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Born To Love
She was The Beauty -- reckless Dorinda Meredith, heiress to the wind!
He was The Blade -- dark, debonair, most dangerous of highwaymen to rove the colonial highroads.
A world of intrigue and danger stood between them, but they were star-crossed lovers -- born to meet, born to clash, and Born to Love
He was The Blade -- dark, debonair, most dangerous of highwaymen to rove the colonial highroads.
A world of intrigue and danger stood between them, but they were star-crossed lovers -- born to meet, born to clash, and Born to Love
576 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 12, 2016
Romance novelist Valerie Sherwood would always lovingly dedicate her books to the special cats in her life; in Born to Love it was Mopsy and Chow. She was slightly cat crazy.
So in honor of Ms. Sherwood, and from one crazy cat lady to another, I would like to dedicate my review of Born to Love to one of my cats.
To Bear, that sweet, gentle soul, a little black furred, black nosed, green-eyed wonder. Bear, you came into my life at 19, when your mother, a feral queen, bore her kittens in the warehouse of the office that I worked. I took you home at four-weeks-old and because you had not been weaned, I had to feed you milk and mush. Every night before I’d fall asleep, you’d suck at my earlobe as you would have at your mother’s teat. Even when you grew, you still held on to this adorable kittenish trait. Sadly Bear, you were in my life for just over a year. I went back to college and my landlady would not allow cats so you stayed home with my mother and siblings. Perhaps life there without me was not what you desired, because you ran away. I never saw you again and I cried many tears of loss. But I have never forgotten you. To you Bear, this review is dedicated.
Now that I’ve got that off my chest, on to the book. Sometimes I hate rating 4 star books, particularly when with just more care to detail and pacing, it could have been a 5 star read. Born to Love was a book that reached great highs and very middling lows. Although I love her voice, this is a problem I’ve run into when reading Sherwood. Plus she makes a great hero and sometimes doesn’t do much with him.
Born to Love is actually four stories of several generations of women with the same name, Dorinda, and their (mis)adventures in love. As repeated over (and over), the premise of the tale is: “It takes one generation to make it, one to lose it, one to talk about it, and one to make it again.”
The book opens up with the most exciting story of the group. Angel-faced, golden-haired Dorinda, a chambermaid, escapes the Great London fire, valiantly saves Grantland Meredith from street toughs, marries him and is shocked to learn he is an Earl. Unfortunately for sweet Dorinda, she is not his true love. That would be Polly, an amoral evil black- haired she-devil of a woman. Polly is the best character in the book, relentlessly calculating and conniving, willing to do anything have her man. Unsurprisingly, this tale is set to end in tragedy.
Daughter Rinda’s tale is told in the second part. She is a hereditary Countess, which struck me as odd, as I don’t believe that English titles passed on through the female line. She falls in love with the Rory, son of her mother’s rival. The second Dorinda risks everything to save her man at the Monmouth Rebellion. Sherwood keeps repeating how brave, how bold, how valiant Rinda was to ride into battle and save Rory. It would have been nice to see it happen, not hear about it, again and again. This story is kind of a letdown.
Of the third Dorinda, we hear about only in a summarized tale told to the fourth Dorinda.
The last half of the book deals with the Dorinda IV, an indentured servant in Virginia. I liked this Dorinda, and her cat, Lady Soft-Paws. This story while enjoyable, was uneven.
After her indenture is over, Dorinda pretends to be a long-lost heiress to a plantation. Two handsome men vie for her attention, but it’s obvious who the hero is: Tarn Jenner, a mysterious man (who has a secret identity, but we don’t know this until the end). The characters play at deceitful games, but this delightful plot-point is squandered as Dorinda spends most of her time mooning over the villain. Tarn Jenner, who is really a witty character, isn’t seen enough to be fully appreciated. The parts we do see are terrific, but fleeting.
The back of the book claims:
“She was the Beauty... He was the Blade-dark debonair, the most dangerous highwayman to rove the colonial roads.”
And yet the highwayman portion is a tiny part of the story and only revealed in brief towards the end of the book!
The conclusion is wrapped up in a neat package although it’s left up to the imagination what the fate of the fifth Dorinda will be.
If I’m focusing too much on the negatives, it’s because this one could have been great: a book I loved; as it is, I just liked it. (4 stars/ B-)
So in honor of Ms. Sherwood, and from one crazy cat lady to another, I would like to dedicate my review of Born to Love to one of my cats.
To Bear, that sweet, gentle soul, a little black furred, black nosed, green-eyed wonder. Bear, you came into my life at 19, when your mother, a feral queen, bore her kittens in the warehouse of the office that I worked. I took you home at four-weeks-old and because you had not been weaned, I had to feed you milk and mush. Every night before I’d fall asleep, you’d suck at my earlobe as you would have at your mother’s teat. Even when you grew, you still held on to this adorable kittenish trait. Sadly Bear, you were in my life for just over a year. I went back to college and my landlady would not allow cats so you stayed home with my mother and siblings. Perhaps life there without me was not what you desired, because you ran away. I never saw you again and I cried many tears of loss. But I have never forgotten you. To you Bear, this review is dedicated.
Now that I’ve got that off my chest, on to the book. Sometimes I hate rating 4 star books, particularly when with just more care to detail and pacing, it could have been a 5 star read. Born to Love was a book that reached great highs and very middling lows. Although I love her voice, this is a problem I’ve run into when reading Sherwood. Plus she makes a great hero and sometimes doesn’t do much with him.
Born to Love is actually four stories of several generations of women with the same name, Dorinda, and their (mis)adventures in love. As repeated over (and over), the premise of the tale is: “It takes one generation to make it, one to lose it, one to talk about it, and one to make it again.”
The book opens up with the most exciting story of the group. Angel-faced, golden-haired Dorinda, a chambermaid, escapes the Great London fire, valiantly saves Grantland Meredith from street toughs, marries him and is shocked to learn he is an Earl. Unfortunately for sweet Dorinda, she is not his true love. That would be Polly, an amoral evil black- haired she-devil of a woman. Polly is the best character in the book, relentlessly calculating and conniving, willing to do anything have her man. Unsurprisingly, this tale is set to end in tragedy.
Daughter Rinda’s tale is told in the second part. She is a hereditary Countess, which struck me as odd, as I don’t believe that English titles passed on through the female line. She falls in love with the Rory, son of her mother’s rival. The second Dorinda risks everything to save her man at the Monmouth Rebellion. Sherwood keeps repeating how brave, how bold, how valiant Rinda was to ride into battle and save Rory. It would have been nice to see it happen, not hear about it, again and again. This story is kind of a letdown.
Of the third Dorinda, we hear about only in a summarized tale told to the fourth Dorinda.
The last half of the book deals with the Dorinda IV, an indentured servant in Virginia. I liked this Dorinda, and her cat, Lady Soft-Paws. This story while enjoyable, was uneven.
After her indenture is over, Dorinda pretends to be a long-lost heiress to a plantation. Two handsome men vie for her attention, but it’s obvious who the hero is: Tarn Jenner, a mysterious man (who has a secret identity, but we don’t know this until the end). The characters play at deceitful games, but this delightful plot-point is squandered as Dorinda spends most of her time mooning over the villain. Tarn Jenner, who is really a witty character, isn’t seen enough to be fully appreciated. The parts we do see are terrific, but fleeting.
The back of the book claims:
“She was the Beauty... He was the Blade-dark debonair, the most dangerous highwayman to rove the colonial roads.”
And yet the highwayman portion is a tiny part of the story and only revealed in brief towards the end of the book!
The conclusion is wrapped up in a neat package although it’s left up to the imagination what the fate of the fifth Dorinda will be.
If I’m focusing too much on the negatives, it’s because this one could have been great: a book I loved; as it is, I just liked it. (4 stars/ B-)
June 17, 2010
I really enjoyed this book, which follows four generations of women, in the late 17th century. It was like four novels in one, and each heroine was a unique character. Much as I admired the first Dorinda, a London chambermaid with a heart condition who marries an earl,I must say I found her rival Lady Polly to be equally fascinating. Polly is one of those bitches you love to hate, until she crosses some lines. the second Dorinda is a stronger character, there's even a little "cathy and heathcliff" vibe with her wrong side of the tracks lover Rory, who also happens to be Lady Polly's son. Rory I felt was the most tragic character in the book. Surviving an abusive childhood to get tangled up with the ill fated Monmouth rebellion in an effort to get his lands back, and unfortunately getting Dorinda caught up in it too. The only dissappointment of the book was the story of the third Dorinda, who is a wild child of the London streets. She would have been the baddest Dorinda, except Sherwood never develops her character. The reader finds out what happens to Dorinda from her daughter, the fourth Dorinda who is a bound girl in the Virginia colony. This final Dorinda is an appealing down to earth resourceful character, who finishes her indentured servitude and returns to Virginia in disguise getting caught between two rogues, a plantation owner and a highwayman, neither of whom are what they seem. When she finally gets to have sex it is truly hot, but lets just say there could have been more of it. I did appreciate the lack of humiliating rape scenes that seem to fill some other bodice rippers. I could have done without some of the endless descriptions of Virginia mansions, and with a little more hot sex with Tarn and Dorinda.
September 28, 2013
¿Quieres leer cuatro historias de amor que te dan ganas de vivir en Inglaterra de 1700? Este es tu libro.
Como romántica sin remedio este libro fue el paraíso, al tratarse de cuatro historias diferentes pero a su vez conectadas me hizo amar más el libro.
La trama es la vida de cuatro mujeres, todas de nombre Dorinda.
En la vida de cada Dorinda existe ese hombre perfecto que todas soñamos, cada uno a su manera, con sus pros y sus contras pero mientras lees envidias la vida de Dorinda.
La lectura en si es bastante ligera y las 300 páginas se pasan volando. Por lo general lo leería en uno o dos días, pero estoy implementando no leer todo un libro en un día así no me pierdo detalles.
Lo que no me gusto mucho fue el epílogo, ya que me pareció innecesario y fueron las 5 páginas más cursis que leí. Tranquilamente se podrían haber ahorrado el epílogo y el libro sería perfecto.
"Y de pronto se encontró entre los brazos de él. Sus labios oprimían cálidamente los de ella, el brazo de Torn le rodeaba la delgada cintura y curvaba su flexible cuerpo joven contra el... Y el mundo fue un lugar mágico. Aquel beso tenia una demorada ternura que le llegaba al corazón. Podía ser un disipado -y también peligroso- pero en aquel momento a Dorinda no le importaba"
¿Puedo ir a llorar a un rincón?
Como romántica sin remedio este libro fue el paraíso, al tratarse de cuatro historias diferentes pero a su vez conectadas me hizo amar más el libro.
La trama es la vida de cuatro mujeres, todas de nombre Dorinda.
En la vida de cada Dorinda existe ese hombre perfecto que todas soñamos, cada uno a su manera, con sus pros y sus contras pero mientras lees envidias la vida de Dorinda.
La lectura en si es bastante ligera y las 300 páginas se pasan volando. Por lo general lo leería en uno o dos días, pero estoy implementando no leer todo un libro en un día así no me pierdo detalles.
Lo que no me gusto mucho fue el epílogo, ya que me pareció innecesario y fueron las 5 páginas más cursis que leí. Tranquilamente se podrían haber ahorrado el epílogo y el libro sería perfecto.
"Y de pronto se encontró entre los brazos de él. Sus labios oprimían cálidamente los de ella, el brazo de Torn le rodeaba la delgada cintura y curvaba su flexible cuerpo joven contra el... Y el mundo fue un lugar mágico. Aquel beso tenia una demorada ternura que le llegaba al corazón. Podía ser un disipado -y también peligroso- pero en aquel momento a Dorinda no le importaba"
¿Puedo ir a llorar a un rincón?
July 25, 2020
A stand-alone novel among her usual series, in "Born To Love," Sherwood attempted a family saga, concentrating on four generations of women named Dorinda, whose fortunes rise and fall, from the Great Fire of London to Tidewater Virginia in the early 18 Century. Like her previous novel, "Lovely Lying Lips," which also tried to vary the point of view among multiple heroines, this method works and doesn't work. The first and fourth Dorindas receive most of the attention, while the third's entire history is related in the space of about a page or two. In one of her rare interviews, Sherwood claimed to write in bursts of inspiration rather than methodically, and the thinness of that section seems to bear it out. The section on the first Dorinda threatens to overwhelm Sherwood, as she sets up a love triangle that she can't control successfully to the reader's sympathy; while the second seems to be grafting aspects that hadn't been used from the plotting and research of "Lovely Lying Lips" onto a new project. The final Dorinda is the heart of the book. Here, Sherwood would've been better served by getting rid of the lopsided family saga around it and having had that story stand by itself as the novel. In that section, quick-witted Dorinda Meredith navigates indenture, mysterious suitors, and nefarious doings at a plantation on the James. The novel is flawed, but once it settles into its final generation, it rolls along enjoyably. After this novel, Sherwood would jump publishers to Pocket Books and return to her comfort zone of multi-volume series.
February 15, 2012
A bit of a guilty pleasure but I recently picked this book up again after reading it quite a few years ago... the cover is a little cheesy but it's actually a wonderful read... full of historical detail and dialogue and interesting characters and excellent romance. It's a book of four parts that details the lives of four generations of women... all named Dorinda. The first is a poor servant girl who rescues a wealthy count during the Great Fire in London... the two fall in love,wed and have a daughter "Rinda"... Countess Rinda has a fiery spirit and falls in love and has a daughter Dorr... a little mystery happens there and Dorr has been brought very low and has a more tragic story... the majority of the story falls on Dorr's daughter- the last Dorinda... who will rise herself up from hopeless circumstances... finding love along the way. Great early 80's romance novel!
August 25, 2014
One of my first romance reads. I've read this book at least three or four times and I now own it so I can read it over again whenever I want.
March 13, 2025
I’m torn between a three or a four star. I had no expectations of this book and it was a bit of a rodeo. There were things I wish I knew prior to reading that might help someone reading this review manage their expectations. This looks like a bodice ripper but really isn’t for 96 percent of the book. It is more of a historical epic with romantic and sometimes gothic elements. I see she actually does write gothic novels from reviewing her backlist which makes sense to me. The 4 Dorinda generations good and bad. Good in that it is a unique idea and fun for history buffs. It was also a story of 3 failed loves hoping to make it right in the 4th generation, Dorinda’s story. That was a fun concept. All of these characters were distinct enough to not blend together. However when you get to the last story, that’s really where the rubber hits the road and you wonder why you read 230 pages of prologue to get there. The fourth book was interesting in a rolling historic fiction kind of way but kind of slow. All of the Pennsylvania part seems a bit overly long and unnecessary. The pacing at the end was like a car crash happening. Not all bad- I mean I couldn’t stop reading the last 100 pages but where was this suspense, angst and unravelling all along? So much plot packed into about 40 pages! I did like how everyone appears to be a villain, and then maybe not quite. There is a rape scene(Despite what Tarn calls “seduction”). It’s mistaken identity so, yep, still rape. Listen this was 1984. I don’t understand the allure of that trope but you cannot be shocked when it appears in a book of this vintage. But the other aspect about that scene was that it affected the authenticity of Dorinda’s true love for Tarn for me. I mean how could it not? She literally thinks she’s having sex with someone else. She leaves tarn telling him she hopes he hangs, gets swindled by Bainter and only then is like “just kidding I’ve really loved you all along Tarn and my body just knew it was you I lost my virginity too”. I liked the fast paced ending with all its twists. The lead character was smart and witty. Loved how Lady Soft Paws has a small role in saving the day. I just wish that “love” scene wasn’t there. It hurt my morality and hurt the plot. That’s where the 4 star took a hit to 3. Historic detail was great. You know it’s successfully emerged you in a historic setting when you go down rabbit holes googling the great fires of 1666, the battle of Sedgemoor and the etymology of the colour “puce”.
January 12, 2025
Four generations of heroines in one book? Yes, please. I do have to caution that, while the stories of the first two Dorindas are romantic, I would class them s historical fiction with romantic elements rather than historical romance, though Dorinda the Fourth's story most certainly is romance.
My biggest reservation about this book is that the story of the third Dorinda, which very much left me wanting to know more, is conveyed secondhand, rather than allowing the reader to come along for the ride. I do appreciate that the fates of characters in earlier sections have room for the reader to finish their particular tales as they please, and one of the best parts was finding out that my favorite character did indeed get her HEA.
I also liked the intimation that the legacy of the Dorindas will continue, and I am going to believe that it did.
My biggest reservation about this book is that the story of the third Dorinda, which very much left me wanting to know more, is conveyed secondhand, rather than allowing the reader to come along for the ride. I do appreciate that the fates of characters in earlier sections have room for the reader to finish their particular tales as they please, and one of the best parts was finding out that my favorite character did indeed get her HEA.
I also liked the intimation that the legacy of the Dorindas will continue, and I am going to believe that it did.
June 21, 2020
Amé cada segundo en el pasado y presente de Dorinda. De cada una de ellas, una historia de maravilla a través del tiempo y del corazón de las protagonistas, sin duda me encantó leerlo.
December 14, 2022
Dios, como ame esta historia. Sus protagonistas, cada una con un amor distinto, y el mismo nombre: Dorinda.
AHHHHHHH Pensé que nunca lo encontraría nuevamente ❤️🥺
AHHHHHHH Pensé que nunca lo encontraría nuevamente ❤️🥺
June 1, 2023
I love the tale of the four Dorindas. A good romance novel never gets old.
March 1, 2016
PB-B @ 1984, 9/85. romance.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews