سيدها

by Sara Craven, سارة كريفن

Stay away from Saracina.

But to the willful Joanna, used to having her own way, the words were a challenge!

Unfortunately the warning was real: her reception on the mysterious Mediterranean island was far from welcoming. She found herself held a prisoner in Leo Vargas's magnificent palazzo, her every move watched. Escape was impossible.

And yet, did she really want to leave the devastating Lion of Saracina? The villagers had suggested she'd make a fine gift for him!

Genres: Harlequin Presents, Harlequin, Romance, Hqn

154 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published March 1, 1977

About the author

Anne Bushell was born on October 1938 in South Devon, England, just before World War II and grew up in a house crammed with books. She was always a voracious reader, some of her all-time favorites books are: "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen, "Middlemarch" by George Eliot, "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë, "Gone With the Wind" by Margaret Mitchell and "The Code of the Woosters" by P. G. Wodehouse.

She worked as journalist at the Paignton Observer, but after her marriage, she moved to the north of England, where she worked as teacher. After she returned to journalism, she joined the Middlesbrough Writers' Group, where she met other romance writer Mildred Grieveson (Anne Mather). She started to wrote romance, and she had her first novel "Garden of Dreams" accepted by Mills & Boon in 1975, she published her work under the pseudonym of Sara Craven. In 2010 she became chairman of the Southern Writers' Conference, and the next year was elected the twenty-six Chairman (2011–2013) of the Romantic Novelists' Association.

Divorced twice, Annie lives in Somerset, South West England, and shares her home with a West Highland white terrier called Bertie Wooster. In her house, she had several thousand books, and an amazing video collection. When she's not writing, she enjoys watching very old films, listening to music, going to the theatre, and eating in good restaurants. She also likes to travel in Europe, to inspire her romances, especially in France, Greece and Italy where many of her novels are set. Since the birth of her twin grandchildren, she is also a regular visitor to New York City, where the little tots live. In 1997, she was the overall winner of the BBC's Mastermind, winning the last final presented by Magnus Magnusson.

Reviews

[StMargarets · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a story in three acts:

Act One – establish the heroine’s character. She is spoiled, strong-willed and treats her “fiancé” like dirt. Thankfully SC doesn’t bore the reader with *why * the heroine is this way – no sob-story backstory, thank goodness. She’s just been spoiled by her domineering father and she is acting out on a sailing trip she is taking with her cousins around the Mediterranean. When she hears that it is forbidden to go to a certain privately-owned island, she immediately makes plans to defy her cousins and goes there on her own.

Act Two – the heroine reaps what she sows. She is captured by soldiers and imprisoned in a luxurious room with a portrait of “The Lion” – the original medieval overlord of the island who looks just like the present day overlord. The present day overlord, our hero, is hot, hot, hot. And he’s not letting the heroine leave.

They spend time together, there are some punishing kisses. Helicopters land and fly away. It’s all very mysterious. The hero provides his OM cousin to keep her entertained during the day (but not at night *wags eyebrows *)

Heroine is falling in love and . . .

Act Three – Brigadier Dad shows up at the hero’s invite. Seems all of the cloak and dagger stuff was because the hero was hosting a dissident from the USSR and he had to keep everyone in the dark until the dissident was safe in another country. And – by coincidence - the H knows the h’s dad. So it’s time for a house party. An OW also shows up to make the heroine’s life miserable. Hero proposes. Heroine goes to his room to accept but sees the OW coming out of the H’s room and leaps to conclusions.

In Act Three, part two the heroine has moved out of her father’s house and finally has a job for the first time. She’s a model and miserable with her new fame and fortune. Submissive former fiancé is still hanging around. Finally hero shows up, explains away the OW. HEA.

I enjoyed the middle part of the story very much. The cloak and dagger stuff was a lot of fun – and the heroine had to confront her own mistakes, which was refreshing. I’m not so sure of the romance, because the reader doesn’t see a lot of the hero – but they seem happy – and honestly, who would want to take on this heroine? I mean, yes she has two other men interested in her besides the hero – so there must be something to the saying about nice girls finishing last. Read only if you like bitchy heroines. (I do – it must be my nice-girl, Midwestern upbringing that makes them so fascinating.)

[Iris · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Mills & Boon cover is a lovely painting by Eric Earnshaw that doesn't convey anything at all about the story

The Harlequin cover is by William Biddle and it's a fun one. I think Biddle was amusing himself by comparing the lion with the craggy tough guy hero but I can't help seeing it as something of a visual pun with the Helen Reddy lookalike heroine...hearing in my head the line: I am woman hear me roar.

A 2.5 star for me.

Only SC's third book and perhaps she was aiming for romantic suspense but the romance is mild and the suspense other than h nearly being mauled by a guard dog is anti-climactic. There's too much viewing of island scenery and hearing about old legends, expecting them to add to the characterization of current day hero. And too much hanging out with callow young men and women, one of whom is the h. Joanna's no different than countless other spoiled daddy's girls upon meeting her soon-to-be new overseer: she cries, faints, gets angry, gets threatening, brushes her hair till it shines, wears impractical footwear, and takes many long baths in gloriously scented water. At least she's trying some things.

Leo is the main problem. Standard issue businessman who heads a family and an empire, he's not nearly as exciting and unique as SC wants him to be and so this spoiled but innocent young woman whose daddy has the right connections checks all of his boxes. Even after he's gifted with one of SC's funny, can't miss fashion choices: "black—slightly flared velvet pants and a matching tunic top, the neck severely slashed to reveal his brown chest." he remains bland. Honestly if you can't make that work for you there's no hope.

[DamsonDreamer · Rating 3 out of 5]

The h, spoilt little rich girl, Joanna, leaves her irksome boyfriend and other boat mates to go to a private out of bounds island and finds herself under the control of its owner Leo Vargas, Prince Vorghese. There's another similar "imprisoned in a room while wafting about in peignoirs " gothic-lite tale somewhere in my SC reading but I've more or less got through her entire catalogue now and the title eludes me. Anyway, this one was better than that one. The suspense is due to a political reason which is the reason for the imprisonment. There's a nice folkloric element about garlanding a stone lion which adds charm (like the temple offering in Moon of Aphrodite, another recent SC read) and local colour. The other characters: h's stuffed shirt rear admiral father, the disposable earlier mistress, the english boyfriend, the younger playboy Vargas sidepiece are just as they sound.
The H, (outlandish velvet tunic and bell bottoms aside) is a bit of a shadowy, tawny haired cipher and slightly unconvincing.

[Lemon · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF. I couldn't get past how hateful, spoilt, self-centered and selfish the heroine was. Also, I couldn't get over the fact that the hero is a Gerard Depardieu look alike on the cover. That just kind of spoiled it for me as I always think of him in his role in Cyrano de Bergerac, not as a cosmopolitan jet-setting Italian prince as the hero in this books is supposed to be.

[IRE · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jan 2022 reread rating 4
OMG 2017 me was a wonder..
I went back to this book after all these years because I remembered the scene on which the whole novel is based..
The iconic stone Lion scene.. damn SC really does think it all out!
The entire thing is honestly written beautifully and I can appreciate that.
I think I understand Joanna better now than when I was younger..
The more you live, the more you learn..
I think.. I'm not half as brave as Joanna but I do have the same temperament and I'm sure I would have done exactly the same things she did and would have had the same thoughts about work and marriage and life.
Maybe its that I realized that she's written a character that's very real or maybe it's that I've realized that writing is very hard work but I'm changing the rating to 4 stars.
Hahah how things change..
But I did come back right?
Here's to hoping I find my own leo..



2017 review rating 3
I kinda liked it, kinda hated it..which is what happens to me most times when i read Craven. I don't buy the love at first sight thing except in Reid novels. It lacked emotional intensity, the h was very spoiled tbh and didn't actually know what to do with herself. In the start she wanted a job and not to live off her daddy's money, in the middle she didn't want to end up living as a useless rich wife yet in the end she did end up as exactly that. What does that signify?

Who knows maybe you do lose your senses when you fall in love and who wants to work when you can be a rich wife?

Sometimes i hate myself for reading harlequin (vintages especially) just because they make it sound like its either just marriage or work. Also the women are brainless idiots who end up being put in their place under the guise of finding love.

At other times, I love harlequins because they are sooo romantic and angsty. Who can resist romance, angst and happily ever after with a tall, hot and handsome guy? and OH THE ENDINGS! There are books tho where the women are powerful too so its a love hate relationship. I find Graham and Reid are<3

Weirdly philosophical today.
happens

[Dianna · Rating 3 out of 5]

All Joanna wants out of life is to sunbathe topless, have all her orders obeyed, and to make pleasant love to her almost fiancé Tony.

Tony is Joanna’s first cousin, and while there’s a bit of a stigma attached to that, this is the 70s, the English are ALWAYS marrying their cousins in romances, and cousin marriage is not illegal in Britain. I looked it up recently, and there are moves in that direction, but they seem vaguely sort of racist.

Joanna is cruising around the Mediterranean with cousin Tony, cousin Mary and Mary’s fiancé Paul. Mary and Paul are incredibly boring. Mary is learning cordon bleu cookery and how to cringe elegantly when her husband issues commands. Joanna cordially dislikes them both and feels sorry for Mary, who is such a dull little thing.

Joanna is kind of a bitch.

The four of them head to a nightclub where Joanna wears awesome 70s gear and shakes it and everyone wants to dance with her because she’s so beautiful and sexy. Paul and Mary hang around at their table being all judgy, and eventually talk to some fishermen, who tell them they must not go to Saracina on the way to Corsica. There’s some crazy going down on the island: all the women have been deported and gunboats patrol the coast.

Nonsense, says Joanna. We may be tourists and we may speak very little Italian, but we’re not that gullible.

‘We are NOT going to Saracina, your majesty,’ Paul tells Joanna. He gently pats Mary, who is quivering in fear. Mary is sort of Anne from Famous Five. Joanna is of course George, but grown up super blonde and sexy. Paul is Julian, and Tony is Dick … mostly because I vaguely think that Dick was less bossy than Julian, and people weren’t always saying ‘you should be a policeman when you grow up, young man,’ to him. Julian was so smarmy. There’s no Timmy, which is a shame. Mary would probably be allergic to a dog anyway.

Joanna, however, IS going to Saracina. She only heard of the place a few hours ago, but she refuses to not follow through on a plan just because someone mentions gunboats. She decides that she’ll sneak off while the other three are wandering around the little harbour town.

As well as being kind of a bitch, Joanna is incredibly spoiled and probably a little stupid. She would have made an excellent girlfriend for a Bond villain, if Bond villains were actually sexy and not quite so psychotic. Lucky for her, she’s about to meet a guy she’ll practically accuse of being a Bond villain.

He’s not going to like it. At all. I think I’ve worked out the typical Sara Craven hero. He falls in love with the heroine on sight, and then spends the book unsuccessfully trying to make it all about sex, and being devastated and then uncontrollably angry because the heroine thinks he’s evil. Sure, he hides it all by being silky and sarcastic and torturing the heroine by letting her think he’s still on with some other woman, but he’s suffering, poor devil.

But first, she’ll be caught sunbathing topless on a beach on Saracina by half a dozen military guys.

Joanna puts her top on. The military guys blindfold her and take her to the palazzo. It’s all very cool. There, she encounters Leo. He’s a handsome international banking prince, although he doesn’t use the title. He owns an island! He knows her daddy.

Joanna is now Leo’s prisoner. Her luggage has been sent for, and when it arrives she’ll be able to not be naked under Leo’s silky black robe. Leo does get to feel her up under the robe. ‘We’re going to have sex,’ he tells her, his beautiful tawny eyes smouldering beneath his tawny brows. The whole lion thing gets milked a fair bit. There’s this whole legend and a stone statue where horny girls leave flowers so the lord will know they want some sexing, and this big painting of the first evil banking lion guy in the mistress boudoir Joanna is to be locked up in.

‘No we aren’t, you skeezy old criminal,’ says Joanna. Sure, she’s turned on. He’s hot, and he touched her boobies without asking. She has this whole thing going where she needs a man to dominate her but she needs her freedom from conventional stuff like doing what her daddy says. She just can’t really get on board with his whole being a bank robber thing, because she has morals.
It all looks set for them to smoulder at each other heaps and then have a lot of almost sexy times and misunderstandings about Leo’s old girlfriends culminating in a marriage proposal, except it doesn’t. Instead, Leo is too busy doing mysterious non-criminal things that still involve soldiers and gunboats, so he brings his cousin over to the island to entertain Joanna.

Joanna gets all the menfolk! She is so pretty and they all want to marry her and be a posh couple hosting dinner parties for business associates.

There’s another woman for Joanna to feel tortured over … although Leo never feels suitably tortured by Joanna’s two other boyfriends. The story hints at more adventure than there actually is – the message seems to be that you can settle down and be rich but boringly conventional as long as it’s with a hot guy.

[RomLibrary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stay away from Saracina.

But to the willful Joanna, used to having her own way, the words were a challenge!

Unfortunately the warning was real: her reception on the mysterious Mediterranean island was far from welcoming. She found herself held a prisoner in Leo Vargas's magnificent palazzo, her every move watched. Escape was impossible.

And yet, did she really want to leave the devastating Lion of Saracina? The villagers had suggested she'd make a fine gift for him!

[Grrrrace · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's always fun to enter the wayback machine for a vintage MB/Harlequin outing to see how much--or little--has changed in romantic fiction. Published in 1977, GfaL was fun in some ways and quite dull in others (particularly given a captive heroine, a vague defection subplot, a throwback Medici-like secretive millionaire/billionaire hero with a private island, and not one but two OM!). The vintage elements were fun (the hero wears a chest-baring black velvet casual suit at one point; there is disco dancing!; the heroine's rear-admiral father calls her art school friends "damn hippies"!). But the story bears the mark of a newish author (this was Craven's 3rd novel I believe) still finding her feet and making some fatal errors--chiefly, the heroine spends way too much time with the OM and not nearly enough with the enigmatic hero.

A lot of reviewers disliked the heroine in this one, and indeed she was a spoiled and willful girl who could be quite the brat. But I actually liked her for her awareness of her own faults and her resolution to act better -- once she gets her way this one last time, when her friends balk at visiting the hero's off-limits island and she decides to go by herself. The mystery surrounding his old-skool fortress doesn't play out with the tension it should but it gives the heroine a reason to skulk around the place and get herself into hot water (and heated embraces) with the hero. Craven gave the heroine a little depth with her musings about her rather aimless life and her desire to establish some independence and a career for herself, and a recognition that such desires might well be at odds with any future relationship (in 1977). So just a smidge of social commentary snuck into/buried in the OTT plotline.

Violet Winspear does the throwback hero and captive heroine in a private kingdom trope much better, but this is very much in that tradition and has some amusing elements and a crisp writing style that would only get better with time.

[More Books Than Time · Rating 2 out of 5]

If Sara Craven were not such a good author this would rate a 1 for the obnoxious plot of a rich older man and the sweet young thing. Plus add that he's Italian and a prince (but doesn't use the title of course) and has a former mistress draping herself all over him and we have an icky read. I read the beginning and end, skimmed a bit more.

[Diamond]

سيدها
عنيدة، مستقلة، حرة الإرادة هكذا كانت روندا رانسوم، إلى أن أوقعها عنادها، وفضولها القاتل بين يدي سجّان متوحش، في جزيرة هو سيّدها والقانون فيها
إنه الأمير المطلق، وحش الجزيرة، وكل ما حوله خاضع له فهل تخضع هي كذلك؟

[Lynn Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely romance story.

[Monique · Rating 2 out of 5]

Star Rating: ★★½☆☆

[Mari garcia]

it was a great book...I loved it:)