entre ellos xq se siente sobre todo las dudas de ella y la desconfianza de él. Creo q se podría haber sacado más partido de la historia de Juliana y Luca para mejorar la narrativa y el ritmo de la trama, q resulta lectura pesada xq la autora abusa demasiado de las descripciones pero sin lograr conciliar los tiempos históricos de la historia francesa q pudo ser muy interesante de leer como ambientación pero no como se cuenta aquí.
No me gustó el final, sin embargo, le doy una estrella más que la anterior novela xq aquí no hay "seducciones" como en el libro anterior.

[Janet L. Hage · Rating 5 out of 5]

French politics, intrigue, musketeers, and romance

Children from book one meet in France. The Prince is relaxing with the gypsies of his father's court and has a woman who was thrown from a coach put into his arms. Mara is his mother's God-daughter but a French authority is holding her Grandmother for Grandma's gambling debts. Mara is to seduce the Prince and have him take her to a certain ball and then Grandma would be released. As in all fairy tales all does not go as planned, but you will have to read the book to find the happy ending. Adult readers due to violence and some sexual content.

[Elaine Howlin · Rating 2 out of 5]

It must be very hard to write comedy in books... it makes me cringe when I read a scene that is obviously meant to be funny.
Bit boring and predictably.

[Gwamsa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Roderic and Mara

This book a has it all...passion, searing love, and intrigue. The workings of an absolutely devious prince's mind and the results of his machinations make for action and excitement. I recommend this book.

[Sanam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this series but I HATE the name dropping and famous writers as characters. Didn’t add anything on o the plot and just boring to read about them and that drama. The French political background plot was not interesting either. Wish there was more romance and angst.

[sanner faye crook · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars

This book was was boring. I finish it to see what happen but was barley able to get finishawas boring to much time. what people had on and what they they look )

[Anne Dunlap · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disappointed after the first book...

[Brenda Rodriguez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unfortunately, I found the secondary characters more enjoyable than the main characters. I'd rather be friends with Juliana or Trude than Mara.

[Katherine Hopper]

DNF about 60 pages in. I don’t have an audio of this and trying to read it physically at night when I have the time just isn’t going to work. Way too boring :(

[Sherry LaJaunie · Rating 3 out of 5]

More country accents for French Creoles. Ugh!

[Nicole alphAbet]

winter pile

[Tapa in lovezone]

I read a sample. Couldn’t even complete that. It was so boring.
The way the MCs talk was boring for me.
I wasn’t intrigued.

[Debra · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a new author to me. Good romance but considerably more history than what I am used to. I felt it slowed the story down too much.

[P Karr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mara has been brought up as the daughter of a plantation owner. She is French Creole and is getting over her martyred fiancée. She is visiting Paris with her grandmother when the old lady gets into a gambling addiction. Unable to pay their debts, Mara is blackmailed into doing something utterly distasteful that is sure to ruin her.

Roderic is the prince of Ruthenia and also the prince of the gypsies. He and his cadre of guards are camped outside Paris, having some fun along with the gypsies. A carriage throws out a girl and drives away. The wounded girl is Mara who asks for Roderic’s protection. The cadre rightly suspects Mara. Mara is supposed to seduce the prince and be ready for her orders, or her grandmother’s life will be harmed.

Find out more at A Million Kindle Books

[Pamela Walton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Royal Passion

I loved the book from beginning to end often trying to second guess.I didn't read the first book but will read the next one.love this author and never realised that she had written so many books.

[Sandi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another winner.

Jennifer Blake draws you into the story from the first pages. She creates twists and turns that entertains and keeps your interest throughout the entire book. The reader is treated to vivid details of the surroundings and the history of the country the characters are in. Such information involves the reader in the story. I recommend this book if you are looking for an entertaining, well written novel that will hold your interest and make you smile.

[Cindy Woods · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it

Loved this series. Only problem was typos.. the worst was "feces" instead of "faces"..ugh!! Other than those irritating typos, the story is very good. I wasn't too crazy about Mara and her not realizing how dangerous her not telling the prince about her reason for making contact with him waz...how naive...but love the prince! Also am crazy about Luca and the whole gypsy atmosphere and philosophy is woven throughout. Definitely highly recommend.

[Alex · Rating 1 out of 5]

Too many historical facts got in the way of reading the book. Got lost many times in the plot. Therefore, was super bored!

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[Lee · Rating 1 out of 5]

Even giving allowances for the year it was written, this book is so, so racist. Let's say you take the specific racial slur out of the book and removed it (which would probably shorten the tome by a good 50 pages considering its overuse), the characters themselves are terrible stereotypes of Romani people and culture.

[Helm Ehmy Ilarde · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am in love with Roderic!
More exactly, I'm in love with his character. If it's even possible I'll be giving off hearts around me right now.
Witty and romantic, Jennifer Blake did it again to me. Even until now my heart's still throbbing because of this story.