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Company of Rogues #1
An Arranged Marriage
In the tradition of Amanda Quick, New York Times bestselling author Jo Beverley has won the hearts of readers everywhere with her historical romances set in the Georgian and Regency periods. "An Arranged Marriage" is the first of Beverley's beloved tales that began her popular "Company of Rogues" series.
Eleanor Chivenham didn't put much past her vile brother, but even she had not anticipated his greedy scheme to dupe a rich earl into mistaking her for a lightskirt! With her reputation in shreds and her future ruined, a defeated Eleanor was forced to agree to a hasty wedding. But marriage to the mysterious Nicholas Delaney was more than she'd bargained for. He doubtless thought the worst of her, but when society gossip soon told her all about his beautiful French mistress, Eleanor tried to act with the cool dignity required in a marriage of convenience. But how long could she hold out against his undeniable charm -- or the secret desires of her heart?
For the sake of family honor, Nicolas Delaney agreed to wed a wronged lady. In truth, such chivalry ran counter to his carefully wrought image of a carousing, dissolute rogue -- the guise so vital to his secret political mission. He hoped to keep his new wife in the background until a spy was trapped, but Eleanor's beauty and fighting wit were impossible to ignore. In fact, she presented quite a challenge to his prowess with women -- and a test of his formidable will!
351 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
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About the author
Jo Beverley
140 books1,129 followersMary Josephine Dunn was born 22 September 1947 in Lancashire, England, UK. At the age of eleven she went to an all-girls boarding school, Layton Hill Convent, Blackpool. At sixteen, she wrote her first romance, with a medieval setting, completed in installments in an exercise book. From 1966 to 1970, she obtained a degree in English history from Keele University in Staffordshire, where she met her future husband, Ken Beverley. After graduation, they married on June 24, 1971. She quickly attained a position as a youth employment officer until 1976, working first in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, and then in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire.
In 1976, her scientist husband was invited to do post-doctoral research at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. When her professional qualifications proved not to be usable in the Canadian labour market, she raised their two sons and started to write her first romances.
Moved to Ottawa, in 1985 she became a founding member of the Ottawa Romance Writers’ Association, that her “nurturing community” for the next twelve years. The same year, she completed a regency romance, but it was promptly rejected by a number of publishers, and she settled more earnestly to learning the craft. In 1988, it sold to Walker, and was published as "Lord Wraybourne's Betrothed". She regularly appears on bestseller lists including the USA Today overall bestseller list, the New York Times, and and the Publishers Weekly list. She has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Golden Leaf, the Award of Excellence, the National Readers Choice, and a two Career Achievement awards from Romantic Times. She is also a five time winner of the RITA, the top award of the Romance Writers Of America, and a member of their Hall of Fame and Honor Roll.
Jo Beverley passed away on May 23, 2016 after a long battle with cancer.
In 1976, her scientist husband was invited to do post-doctoral research at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. When her professional qualifications proved not to be usable in the Canadian labour market, she raised their two sons and started to write her first romances.
Moved to Ottawa, in 1985 she became a founding member of the Ottawa Romance Writers’ Association, that her “nurturing community” for the next twelve years. The same year, she completed a regency romance, but it was promptly rejected by a number of publishers, and she settled more earnestly to learning the craft. In 1988, it sold to Walker, and was published as "Lord Wraybourne's Betrothed". She regularly appears on bestseller lists including the USA Today overall bestseller list, the New York Times, and and the Publishers Weekly list. She has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Golden Leaf, the Award of Excellence, the National Readers Choice, and a two Career Achievement awards from Romantic Times. She is also a five time winner of the RITA, the top award of the Romance Writers Of America, and a member of their Hall of Fame and Honor Roll.
Jo Beverley passed away on May 23, 2016 after a long battle with cancer.
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October 22, 2012
OK. This was me at various points in the book
…when I wasn't
Here's the basic story—maybe you'll see what I mean.
Eleanor Chivenham is in a bad situation that just keeps getting worse. Before their parents died, her brother Lionel persuaded them to make him her guardian. She can't claim her inheritance unless she either marries with his consent or turns 25 without shaming herself. She's stuck in his house, with two more years on her sentence, since she’s not meeting anyone worth marrying among Lionel's drunken, lecherous cronies.
Which is not to say there've been no offers. Lately, Lionel has been urging her to marry Lord Deveril.
The dude's an earl and all that, but something about him makes her feel like she's got spiders in her drawers. So she said she’d rather die. At the time, Lionel let it drop, but she knows he's not giving up. She's lying in her locked bedroom, wondering what he'll try next, while her brother is "entertaining" downstairs.
A maid scratches at the door and offers her a nice hot toddy to help her relax. You'd think she'd see it coming, wouldn't you? But you'd be wrong.
Unbeknownst to Eleanor, Christopher Delaney, Earl of Stainbridge, has been drugged as well. Lionel and Deveril had initially offered him a pretty young man. But he had his wits together enough to protest that he was a ladies’ man ("was married, you know"). So Deveril offers him the doxy he has waiting for him upstairs. Stainbridge (a/k/a Kit) can't have people getting the idea that he's a Backgammon player, so up he goes.
Eleanor tries to protest as the stranger slaps her and demands that she perform. But the words, "help!" "don't!" "stop!" just won’t come out of her mouth. She does manage “please,” though. (Because that’s so much easier to say than “stop” and not the least bit ambiguous.)
Her last impressions as she drifts into oblivion are the look on his face and the pain…
Downstairs, Lionel and Deveril talk about how it’s a shame they couldn’t get Stainbridge to show his true colors so they could blackmail him. As for the sacrifice of Eleanor's maidenhead, Deveril's cool. Taking her when she's unconscious wouldn't be that much fun anyway. And now that she's been "shamed," she has to marry him. He'll "enjoy her hatred even more when she's compelled to conceal it."
The next AM, Kit goes back to Lionel’s place to try to make sense of what happened, and he sees a cloaked figure slip out a side door. He follows, and he catches up just as she’s fixing to jump off a bridge.
He snatches her down. They recognize each other. She faints. Shortly after she comes around, he says, "You are the woman who was…introduced to pleasure last night."
Now, me, I'm thinking that statement, coming out of the mouth of a man who slapped and raped me last night, might just make me a little
Not Eleanor, though. This gal is the poster child for Flat Affect. She just calmly clarifies the situation. He raped her. She recognizes him, and besides her brother told her who had the "honor" of doing it. (At this point in the book, I was attributing her passivity and emotionlessness to shock or the near death experience or something, but nope, that's not it.)
Anyway, once they have that sorted out, Kit suggests they go back to his place, and she's like, "sure, why not?" Once there, he insists she have some tea. And because she's had such good experiences with drinks lately, she's all, "pass the sugar."
Meanwhile Kit decides to tackle the problem square-on.
Yes, he really does have a twin, by the name of Nicholas. Who is in Paris at the moment, but Kit pretends he just skipped town after "expressing concern" about the events of the previous night. (I can hear that conversation now: "Hey, Kit, I think I raped a girl last night. Bit concerned about it. Off to Paris!")
Eleanor is skeptical—for a second. Then she's like, "You mean it wasn't you? Whew! So now what do we do?"
Kit proposes that she marry Nick (because that's just a super idea.) Exact words: “P 28 He is very kind-hearted and when he learns of this affair he will want to marry you and make all right.” (Eleanor evidently misses the obvious logic problem here. If Nick did it, then he probably wouldn't need to learn about it. But she's not one to question, I guess.)
Kit, to his credit, is at least concerned about his unintended victim, and wants to help her. He’s "not the marrying type" himself, not to mention marrying a woman you raped has to be a little awkward. But if she springs a brat in nine months he’d like to keep it in the family. Still, if she's totally opposed to marrying her rapist he says he will set her up as a widow in some little burg somewhere, with enough money to live comfortably.
Eleanor considers her options: 1) Return home and marry Deveril. 2) Go back to the bridge. 3) Marry her "kind-hearted" rapist. 4) Be a fake widow in some distant, rustic place.
#4, right? Independence, respectability, enough money to get by. Maybe some neighbors might suspect a "widow" with no connections, but with an earl supporting the story it would die down quick enough.
But…you guessed it. Eleanor calmly decides on Door # 3. (Now, if her reason had been that she feared her brother and Deveril could track her down, and as a woman alone she'd be vulnerable, I'd buy it. Instead, she worries that she'd have to tell the truth to any man who wanted to marry her, and no decent man would have her once he learned she'd been raped and faked a marriage to cover for any child she might have. Apart from the obvious fallacy of that reasoning, most recent rape victims would be just fine with the "no decent man would have her" part. But not El. Nope. She decides she's better off marrying the rapey slimeball. Because that's clearlythe best option.)
Kit tells her more about her husband to be. “He lives for excitement and can be careless of who he hurts.”
Eleanor's reaction to that? She's a little dismayed that “Nicky” won’t be the “comfortable helpmeet” she’d hoped for. (Because apparently she couldn't guess this from the fact that he raped her.)
Eager to reassure her, Kit reiterates that Nicky is kind and charming…and "experienced with women.”
Me?
But Eleanor doesn't even blink about the experienced with women bit. Instead she reflects that men can be different when they’re drunk, and then remembers a nice guy she knew that used to beat his wife. “This was not a reassuring thought,” we’re told. (Um, yeah.)
Meanwhile, in Paris, Nicholas gets a letter from Kit, who admits that he sort of accidentally deflowered a virgin the other night and just stopped her from killing herself the next day. He tells Nick that his allowance will be cut off unless he marries the girl. Nick doesn't need the money, and he's ass-deep in espionage, but hey, why not? Got nothing better to do than marry a suicidal rape victim.
Eleanor receives a ring and a note from her groom to be that reads: “You must know I share all your feelings and anticipation at the thought of the ceremony to come.” (Me: Horror? Revulsion? Wow, that’s comforting!")
Reading on…”Please wear the small gift enclosed as a sign of your kindness towards me. Soon I will have the right to give you much more.”
Now if I read that last bit, coming from a rapist who is being forced to marry me?
But here's what Eleanor thinks: “An ambiguous and alarming note, but Eleanor realized it could be read as expressing devotion." (Because devotion from a rapist is a good thing.)
When Eleanor meets Nick, as usual, she's just all matter of fact. The one time she snaps at him, she immediately apologizes. And when he takes her aside to “their” room (she thinks of it this way), and she looks nervous, he asks what she’s afraid of. (Me: Are you f-ing KIDDING ME?)
Eleanor: “I suppose I am afraid of the abnormality of things.”
A bit later, El encounters a slutty Frenchwoman who seems very possessive of Nick. So the next sharp words out of her mouth are catty questions about the whore! (Because God forbid her rapist should cheat on her with another woman.) Mind you, Eleanor still hasn't said one word about the rape. Apparently she's just going to go quietly to the altar without any effort to find out, at least, whether what he did was an aberration, or whether he's in the habit. Me, I'd think that was somewhat important.
That night, after the wedding, she tries to put him off. He accuses her of being more prickly than a hedgehog. (Am I really the only one who thinks that, from her POV, that comment is a little outrageous? But of course it doesn't faze Eleanor.)
Then Nick smiles at her, and it takes all her resolution not to melt and smile back. (WTF???)
OK, I’m going into excruciating detail here. But this is just the first 60 pages. Am I the only one who thinks this woman is several fries short of a Happy Meal?
So then, finally, they talk enough that they both realize that Kit has deceived them, that he's the actual rapist and he's let her think it was Nick. Nick points out that he'd prefer it if he could believe the kid might be his (everybody just assumes that she's knocked up). So El agrees to consummate. Because of course there'll be no problem shagging a guy who looks just like the rapist. At least JoBev had the good sense to make it a challenge for her, and not an orgasmic experience. But still. Seriously. WTF.
Once they settle at Nick's house, he tells her that he's going out—he's going to go pay a call to her brother Lionel, who, Nick assures her, will not trouble her again.
Me: "Ooo! Can I come? Can I watch?" Or at least, maybe, "Do be careful."
Eleanor: Shrugs and goes back to thinking about how to do her hair. (I'm not kidding.)
Before he married Eleanor, Nick was recruited by his country to seduce a former lover (the French whore) to obtain information about a plot to help Napoleon escape from Elba. The marriage, obviously, complicates matters, but he's determined to go ahead with the plan. Like some other reviewers, I just didn't get what was so wonderful about this guy.
I did connect with Eleanor. I was furious at the things she went through. But her behavior just kept throwing me off the cart. JoBev paints a character who is just so friggin' placid that nothing ever gets to her—the only time she really loses her cool and yells (because Nick wants her to kiss and make up with Kit), he says "Wow—you must be pregnant." (Because we all know that if a rape victim gets upset at the suggestion that she ought to "get over it" so that the perp can be part of the family, it must be hormones.) And of course Eleanor agrees that it must be, and apologizes.
Most romance heroines are feisty or at least strongly passionate, so maybe JoBev was just trying something different, which is commendable. But it didn't work—at least not for me. Eleanor is supposedly driven to the point of suicide early in the book, but faced with the trauma of rape, of having to marry her rapist, of then falling in love with her husband only to realize that everyone on the planet knows he's banging an abbess, of being treated like a leper in her own marriage, of having to beg him for basic kindness, , she never gets upset (tho she does sink into a rather serious funk late in the book over something else). You get the feeling that even the suicide attempt was just a rational decision. I don't know how the hell I'm SUPPOSED to relate to that.
Oh! And this book abounds with people who need to get their butts kicked. There's the brother who drugs her and puts a rapist in her bed. There's Deveril who is pulling the strings. There's the French whore who is a vindictive, evil, bitch. There's Stainbridge, who wasn't exactly thinking straight when he raped Eleanor, but afterwards was just so astonishingly insensitive you wanted to strangle him.
Anyway, this gets two stars, mainly because one star is for the rare book that either offends or bores me so much I can't finish. This definitely didn't bore me, and while I was frustrated, I wasn't offended. This is one of JoBev's first published works, and having read and loved LOTS of others, including some that are in my permanent library, I can assure you that this is an aberration. But wow, this one just…
…when I wasn't
Here's the basic story—maybe you'll see what I mean.
Eleanor Chivenham is in a bad situation that just keeps getting worse. Before their parents died, her brother Lionel persuaded them to make him her guardian. She can't claim her inheritance unless she either marries with his consent or turns 25 without shaming herself. She's stuck in his house, with two more years on her sentence, since she’s not meeting anyone worth marrying among Lionel's drunken, lecherous cronies.
Which is not to say there've been no offers. Lately, Lionel has been urging her to marry Lord Deveril.
The dude's an earl and all that, but something about him makes her feel like she's got spiders in her drawers. So she said she’d rather die. At the time, Lionel let it drop, but she knows he's not giving up. She's lying in her locked bedroom, wondering what he'll try next, while her brother is "entertaining" downstairs.
A maid scratches at the door and offers her a nice hot toddy to help her relax. You'd think she'd see it coming, wouldn't you? But you'd be wrong.
Unbeknownst to Eleanor, Christopher Delaney, Earl of Stainbridge, has been drugged as well. Lionel and Deveril had initially offered him a pretty young man. But he had his wits together enough to protest that he was a ladies’ man ("was married, you know"). So Deveril offers him the doxy he has waiting for him upstairs. Stainbridge (a/k/a Kit) can't have people getting the idea that he's a Backgammon player, so up he goes.
Eleanor tries to protest as the stranger slaps her and demands that she perform. But the words, "help!" "don't!" "stop!" just won’t come out of her mouth. She does manage “please,” though. (Because that’s so much easier to say than “stop” and not the least bit ambiguous.)
Her last impressions as she drifts into oblivion are the look on his face and the pain…
Downstairs, Lionel and Deveril talk about how it’s a shame they couldn’t get Stainbridge to show his true colors so they could blackmail him. As for the sacrifice of Eleanor's maidenhead, Deveril's cool. Taking her when she's unconscious wouldn't be that much fun anyway. And now that she's been "shamed," she has to marry him. He'll "enjoy her hatred even more when she's compelled to conceal it."
The next AM, Kit goes back to Lionel’s place to try to make sense of what happened, and he sees a cloaked figure slip out a side door. He follows, and he catches up just as she’s fixing to jump off a bridge.
He snatches her down. They recognize each other. She faints. Shortly after she comes around, he says, "You are the woman who was…introduced to pleasure last night."
Now, me, I'm thinking that statement, coming out of the mouth of a man who slapped and raped me last night, might just make me a little
Not Eleanor, though. This gal is the poster child for Flat Affect. She just calmly clarifies the situation. He raped her. She recognizes him, and besides her brother told her who had the "honor" of doing it. (At this point in the book, I was attributing her passivity and emotionlessness to shock or the near death experience or something, but nope, that's not it.)
Anyway, once they have that sorted out, Kit suggests they go back to his place, and she's like, "sure, why not?" Once there, he insists she have some tea. And because she's had such good experiences with drinks lately, she's all, "pass the sugar."
Meanwhile Kit decides to tackle the problem square-on.
Yes, he really does have a twin, by the name of Nicholas. Who is in Paris at the moment, but Kit pretends he just skipped town after "expressing concern" about the events of the previous night. (I can hear that conversation now: "Hey, Kit, I think I raped a girl last night. Bit concerned about it. Off to Paris!")
Eleanor is skeptical—for a second. Then she's like, "You mean it wasn't you? Whew! So now what do we do?"
Kit proposes that she marry Nick (because that's just a super idea.) Exact words: “P 28 He is very kind-hearted and when he learns of this affair he will want to marry you and make all right.” (Eleanor evidently misses the obvious logic problem here. If Nick did it, then he probably wouldn't need to learn about it. But she's not one to question, I guess.)
Kit, to his credit, is at least concerned about his unintended victim, and wants to help her. He’s "not the marrying type" himself, not to mention marrying a woman you raped has to be a little awkward. But if she springs a brat in nine months he’d like to keep it in the family. Still, if she's totally opposed to marrying her rapist he says he will set her up as a widow in some little burg somewhere, with enough money to live comfortably.
Eleanor considers her options: 1) Return home and marry Deveril. 2) Go back to the bridge. 3) Marry her "kind-hearted" rapist. 4) Be a fake widow in some distant, rustic place.
#4, right? Independence, respectability, enough money to get by. Maybe some neighbors might suspect a "widow" with no connections, but with an earl supporting the story it would die down quick enough.
But…you guessed it. Eleanor calmly decides on Door # 3. (Now, if her reason had been that she feared her brother and Deveril could track her down, and as a woman alone she'd be vulnerable, I'd buy it. Instead, she worries that she'd have to tell the truth to any man who wanted to marry her, and no decent man would have her once he learned she'd been raped and faked a marriage to cover for any child she might have. Apart from the obvious fallacy of that reasoning, most recent rape victims would be just fine with the "no decent man would have her" part. But not El. Nope. She decides she's better off marrying the rapey slimeball. Because that's clearlythe best option.)
Kit tells her more about her husband to be. “He lives for excitement and can be careless of who he hurts.”
Eleanor's reaction to that? She's a little dismayed that “Nicky” won’t be the “comfortable helpmeet” she’d hoped for. (Because apparently she couldn't guess this from the fact that he raped her.)
Eager to reassure her, Kit reiterates that Nicky is kind and charming…and "experienced with women.”
Me?
But Eleanor doesn't even blink about the experienced with women bit. Instead she reflects that men can be different when they’re drunk, and then remembers a nice guy she knew that used to beat his wife. “This was not a reassuring thought,” we’re told. (Um, yeah.)
Meanwhile, in Paris, Nicholas gets a letter from Kit, who admits that he sort of accidentally deflowered a virgin the other night and just stopped her from killing herself the next day. He tells Nick that his allowance will be cut off unless he marries the girl. Nick doesn't need the money, and he's ass-deep in espionage, but hey, why not? Got nothing better to do than marry a suicidal rape victim.
Eleanor receives a ring and a note from her groom to be that reads: “You must know I share all your feelings and anticipation at the thought of the ceremony to come.” (Me: Horror? Revulsion? Wow, that’s comforting!")
Reading on…”Please wear the small gift enclosed as a sign of your kindness towards me. Soon I will have the right to give you much more.”
Now if I read that last bit, coming from a rapist who is being forced to marry me?
But here's what Eleanor thinks: “An ambiguous and alarming note, but Eleanor realized it could be read as expressing devotion." (Because devotion from a rapist is a good thing.)
When Eleanor meets Nick, as usual, she's just all matter of fact. The one time she snaps at him, she immediately apologizes. And when he takes her aside to “their” room (she thinks of it this way), and she looks nervous, he asks what she’s afraid of. (Me: Are you f-ing KIDDING ME?)
Eleanor: “I suppose I am afraid of the abnormality of things.”
A bit later, El encounters a slutty Frenchwoman who seems very possessive of Nick. So the next sharp words out of her mouth are catty questions about the whore! (Because God forbid her rapist should cheat on her with another woman.) Mind you, Eleanor still hasn't said one word about the rape. Apparently she's just going to go quietly to the altar without any effort to find out, at least, whether what he did was an aberration, or whether he's in the habit. Me, I'd think that was somewhat important.
That night, after the wedding, she tries to put him off. He accuses her of being more prickly than a hedgehog. (Am I really the only one who thinks that, from her POV, that comment is a little outrageous? But of course it doesn't faze Eleanor.)
Then Nick smiles at her, and it takes all her resolution not to melt and smile back. (WTF???)
OK, I’m going into excruciating detail here. But this is just the first 60 pages. Am I the only one who thinks this woman is several fries short of a Happy Meal?
So then, finally, they talk enough that they both realize that Kit has deceived them, that he's the actual rapist and he's let her think it was Nick. Nick points out that he'd prefer it if he could believe the kid might be his (everybody just assumes that she's knocked up). So El agrees to consummate. Because of course there'll be no problem shagging a guy who looks just like the rapist. At least JoBev had the good sense to make it a challenge for her, and not an orgasmic experience. But still. Seriously. WTF.
Once they settle at Nick's house, he tells her that he's going out—he's going to go pay a call to her brother Lionel, who, Nick assures her, will not trouble her again.
Me: "Ooo! Can I come? Can I watch?" Or at least, maybe, "Do be careful."
Eleanor: Shrugs and goes back to thinking about how to do her hair. (I'm not kidding.)
Before he married Eleanor, Nick was recruited by his country to seduce a former lover (the French whore) to obtain information about a plot to help Napoleon escape from Elba. The marriage, obviously, complicates matters, but he's determined to go ahead with the plan. Like some other reviewers, I just didn't get what was so wonderful about this guy.
I did connect with Eleanor. I was furious at the things she went through. But her behavior just kept throwing me off the cart. JoBev paints a character who is just so friggin' placid that nothing ever gets to her—the only time she really loses her cool and yells (because Nick wants her to kiss and make up with Kit), he says "Wow—you must be pregnant." (Because we all know that if a rape victim gets upset at the suggestion that she ought to "get over it" so that the perp can be part of the family, it must be hormones.) And of course Eleanor agrees that it must be, and apologizes.
Most romance heroines are feisty or at least strongly passionate, so maybe JoBev was just trying something different, which is commendable. But it didn't work—at least not for me. Eleanor is supposedly driven to the point of suicide early in the book, but faced with the trauma of rape, of having to marry her rapist, of then falling in love with her husband only to realize that everyone on the planet knows he's banging an abbess, of being treated like a leper in her own marriage, of having to beg him for basic kindness, , she never gets upset (tho she does sink into a rather serious funk late in the book over something else). You get the feeling that even the suicide attempt was just a rational decision. I don't know how the hell I'm SUPPOSED to relate to that.
Oh! And this book abounds with people who need to get their butts kicked. There's the brother who drugs her and puts a rapist in her bed. There's Deveril who is pulling the strings. There's the French whore who is a vindictive, evil, bitch. There's Stainbridge, who wasn't exactly thinking straight when he raped Eleanor, but afterwards was just so astonishingly insensitive you wanted to strangle him.
Anyway, this gets two stars, mainly because one star is for the rare book that either offends or bores me so much I can't finish. This definitely didn't bore me, and while I was frustrated, I wasn't offended. This is one of JoBev's first published works, and having read and loved LOTS of others, including some that are in my permanent library, I can assure you that this is an aberration. But wow, this one just…
June 27, 2016
I cannot say how glad I am that this wasn't my first experience with Jo Beverley. What a dismal story! The interesting thing is that her general craft and characterization are okay, but the plot is a great big pile of suck that distorts every other element into the suck-pit of amazing suckitude.
I mean, if you're going to have a hero that you claim is smart and a natural leader and all, then having a story where he's run ragged by a floozy for months on end, interfering with his relationship with the woman he loves, is going to undermine everything else you try to tell us about your hero. In short, Nick is a dead loss from start to finish and all his posturing as a sophisticated rogue capable of navigating his world competently and providing for his own is just so much hot air. Indeed, he loses at literally every single juncture where he might have turned the plot around. I'm not sure what Beverley was thinking she was showing, but a guy worth hanging out with, let alone falling in love with, was not it.
She might have made up for it with a strong heroine who could have been engaging and maybe redeem our hero, but Eleanor was as, or more, of a doormat than Nick was. I mean the ten-penny villains won against both at every single turn and . The more I think about it the angrier I get.
And that's before you even get to the central motivation for their relationship to begin with. Starting off with a rape had potential for interesting story developments and hardship, but it had only the very weirdest effect on the story. Having drugs involved muted some of the impact, both emotionally and on the plot, and I can go with that, but it was still kind of weird and much of the plot driven from that point doesn't withstand scrutiny or reflection very well.
And you know what I really hate? I really hope Beverley resists that potentially disastrous impulse.
So yeah, a lot of ick and no fun made this a real drag. I'm glad I'm through it and hope this doesn't bode ill for the rest of this series.
A note about Steamy: Another part that drained into the sucktic tank. There are a couple explicit sex scenes, but since Nick is still sleeping with his floozy, it's full of shame and doubt and, well, suck. Low middle range of my steam tolerance, but I have a hard time applying the scale through all the suck surrounding it.
I mean, if you're going to have a hero that you claim is smart and a natural leader and all, then having a story where he's run ragged by a floozy for months on end, interfering with his relationship with the woman he loves, is going to undermine everything else you try to tell us about your hero. In short, Nick is a dead loss from start to finish and all his posturing as a sophisticated rogue capable of navigating his world competently and providing for his own is just so much hot air. Indeed, he loses at literally every single juncture where he might have turned the plot around. I'm not sure what Beverley was thinking she was showing, but a guy worth hanging out with, let alone falling in love with, was not it.
She might have made up for it with a strong heroine who could have been engaging and maybe redeem our hero, but Eleanor was as, or more, of a doormat than Nick was. I mean the ten-penny villains won against both at every single turn and . The more I think about it the angrier I get.
And that's before you even get to the central motivation for their relationship to begin with. Starting off with a rape had potential for interesting story developments and hardship, but it had only the very weirdest effect on the story. Having drugs involved muted some of the impact, both emotionally and on the plot, and I can go with that, but it was still kind of weird and much of the plot driven from that point doesn't withstand scrutiny or reflection very well.
And you know what I really hate? I really hope Beverley resists that potentially disastrous impulse.
So yeah, a lot of ick and no fun made this a real drag. I'm glad I'm through it and hope this doesn't bode ill for the rest of this series.
A note about Steamy: Another part that drained into the sucktic tank. There are a couple explicit sex scenes, but since Nick is still sleeping with his floozy, it's full of shame and doubt and, well, suck. Low middle range of my steam tolerance, but I have a hard time applying the scale through all the suck surrounding it.
September 9, 2022
Read:2/20
Could have been better. Not very romantic. The ending was confusing .
Read:7/22
Very well written with great character development!
I enjoyed this story more the second time around. Eleanor's brother drugs her so his vile friend can rape her. Lord Kit Delaney is drugged also and believes Eleanor is a prostitute. He is gay and trying to prove his manhood.
After the rape, Eleanor runs away right into the arms of her rapiest brother. Nicholas being a decent man marries Eleanor. They actually slowly fall in love. But Nicholas is gone a lot.
Nicholas has one problem. He is a spy. He has to convince an ex mistress to handover the plans for Napoleon's escape from Elba. Nicholas does cheat on Eleanor for his job. Of course that becomes a problem when he falls in love with his wife.
I love the side characters in the book. A very interesting group. I would love to read their stories.
While, I didn't love the book, it's still worth a read!
FYI: It's free on KU right now
Could have been better. Not very romantic. The ending was confusing .
Read:7/22
Very well written with great character development!
I enjoyed this story more the second time around. Eleanor's brother drugs her so his vile friend can rape her. Lord Kit Delaney is drugged also and believes Eleanor is a prostitute. He is gay and trying to prove his manhood.
After the rape, Eleanor runs away right into the arms of her rapiest brother. Nicholas being a decent man marries Eleanor. They actually slowly fall in love. But Nicholas is gone a lot.
Nicholas has one problem. He is a spy. He has to convince an ex mistress to handover the plans for Napoleon's escape from Elba. Nicholas does cheat on Eleanor for his job. Of course that becomes a problem when he falls in love with his wife.
I love the side characters in the book. A very interesting group. I would love to read their stories.
While, I didn't love the book, it's still worth a read!
FYI: It's free on KU right now
January 16, 2019
Eleanor Chivenham lives in a HOUSE OF SIN. So obviously when there's a knock at her door in the middle of an orgy, she answers it to discover a surly maid with some drugged tea. Then her super-gross brother convinces the equally-drugged Christopher "Kit" Delaney, Earl of Stainbridge to have some sex with the prostitute upstairs to prove he's not into dudes. The next day, Kit rescues Eleanor from a suicide attempt and convinces her to marry his twin brother Nicholas, who he helpfully explains is the one who raped her the night before because "[h]e can be a little wild, but was concerned about what had occurred at your brother's house."
Yes, this book opens with the literal drugging and rape of the heroine by her future brother-in-law WHO THEN LIES TO HER ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED TO HER.
So she ends up married to handsome, suave, debonair Nicholas Delaney who is so handsome, suave, and debonair that she immediately feels trust for this man who she believes raped her. LUCKILY FOR HER she discovers the truth allowing her to get on with making the marriage consumed!!
Also Nicholas is allegedly a spy for the British government and is tasked with seducing secrets of a Napoleonic plot out of a French courtesan which TURNS HIS SENSITIVE STOMACH and makes Eleanor WRITHE WITH JEALOUSIES and eventually results in kidnapping, estrangement, etc.
Honestly: what a ride.
1. This book doesn't necessarily paint Eleanor's trauma with a light brush, but it absolutely paints it with a ... ludicrous brush? It's not well handled AT ALL. It's really only brought up when there is a need for dramatic tension: i.e., will Eleanor go to bed with Nicholas? NOT IF HER RESIDUAL FEAR RUINS THIS SEXY MOMENT. (This is gross, btw: I am by no means attempting to undermine VERY REAL RESIDUAL FEAR AND TRAUMA.) There's also the very attractive moment where Nicholas chastises Eleanor for not wanting to spend any time with HER RAPIST KIT ALSO KNOWN AS THE MAN WHO LIED TO HER ABOUT COMMITTING THE RAPE AND WHO ATTEMPTED TO PIN IT ON HIS BROTHER INSTEAD. Her husband tells her, "I would ask you to try and forgive Kit, however, and forget if possible. For better or worse we are a family now. Though I don't always like what Kit does, the bond between us is too strong to be broken."
I MEAN WHAT THE FUCK.
So Eleanor takes this badly, THANK GOD, and fucking rips Nicholas a new one. ("Good heavens, I had quite forgotten [...] I am the Delaney bride. Share and share alike, I suppose. So am I to forgive Kit, am I? And behave with him as if nothing had ever happened. And what else? Perhaps I should live with him three days a week. And three nights?")
NICHOLAS FUCKING RESPONDS WITH "LOL U MUST BE PREGNANT. I HEARD WOMEN GET STRANGE IDEAS WHEN THEY'RE KNOCKED UP LOL LOL"
2. I would love to say that I was smart and did not finish this dumpster fire of a book BUT I DID. I DID. I READ THE WHOLE THING. THIS BULLET POINT IS ENTIRELY TO COMPLAIN ABOUT THE BIGGEST MESS OF ALL: YOURS TRULY.
3. Eleanor wasn't a total loss of a heroine. She has moments of fire and brimstone and intelligence that were engaging and interesting. I wanted her to be happy, especially in light of the epic bullshit shower she has to deal with. Did I like her and Nicholas together? Not particularly. Did I find her flirtations with other members of the company of rogues intriguing and interesting? Absolutely I did.
4. FUCK NICHOLAS. After all of the above listed complaints, I am also lodging complaints over the lack of groveling at the close of the novel. He fucking kept Eleanor on tenterhooks for sixish months and then has the audacity to be like "LISTEN THREE (3) WEEKS IS TOO MUCH" like FUCK OFF AND WAIT. Grovel. Beg. APOLOGIZE YOU COCKSURE BASTARD.
Yes, this book opens with the literal drugging and rape of the heroine by her future brother-in-law WHO THEN LIES TO HER ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED TO HER.
So she ends up married to handsome, suave, debonair Nicholas Delaney who is so handsome, suave, and debonair that she immediately feels trust for this man who she believes raped her. LUCKILY FOR HER she discovers the truth allowing her to get on with making the marriage consumed!!
Also Nicholas is allegedly a spy for the British government and is tasked with seducing secrets of a Napoleonic plot out of a French courtesan which TURNS HIS SENSITIVE STOMACH and makes Eleanor WRITHE WITH JEALOUSIES and eventually results in kidnapping, estrangement, etc.
Honestly: what a ride.
1. This book doesn't necessarily paint Eleanor's trauma with a light brush, but it absolutely paints it with a ... ludicrous brush? It's not well handled AT ALL. It's really only brought up when there is a need for dramatic tension: i.e., will Eleanor go to bed with Nicholas? NOT IF HER RESIDUAL FEAR RUINS THIS SEXY MOMENT. (This is gross, btw: I am by no means attempting to undermine VERY REAL RESIDUAL FEAR AND TRAUMA.) There's also the very attractive moment where Nicholas chastises Eleanor for not wanting to spend any time with HER RAPIST KIT ALSO KNOWN AS THE MAN WHO LIED TO HER ABOUT COMMITTING THE RAPE AND WHO ATTEMPTED TO PIN IT ON HIS BROTHER INSTEAD. Her husband tells her, "I would ask you to try and forgive Kit, however, and forget if possible. For better or worse we are a family now. Though I don't always like what Kit does, the bond between us is too strong to be broken."
I MEAN WHAT THE FUCK.
So Eleanor takes this badly, THANK GOD, and fucking rips Nicholas a new one. ("Good heavens, I had quite forgotten [...] I am the Delaney bride. Share and share alike, I suppose. So am I to forgive Kit, am I? And behave with him as if nothing had ever happened. And what else? Perhaps I should live with him three days a week. And three nights?")
NICHOLAS FUCKING RESPONDS WITH "LOL U MUST BE PREGNANT. I HEARD WOMEN GET STRANGE IDEAS WHEN THEY'RE KNOCKED UP LOL LOL"
2. I would love to say that I was smart and did not finish this dumpster fire of a book BUT I DID. I DID. I READ THE WHOLE THING. THIS BULLET POINT IS ENTIRELY TO COMPLAIN ABOUT THE BIGGEST MESS OF ALL: YOURS TRULY.
3. Eleanor wasn't a total loss of a heroine. She has moments of fire and brimstone and intelligence that were engaging and interesting. I wanted her to be happy, especially in light of the epic bullshit shower she has to deal with. Did I like her and Nicholas together? Not particularly. Did I find her flirtations with other members of the company of rogues intriguing and interesting? Absolutely I did.
4. FUCK NICHOLAS. After all of the above listed complaints, I am also lodging complaints over the lack of groveling at the close of the novel. He fucking kept Eleanor on tenterhooks for sixish months and then has the audacity to be like "LISTEN THREE (3) WEEKS IS TOO MUCH" like FUCK OFF AND WAIT. Grovel. Beg. APOLOGIZE YOU COCKSURE BASTARD.
August 20, 2020
Nunca antes había leído a Jo Beverley, pero me animé gracias al Reto Rita 3.0. Al principio me costó acostumbrarme a su estilo, pero una vez que le agarras el ritmo se disfruta de una prosa ágil y muy rica en descripciones, así como en la forma que traspasa los sentimientos de sus personajes.
A pesar de lo anterior, dudé mucho mi valoración para esta novela (estaba entre 2 o 3 estrellas). Lo que pasa es que la forma en que la autora aborda la trama hace casi imposible que se desarrolle la relación entre Eleanor y Nicholas (las circunstancias los forzaban a mantenerse alejados), por lo que el romance me quedó muy, muy, muy al debe.
Pero finalmente me decanto por las tres estrellitas, en reconocimiento al estilo narrativo, a la caracterización de los personajes (varios secundarios son incluso más atractivos que los principales) y a algunos aspectos del argumento que no son comunes en el género y que me imagino son los que causan tanta controversia según otros comentarios que he leído, pero que bajo mi punto de vista le dan un toque de originalidad y sacan de la zona de confort.
Reto Rita 3.0 (abril)
Reto #28 PopSugar 2019: Un libro que incluya una boda
A pesar de lo anterior, dudé mucho mi valoración para esta novela (estaba entre 2 o 3 estrellas). Lo que pasa es que la forma en que la autora aborda la trama hace casi imposible que se desarrolle la relación entre Eleanor y Nicholas (las circunstancias los forzaban a mantenerse alejados), por lo que el romance me quedó muy, muy, muy al debe.
Pero finalmente me decanto por las tres estrellitas, en reconocimiento al estilo narrativo, a la caracterización de los personajes (varios secundarios son incluso más atractivos que los principales) y a algunos aspectos del argumento que no son comunes en el género y que me imagino son los que causan tanta controversia según otros comentarios que he leído, pero que bajo mi punto de vista le dan un toque de originalidad y sacan de la zona de confort.
Reto Rita 3.0 (abril)
Reto #28 PopSugar 2019: Un libro que incluya una boda
June 4, 2009
Although Forbidden is still my favorite because I loved Frances and Serena as a couple so much (plus Francis is a virgin hero), this is an incredibly effective book. There are so many reasons why this story could have gone the wrong way for me: First and foremost, the hero commits the unthinkable for me in a romance, adultery. However, he has reasons that I could not argue with. He has been asked to cozy up to his former mistress who is actually a morally bankrupt spy, and in order to do that, pillow talk is essential. Also, Eleanor and Nicholas do not have an emotional commitment (this alone would not have been enough for me). Eleanor is dealing with the trauma of having been raped, also living in a household with a brother who is a complete libertine, and never feeling safe. She is way too traumatized to be a 'real wife' to Nicholas initially. Then there's the fact that Eleanor was drugged and offered out to be raped from a person she should have been able to trust, her brother. She is raped by Nicholas' titled brother, who is actually gay, but is hiding it. He rapes her to help preserve his reputation as a heterosexual (there are questions). So you would think, okay, this is a romance? But yes, it is.
It's a bit different for a romance. And the relationship between Nicholas and Eleanor develops very slowly. There is a sexual enconter between them on their wedding night, but it's fairly passionless. Nicholas felt that they should have this so that in their mind, the child that Eleanor could be carrying could be her husband's. Okay, I had no quarrel with that.
I liked the aspect of seeing this couple come to know each other and build a marriage together on what should have been a very shaky foundation. But somehow, a strong bond develops between them. It is nice to see them in later books as they form a happy family and love each other deeply.
Of course, Eleanor has issues with Nicholas' brother. I can't blame her at all. I think he was a loser and a jerk. In a way, he seemed surprised at how much Eleanor despised him. Hello! Not only did he wrong Eleanor terribly, but then he begged his untitled brother to marry her in case of consequences. I have nothing against him as a closeted gay person. I just thought he could have been a man and owned up to what he did.
At any rate, I really did like this book.
It's a bit different for a romance. And the relationship between Nicholas and Eleanor develops very slowly. There is a sexual enconter between them on their wedding night, but it's fairly passionless. Nicholas felt that they should have this so that in their mind, the child that Eleanor could be carrying could be her husband's. Okay, I had no quarrel with that.
I liked the aspect of seeing this couple come to know each other and build a marriage together on what should have been a very shaky foundation. But somehow, a strong bond develops between them. It is nice to see them in later books as they form a happy family and love each other deeply.
Of course, Eleanor has issues with Nicholas' brother. I can't blame her at all. I think he was a loser and a jerk. In a way, he seemed surprised at how much Eleanor despised him. Hello! Not only did he wrong Eleanor terribly, but then he begged his untitled brother to marry her in case of consequences. I have nothing against him as a closeted gay person. I just thought he could have been a man and owned up to what he did.
At any rate, I really did like this book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 9, 2019
What an odd, bizarre story presented in a slow measured way.
Naturally the ratings veer crazily. Since I felt invested enough to see where it went so I give it an almost 3.
The beginning and the basis of the h/H relationship is beyond peculiar to say the least.
As the story settles into humdrum domesticity, I almost forgot the icky beginning.
But then the H decides to shag the ow for the flag. Poor sod! Poor Bloody James Regency Bond! Twilight zoned with a bang!
Details?
And although the reviews for #2 are similarly un-encouraging, I wish to visit it for myself!
Naturally the ratings veer crazily. Since I felt invested enough to see where it went so I give it an almost 3.
The beginning and the basis of the h/H relationship is beyond peculiar to say the least.
As the story settles into humdrum domesticity, I almost forgot the icky beginning.
But then the H decides to shag the ow for the flag. Poor sod! Poor Bloody James Regency Bond! Twilight zoned with a bang!
Details?
And although the reviews for #2 are similarly un-encouraging, I wish to visit it for myself!
March 19, 2011
So I'm home sick with a terrible cold and thought to myself, self, you need to read something pleasant. Perhaps a re-read of a book you love? Nope, did that yesterday with Goddess of the Hunt. Aaah, LOVE that book. Maybe I'll try one I bought last week at the used book store. Like this one, "An Arranged Marriage". Sounds promising.
My first inclination that this book was going to be a BIT different was the rape at the beginning. Notice I said rape, not forced seduction. This is a drugged, forced against her will with others in the room holding her down rape.
The heroine has a repugnant brother, who has gambled away his inheritance and seeks to get his hands on Eleanor's. He has set up a marriage for Eleanor to one of his drinking buddies (Eleanor describes him as smelling like a corpse) and in order to get that done he drugs Eleanor. He then drugs another man, Lord Stainbridge - and threatens to expose his unnatural proclivities to society and offers him a valuable jade (threatens and bribes all at the same time, wow!) in order that he will bed his sister. Of course, he tells Lord Stainbridge she is a prostitute.
In the immortal words of Bill and Ted, "Whoa".
As if all that isn't enough, the next day Lord Stainbridge (feeling rather icky, to say the least) goes to the brother's home to spy and catches the woman he raped the night before just as she is about to throw herself into the river. He brings her back to his home, where he spins a tale about his twin brother and how HE was the one who raped her, and that he will make his brother marry her.
Lord Stainbridge sends a letter to the Earl of Stainbridge (his twin) and confesses all to him. Then asks him to marry Eleanor and threatens to cut him off if he doesn't.
At this point, I'm thinking - woohoo! This is going to be different, maybe a bit twisted, and finally, I can recommend a book to Karla (Mossy Love Grotto) that she'll actually like.
Not to be, alas. That first bit must have just been a tease.
They get married, have some wooden dialogue, some drawing-room repartee, some really boring sex, then, we find out he's a spy (of sorts) and is expected to recommence an affair with an ex-lover to extract some secrets for the government. So he leaves her at home with all of his school friends (after telling them all to keep her busy, as they ALL know he is off schtupping his ex for his country).
No more mention of the gay brother, or her brother. Wait, the gay brother shows up for dinner and is all snarky with everyone for no reason I can tell. Is he a bad guy, or just repressed, misunderstood and miserable?
I actually liked a couple of the hero's friends more than I liked the hero. She should have cheated on him with either of them. That might have made the book more interesting.
Oh well, when I left these silly people Eleanor was expecting, Nicholas was spending all of his time with his former mistress, and I couldn't have cared less how it all ended up. What happened to her brother in the end? What about the closeted twin? I'll leave that for a day when I have absolutely NOTHING else to read, or for someone to send me a message and tell me.
My first inclination that this book was going to be a BIT different was the rape at the beginning. Notice I said rape, not forced seduction. This is a drugged, forced against her will with others in the room holding her down rape.
The heroine has a repugnant brother, who has gambled away his inheritance and seeks to get his hands on Eleanor's. He has set up a marriage for Eleanor to one of his drinking buddies (Eleanor describes him as smelling like a corpse) and in order to get that done he drugs Eleanor. He then drugs another man, Lord Stainbridge - and threatens to expose his unnatural proclivities to society and offers him a valuable jade (threatens and bribes all at the same time, wow!) in order that he will bed his sister. Of course, he tells Lord Stainbridge she is a prostitute.
In the immortal words of Bill and Ted, "Whoa".
As if all that isn't enough, the next day Lord Stainbridge (feeling rather icky, to say the least) goes to the brother's home to spy and catches the woman he raped the night before just as she is about to throw herself into the river. He brings her back to his home, where he spins a tale about his twin brother and how HE was the one who raped her, and that he will make his brother marry her.
Lord Stainbridge sends a letter to the Earl of Stainbridge (his twin) and confesses all to him. Then asks him to marry Eleanor and threatens to cut him off if he doesn't.
At this point, I'm thinking - woohoo! This is going to be different, maybe a bit twisted, and finally, I can recommend a book to Karla (Mossy Love Grotto) that she'll actually like.
Not to be, alas. That first bit must have just been a tease.
They get married, have some wooden dialogue, some drawing-room repartee, some really boring sex, then, we find out he's a spy (of sorts) and is expected to recommence an affair with an ex-lover to extract some secrets for the government. So he leaves her at home with all of his school friends (after telling them all to keep her busy, as they ALL know he is off schtupping his ex for his country).
No more mention of the gay brother, or her brother. Wait, the gay brother shows up for dinner and is all snarky with everyone for no reason I can tell. Is he a bad guy, or just repressed, misunderstood and miserable?
I actually liked a couple of the hero's friends more than I liked the hero. She should have cheated on him with either of them. That might have made the book more interesting.
Oh well, when I left these silly people Eleanor was expecting, Nicholas was spending all of his time with his former mistress, and I couldn't have cared less how it all ended up. What happened to her brother in the end? What about the closeted twin? I'll leave that for a day when I have absolutely NOTHING else to read, or for someone to send me a message and tell me.
July 14, 2020
3.5 stars
I have read this one in paperback form many times. I found it for Kindle and decided to re-read again. I like this book and the characters. Why did I knock off stars this time? I had forgotten that the ending is somewhat abrupt. I would like to see an epilogue. No one expected the H to grovel. Even though he was a spy and working for the British government, the H needed to grovel, not just be tormented, and he needed to court/woo the h. Also, I didn't think the H/h had spent much time together to go from high regard and liking each other to loving each other.
I have read the other books in the series about the Company of Rogues. May do a re-read of the series.
I have read this one in paperback form many times. I found it for Kindle and decided to re-read again. I like this book and the characters. Why did I knock off stars this time? I had forgotten that the ending is somewhat abrupt. I would like to see an epilogue. No one expected the H to grovel. Even though he was a spy and working for the British government, the H needed to grovel, not just be tormented, and he needed to court/woo the h. Also, I didn't think the H/h had spent much time together to go from high regard and liking each other to loving each other.
I have read the other books in the series about the Company of Rogues. May do a re-read of the series.
July 4, 2023
I’ve felt like this deserved a reread for a while. I still didn’t LOVE it, but the nonsensical parts didn’t bother me quite as much this time, so I’ll go up to 3 ⭐’s.
Don’t get me wrong, I still think the plot is very illogical with numerous plot holes, but I was prepared. My biggest grump is that everything… and I mean every THING that could/should generate some type of emotional response falls flat because Eleanor is written with the personality of a robot. Hardly anything ever bothers her, and she brings up nothing to her husband. It was such a missed opportunity for angst.
Bottom Line- OK not great. It wasn’t very romantic because they don’t spend much time together. I didn’t ever feel connected to them because it’s hard to feel anything when the mc placidly sits around shrugging her shoulders while he smirks with witty, charming but non-informative remarks. I wanted her to speak up, stamp her foot, call her cheating husband out on his actions, initiate a conversation…something. Anything. It was all so blasé… and big stuff is going on… Not to mention, the book is filled with terrible people, and no one gets any comeuppance. I also felt like we needed more resolution in the ending, it was rather abrupt.
***Original Review***
2 generous stars
I am on a bit of a historical binge and came across this one on KU. It tells the story of Eleanor and Nicholas. The basis of the story is pretty farfetched. The actions of the characters are ridiculous.
SPOILERS….
Eleanor is raped by Kit, (he was threatened to be blackmailed about being gay if he didn’t ravage the wench upstairs) and her reputation is in tatters. Kit feels guilty…but not too guilty and forces his brother (or be cut off) to marry her.
Eleanor is given 3 choices… marry a mean skeevy dude, marry the brother who she thinks raped her (Kit lied), or be set up in the country as a widow. Eleanor, who apparently has zero emotions or feelings chooses to marry her rapist.
**Rape is a very touchy subject to attempt in books, and I must say this has to be the most fluffy, non-traumatic, flippant way I have ever seen it addressed.
N & E agree to a wedding of convenience, rather than love. But he’s very kind to her and will even raise the potential child from his brother’s rape. They talk things over, realize Kit lied, and decide to consummate the marriage. Soon they both start to have feelings for each other, but there is the pesky issue of his mistress... that you know, he must screw to obtain info from... cuz he’s a spy.
I guess it’s probably because mistresses were common during these time periods, but I’m over all the damn mistresses and cheating. The cheating is handled from afar. We aren’t privy to any of his time with the OW except one scene with a few kisses)
E is quite aware of it, but he basically pushed her away (really just avoids her) because he is a gentleman and can’t stand the thought of hopping from OW to wife’s beds. This is about the only direct insight we get on the nasty business, when it is suggested, he be honest with her.
“Dear Eleanor,” he parodied, “excuse me while I go off and make mad passionate love in a number of novel, and occasionally disgusting, ways to a woman I hate. You don’t mind do you dear? It is after all for the good of the country.”
So yeah, it’s a little better because he was an “undercover lover” prior to becoming married, and they do initially agree to a marriage of convenience, but it bugged the crap out of me that it didn’t bug the crap out of her. She was so understanding, never called him out, wouldn’t let him see her hurt feelings, justified it all. She even sits docilely by his side as he bluntly tells her and his friends all about it.
Don’t get me wrong, I still think the plot is very illogical with numerous plot holes, but I was prepared. My biggest grump is that everything… and I mean every THING that could/should generate some type of emotional response falls flat because Eleanor is written with the personality of a robot. Hardly anything ever bothers her, and she brings up nothing to her husband. It was such a missed opportunity for angst.
Bottom Line- OK not great. It wasn’t very romantic because they don’t spend much time together. I didn’t ever feel connected to them because it’s hard to feel anything when the mc placidly sits around shrugging her shoulders while he smirks with witty, charming but non-informative remarks. I wanted her to speak up, stamp her foot, call her cheating husband out on his actions, initiate a conversation…something. Anything. It was all so blasé… and big stuff is going on… Not to mention, the book is filled with terrible people, and no one gets any comeuppance. I also felt like we needed more resolution in the ending, it was rather abrupt.
***Original Review***
2 generous stars
I am on a bit of a historical binge and came across this one on KU. It tells the story of Eleanor and Nicholas. The basis of the story is pretty farfetched. The actions of the characters are ridiculous.
SPOILERS….
Eleanor is raped by Kit, (he was threatened to be blackmailed about being gay if he didn’t ravage the wench upstairs) and her reputation is in tatters. Kit feels guilty…but not too guilty and forces his brother (or be cut off) to marry her.
Eleanor is given 3 choices… marry a mean skeevy dude, marry the brother who she thinks raped her (Kit lied), or be set up in the country as a widow. Eleanor, who apparently has zero emotions or feelings chooses to marry her rapist.
**Rape is a very touchy subject to attempt in books, and I must say this has to be the most fluffy, non-traumatic, flippant way I have ever seen it addressed.
N & E agree to a wedding of convenience, rather than love. But he’s very kind to her and will even raise the potential child from his brother’s rape. They talk things over, realize Kit lied, and decide to consummate the marriage. Soon they both start to have feelings for each other, but there is the pesky issue of his mistress... that you know, he must screw to obtain info from... cuz he’s a spy.
I guess it’s probably because mistresses were common during these time periods, but I’m over all the damn mistresses and cheating. The cheating is handled from afar. We aren’t privy to any of his time with the OW except one scene with a few kisses)
E is quite aware of it, but he basically pushed her away (really just avoids her) because he is a gentleman and can’t stand the thought of hopping from OW to wife’s beds. This is about the only direct insight we get on the nasty business, when it is suggested, he be honest with her.
“Dear Eleanor,” he parodied, “excuse me while I go off and make mad passionate love in a number of novel, and occasionally disgusting, ways to a woman I hate. You don’t mind do you dear? It is after all for the good of the country.”
So yeah, it’s a little better because he was an “undercover lover” prior to becoming married, and they do initially agree to a marriage of convenience, but it bugged the crap out of me that it didn’t bug the crap out of her. She was so understanding, never called him out, wouldn’t let him see her hurt feelings, justified it all. She even sits docilely by his side as he bluntly tells her and his friends all about it.
to-avoid
May 11, 2009From K. @ Ami:
'I spent all night working and "torturing myself" listening to Jo Beverley's "An Arranged Marriage." I think I stuck with it so long because my 50% audiobooks were turning out to be a lesson in "you get what you pay for," and I didn't want ALL of them to be one huge waste of money. This book was just flat out awful. If I sat down and wrote out a list of plot devices that I would despise in a romance novel . . . this book would contain them all.
1) Top of the list: Cheating! However, JoBev couches it in the guise of "I'm noble and just doing it for the sake of God and country." PLEASE!! (I know, I know seton -- you warned me!! ;) If the cheating itself (which continued through most of the book) is not bad enough, we get "treated" to an actual detailed LOVE scene of the hero with the villain mistress! (Oh . . . don't worry, she let's us know he's "disgusted" between each detailed line of "kissing her breasts" and running his fingers over her thighs, "just how she likes it." Ooww!!) Was that necessary? Did JoBev think my mental picture needed more enhancement in that regard?!! I can't imagine why JoBev felt this scene needed to be included whatsoever. After that . . . just throw in some drugging and raping; alluding to (I think?) the homosexual predisposition by the rapist (the brother of our hero) whom I can't figure out if he's a good character or a villain, or whether the (apparent?) homosexual traits are supposed to be good or bad as she depicts them!?! I can't even form a complete thought on it to write a comprehensive sentence about it! It's that confusing. Sheesh! :D
2) Full of underdeveloped cardboard, cliche characters inserted in the story at awkward moments, all of which I could have cared less about. Some kind of "aunt" (I think?) comes out of nowhere at practically the end of the story who had the most grating personality I can imagine. I'm certain she was supposed to come off as the lovable in a "wise old cranky" spinster (before her time) feminist sidekick aunt. Not!
3) The hero and heroine spend about 90% of the story apart, and in practically the last chapter where you think they are finally going to spend some "quality" time together on the same page . . . the heroine tells him to go away for another three weeks so she can think about it! WTF!!! AHHHH! Consequently, their relationship falls into the author's "telling" me they should be in love, rather than "showing" category.
4) The scenes don't feel like they "track" well. There's just too much going on, without enough explanation to fill the plot holes. Both the main espionage theme is "jerky" and underdeveloped, and the romance is as well (pick a theme, any theme . . . but give us at least one that's fleshed out).
5) JoBev absolutely makes sure you know this book is the beginning of a long series. She's all over the place trying to "set up" future books. (Toward the end, she goes so far as to have an actual scene where the hero sits all their "friends" down in the drawing room and explains the entire plot to them . . .and us, I'm sure!! LOL! I''m not kidding -- It feels like he needed a dry erase board and flow chart to go with it. :D) Too bad she doesn't focus on writing a good introductory book that makes you want to read the series.
On my personal scale of good to bad, this book made "Flowers From the Storm" look good! I think you all know what that means coming from me. LOL! At least FFTS was well-written and "tracked," if not a satisfying love story. This book is a failure on every front I can think of, and I'm amazed it came from the same author that penned "My Lady Notorious." Complete opposite ends of the spectrum. I usually try not to be so harsh on any given author/book . . . but this time I just can't find one redeeming aspect to rely on.'
'I spent all night working and "torturing myself" listening to Jo Beverley's "An Arranged Marriage." I think I stuck with it so long because my 50% audiobooks were turning out to be a lesson in "you get what you pay for," and I didn't want ALL of them to be one huge waste of money. This book was just flat out awful. If I sat down and wrote out a list of plot devices that I would despise in a romance novel . . . this book would contain them all.
1) Top of the list: Cheating! However, JoBev couches it in the guise of "I'm noble and just doing it for the sake of God and country." PLEASE!! (I know, I know seton -- you warned me!! ;) If the cheating itself (which continued through most of the book) is not bad enough, we get "treated" to an actual detailed LOVE scene of the hero with the villain mistress! (Oh . . . don't worry, she let's us know he's "disgusted" between each detailed line of "kissing her breasts" and running his fingers over her thighs, "just how she likes it." Ooww!!) Was that necessary? Did JoBev think my mental picture needed more enhancement in that regard?!! I can't imagine why JoBev felt this scene needed to be included whatsoever. After that . . . just throw in some drugging and raping; alluding to (I think?) the homosexual predisposition by the rapist (the brother of our hero) whom I can't figure out if he's a good character or a villain, or whether the (apparent?) homosexual traits are supposed to be good or bad as she depicts them!?! I can't even form a complete thought on it to write a comprehensive sentence about it! It's that confusing. Sheesh! :D
2) Full of underdeveloped cardboard, cliche characters inserted in the story at awkward moments, all of which I could have cared less about. Some kind of "aunt" (I think?) comes out of nowhere at practically the end of the story who had the most grating personality I can imagine. I'm certain she was supposed to come off as the lovable in a "wise old cranky" spinster (before her time) feminist sidekick aunt. Not!
3) The hero and heroine spend about 90% of the story apart, and in practically the last chapter where you think they are finally going to spend some "quality" time together on the same page . . . the heroine tells him to go away for another three weeks so she can think about it! WTF!!! AHHHH! Consequently, their relationship falls into the author's "telling" me they should be in love, rather than "showing" category.
4) The scenes don't feel like they "track" well. There's just too much going on, without enough explanation to fill the plot holes. Both the main espionage theme is "jerky" and underdeveloped, and the romance is as well (pick a theme, any theme . . . but give us at least one that's fleshed out).
5) JoBev absolutely makes sure you know this book is the beginning of a long series. She's all over the place trying to "set up" future books. (Toward the end, she goes so far as to have an actual scene where the hero sits all their "friends" down in the drawing room and explains the entire plot to them . . .and us, I'm sure!! LOL! I''m not kidding -- It feels like he needed a dry erase board and flow chart to go with it. :D) Too bad she doesn't focus on writing a good introductory book that makes you want to read the series.
On my personal scale of good to bad, this book made "Flowers From the Storm" look good! I think you all know what that means coming from me. LOL! At least FFTS was well-written and "tracked," if not a satisfying love story. This book is a failure on every front I can think of, and I'm amazed it came from the same author that penned "My Lady Notorious." Complete opposite ends of the spectrum. I usually try not to be so harsh on any given author/book . . . but this time I just can't find one redeeming aspect to rely on.'
October 18, 2011
Horrible story. It starts off with the heroine being raped by the hero's brother, who was drugged by the heroine's vile and useless brother, after which the hero agrees to marry her for honour or something, although it's advertised to others as an elopement. The hero then spends most of the book in an affair with a French whore because he's some sort of a spy and has to have sex with her constantly in order to uncover some plot involving Napoleon. It's never really explained why the only way he can solve the plot is to have sex with the Frenchwoman, even though it is horribly humiliating for the heroine (apparently everyone in London knows what he's doing). Then the useless brother gets mixed up in a plot with the French whore, blackmails his sister, and agrees to arrange to have her kidnapped by the whore and her buddies, for no reason that I could figure out. At this point I threw the book against the wall.
Funny how Jo Beverley can write some fabulous books that are on my "absolute keepers" list, and others that are dreadful like this one and Christmas Angel, which was the first one of hers that I read. I disliked that one so much that it took several years for me to attempt another one by Beverley.
Funny how Jo Beverley can write some fabulous books that are on my "absolute keepers" list, and others that are dreadful like this one and Christmas Angel, which was the first one of hers that I read. I disliked that one so much that it took several years for me to attempt another one by Beverley.
July 20, 2015
One of the heaviest and most brutal books I have ever read. Heroine gets raped by hero's gay brother, to prove that he's a hetero, and forced to marry hero in case of 'consequences'. And soon after their marriage, there is another scene where the hero practically rapes the heroine, because if she does get pregnant, the child could be her husband's, so they could rest easy knowing that. Ugh. I don't know how I read the story after that, but I did. It was several years ago.
This put put me off Beverley, but I still gave her a chance and read the second one of this series. Another 1 star. Never read any of her books after that.
This put put me off Beverley, but I still gave her a chance and read the second one of this series. Another 1 star. Never read any of her books after that.
April 28, 2011
I feel like I've been violated. Ms. Beverley has ignored a very basic tenet of romance writing. Readers are supposed to believe that "love has conquered all" and that these two people have found a "once in a lifetime love." Isn't that why we buy a romance? But what we got was rape, adultery, and abandonment. This book doesn't deserve to be called a romance.
March 31, 2014
This book didn't work for me on pretty much any level. The hero is so unlikable (he's cheating on his pregnant wife for most of the book. But it's all for some supposed espionage plot that he's trying to uncover, so that makes it all okay.) He is quite conceited, treats Eleanor badly and hopes she'll get over it someday. He doesn't even really make an effort to get to know her, but gives her a few presents and hopes that makes it all better. Eleanor, the heroine, is so flat as a character it was almost a caricature. She was raped, but pretty much shrugs it off. She's asked to accept her rapist as family and marry his twin brother, and is all, okay, whatevs. She rarely has any emotional reactions at all, and if she does, she immediately apologizes for it. It's entirely unrelatable. The villains don't get any comeuppance at all, most confrontations that would have made the book interesting are done off-stage, and the relationship between our hero and heroine had no rootability to it. Definitely not a book I would recommend.
January 20, 2017
0.5
This is one of those times I should have read all the damn spoilers. I could have spared myself. One can never know. I won't tell everything that happens here but I won't bother marking anything as spoiler either. Be warned. I wish I had been.
I am too lazy to list all the things that are horrible in this book and I don't think it deserves more than a reminder of why I hated it. I'll just mention some of the worst.
The hero cheats on his wife almost the whole book. I'm sorry, but it stops being an enjoyable romance when one of the characters does that. And the ridiculous he did it for his country or he gave only his body excuse is insulting. One line is too much, let alone most of the damn book.
And the heroine? God, she is even worse, a total doormat. I'll give you just one of the lines this precious snowflake says: 'I only thought it would help me to establish a good relationship with him if I understood things better.' This is about her rapist.
I wish someone had warned me.
This is one of those times I should have read all the damn spoilers. I could have spared myself. One can never know. I won't tell everything that happens here but I won't bother marking anything as spoiler either. Be warned. I wish I had been.
I am too lazy to list all the things that are horrible in this book and I don't think it deserves more than a reminder of why I hated it. I'll just mention some of the worst.
The hero cheats on his wife almost the whole book. I'm sorry, but it stops being an enjoyable romance when one of the characters does that. And the ridiculous he did it for his country or he gave only his body excuse is insulting. One line is too much, let alone most of the damn book.
And the heroine? God, she is even worse, a total doormat. I'll give you just one of the lines this precious snowflake says: 'I only thought it would help me to establish a good relationship with him if I understood things better.' This is about her rapist.
I wish someone had warned me.
June 16, 2014
Trying to tidy up my TBR list, I decided to tackle some books that have been there for a while. I should have known better, damn me.
If there were minus point for a book I would probably award them to this book. It's not one of the hateful or hideous one. But you really wonder how it could win any prize. The hate for the heroine and her total lack of worth is all mine, but there's no way to deny that this book is all over the place. It has an incredibly stupid plot, with a totally uneven pacing, and characters you could gleefully murder. Please, please, read this.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
And then these:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
The story lacks foundations, breaks any pact with the readers, and keeps choosing the easy way out. It meanders, steamrolling the heroine in its wake, and it succeeded in boring some readers to tears and probably enraging the rest.
The hero is an ass, stupid, conceited, and absolutely worthless in my eyes. Add to this one of the stupidest heroine you can think of, and clearly this spelled disaster to me.
But while I can suffer any fool, heroines are my pet peeves. I need strong women of some substance. Here we have a paper thin doormat. Worse she's completely fake. She's drugged by her brother who has her raped. Her rapist denies, unburden himself of her on his brother, and proceed to arrange a marriage to this brother letting her believe he's the culprit. Her husband cheats on her for all the book (for the sake of England, mind you!), abuses her, manipulates her. His friends cover for him (sake of England, remember!), lie to her. Her brother sells her a second time. And not once this idiot reacts to anything. [Why the hell add a rape if you then ignore it completely?]
I honestly hate her with a passion. She hasn't suffered enough in my eyes. Sorry. :)Plus, there should have been some serious grovelling here, and it should have been by more than one character....:D
The only saving grace was one of the villains, there was a moment where I really was rooting for this character.
If there were minus point for a book I would probably award them to this book. It's not one of the hateful or hideous one. But you really wonder how it could win any prize. The hate for the heroine and her total lack of worth is all mine, but there's no way to deny that this book is all over the place. It has an incredibly stupid plot, with a totally uneven pacing, and characters you could gleefully murder. Please, please, read this.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
And then these:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
The story lacks foundations, breaks any pact with the readers, and keeps choosing the easy way out. It meanders, steamrolling the heroine in its wake, and it succeeded in boring some readers to tears and probably enraging the rest.
The hero is an ass, stupid, conceited, and absolutely worthless in my eyes. Add to this one of the stupidest heroine you can think of, and clearly this spelled disaster to me.
But while I can suffer any fool, heroines are my pet peeves. I need strong women of some substance. Here we have a paper thin doormat. Worse she's completely fake. She's drugged by her brother who has her raped. Her rapist denies, unburden himself of her on his brother, and proceed to arrange a marriage to this brother letting her believe he's the culprit. Her husband cheats on her for all the book (for the sake of England, mind you!), abuses her, manipulates her. His friends cover for him (sake of England, remember!), lie to her. Her brother sells her a second time. And not once this idiot reacts to anything. [Why the hell add a rape if you then ignore it completely?]
I honestly hate her with a passion. She hasn't suffered enough in my eyes. Sorry. :)Plus, there should have been some serious grovelling here, and it should have been by more than one character....:D
The only saving grace was one of the villains, there was a moment where I really was rooting for this character.
May 3, 2016
Terminado, y mi opinión final es que me ha gustado bastante, pese a saber lo que ocurría. Quizás lo he disfrutado más porque iba advertida de lo que iba a ocurrir. Admito que no es una historia fácil de digerir y por eso no guste en general. A favor suyo tiene que la prosa es muy amena, fácil y rápida de leer, de Jo Beverley he leído los primeros cinco Malloren, y son algo más descriptivos y farragosos, quizás por eso pueden hacerse algo más pesados, pero con "Una boda impuesta" eso no ha ocurrido.
En cuanto a la historia de amor, podría haber estado algo más desarrollada, los protagonistas se muestran bastante fríos, sobre todo Nicholas, porque Eleanor posee la perseverancia y devoción de una esposa que ha acabado acostumbrándose a su situación y ama discretamente a su marido. Nicholas no lo ha tenido tan fácil, debe decidir entre amar a su esposa o cumplir su deber para con su país, le han puesto entre la espada y la pared durante todo el libro. Entiendes su situación, pero por otro lado desearías que hubiesen ocurrido las cosas de otra manera. Por lo menos Eleanor al final ha tenido el buen tino de castigarle al final, y que a él no le quede más remedio que apechugar e intentar ganarse su amor.
Buena introducción a la serie de los Granujas, sin duda seguiré leyéndola, porque Lucien y Francis me han dejado con ganas de más.
En cuanto a la historia de amor, podría haber estado algo más desarrollada, los protagonistas se muestran bastante fríos, sobre todo Nicholas, porque Eleanor posee la perseverancia y devoción de una esposa que ha acabado acostumbrándose a su situación y ama discretamente a su marido. Nicholas no lo ha tenido tan fácil, debe decidir entre amar a su esposa o cumplir su deber para con su país, le han puesto entre la espada y la pared durante todo el libro. Entiendes su situación, pero por otro lado desearías que hubiesen ocurrido las cosas de otra manera. Por lo menos Eleanor al final ha tenido el buen tino de castigarle al final, y que a él no le quede más remedio que apechugar e intentar ganarse su amor.
Buena introducción a la serie de los Granujas, sin duda seguiré leyéndola, porque Lucien y Francis me han dejado con ganas de más.
June 3, 2024
This is the most casually cruel romance I’ve ever read. It starts with her rape by the H’s twin brother, the H marries her BUT GETS UPSET when she shows reluctance at making nice with her rapist, they have really brief, boring sex, and if all that weren’t enough, he also spends 90% of the book screwing a French whore. But he does it for king and country, you know, so it’s fine.
Everyone behaves illogically and the romance angst isn’t good enough to justify any of it.
So icky, from beginning to end. I hated it.
Everyone behaves illogically and the romance angst isn’t good enough to justify any of it.
So icky, from beginning to end. I hated it.
avoid
March 24, 2020The book is a very well written version of how to cheat & how to deceive your wife... And oh, forget to mention about how can I be a dormant wife for my husband...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
November 4, 2009
I listened to this story as a free audiobook download from my library.
I thought the premise of the book was completely ludicrous, even by regency smut standards.
At the beginning, the heroine is living with her brother who is a Grade A Pervert of the highest class. He throws wild, drinking parties where men and women canoodle under the influence of alcohol and touch each other in bad places. Eleanor doesn’t approve of the goings-on and knows the only reason she is still clinging to her virginity is because she religiously locks her door every night.
But one night, the pervy brother orchestrates the administration of drugs to both Eleanor and the Earl of Stainbridge so she can't lock her door and neither of them are in complete control of their faculties. The purpose for this being that after being raped by the earl, Eleanor would be ruined and her brother would be in a position to force a marriage to another skeevy man Eleanor otherwise wouldn’t want anything to do with. The next morning, Eleanor decides to kill herself but is fortuitously saved by her rapist who convinces her that he most certainly did NOT rape her and blames the whole thing on his twin brother. Eleanor believes him, befriends him and confides in him that she is fearful about what will happen to her under her brother’s roof. The earl promises to take care of it.
The resolution? He arranges a marriage between Eleanor and the man he’s led her to believe is her rapist: Nicholas Delaney, the younger brother. Without questioning all the details, Nicholas goes along with it and on their wedding night learns that Eleanor believes him to be her rapist. Once the record is set straight, they get naked and consummate the marriage but there aren’t any fireworks.
In time, Nicholas and Eleanor become intrigued by each other and a period of flirtation follows and the next time they make love, they both dig it and it seems like everything is going to be okay. Except that isn’t the case, because Nicholas also happens to be embroiled in a political espionage case that requires he continue a physical relationship with his French mistress even though his heart isn’t in it and he only wants Eleanor. Nicholas recognizes this as a case where he must “lie back and think of England” so he continues to boink the French mistress through a series of steamy scenes, all the while acting more and more erratic in his behavior to Eleanor (who also happens to be pregnant). One moment he acts like a man who is falling in love with his wife and the next he is rude and nasty to her (to “protect” her from the knowledge of what is really going on).
It all ends well and aside from the plot sucking major balls, I don’t have any real fault with the author’s writing style or the development of the story. I’m curious enough to check out something else she’s written, perhaps something that doesn’t start with rape, muddle through some significant issues with infidelity in the middle section and oddly end with a happy ending.
I thought the premise of the book was completely ludicrous, even by regency smut standards.
At the beginning, the heroine is living with her brother who is a Grade A Pervert of the highest class. He throws wild, drinking parties where men and women canoodle under the influence of alcohol and touch each other in bad places. Eleanor doesn’t approve of the goings-on and knows the only reason she is still clinging to her virginity is because she religiously locks her door every night.
But one night, the pervy brother orchestrates the administration of drugs to both Eleanor and the Earl of Stainbridge so she can't lock her door and neither of them are in complete control of their faculties. The purpose for this being that after being raped by the earl, Eleanor would be ruined and her brother would be in a position to force a marriage to another skeevy man Eleanor otherwise wouldn’t want anything to do with. The next morning, Eleanor decides to kill herself but is fortuitously saved by her rapist who convinces her that he most certainly did NOT rape her and blames the whole thing on his twin brother. Eleanor believes him, befriends him and confides in him that she is fearful about what will happen to her under her brother’s roof. The earl promises to take care of it.
The resolution? He arranges a marriage between Eleanor and the man he’s led her to believe is her rapist: Nicholas Delaney, the younger brother. Without questioning all the details, Nicholas goes along with it and on their wedding night learns that Eleanor believes him to be her rapist. Once the record is set straight, they get naked and consummate the marriage but there aren’t any fireworks.
In time, Nicholas and Eleanor become intrigued by each other and a period of flirtation follows and the next time they make love, they both dig it and it seems like everything is going to be okay. Except that isn’t the case, because Nicholas also happens to be embroiled in a political espionage case that requires he continue a physical relationship with his French mistress even though his heart isn’t in it and he only wants Eleanor. Nicholas recognizes this as a case where he must “lie back and think of England” so he continues to boink the French mistress through a series of steamy scenes, all the while acting more and more erratic in his behavior to Eleanor (who also happens to be pregnant). One moment he acts like a man who is falling in love with his wife and the next he is rude and nasty to her (to “protect” her from the knowledge of what is really going on).
It all ends well and aside from the plot sucking major balls, I don’t have any real fault with the author’s writing style or the development of the story. I’m curious enough to check out something else she’s written, perhaps something that doesn’t start with rape, muddle through some significant issues with infidelity in the middle section and oddly end with a happy ending.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 24, 2008
I'd give minus points if I could. Considering this first book in Beverley's Rogues series was actually the third she wrote for it, it's all the worse - badly (under)written, badly plotted, badly executed. Pushed into 350 pages by an author who has no shame in rushing through the most dramatic storylines by telling rather than showing anything about her paper-thin characters, and not even including (because seemingly not knowing) any historical details, this is yet another huge disappointment.
Beverley would have had working ideas - or at least original twists on old ideas - but to start with the rape (both participants drugged/forced) that's sadly often the norm in bodice rippers, and then to have that "nightmare" just be half a sentence and never dealt with, except in occasional miffed thoughts of the heroine?! Beverley was aware of it, too, because there is one half line where the heroine gets to think that she must be not a lady because she "dealt" with it so well. Except her enjoying shop windows the morning after, and generally being insufferably pleased with herself despite the text telling us the usual tropes - how she's insecure and worries about the obligatory female rival - makes her my least liked/most hated of Beverley's heroines.
She's probably perfectly tuned to the expected audience though, an unremarkable woman that is then called beautiful, doing nothing except tear out facial hair and arrange ornaments in order to incite deep lust and love - why, any woman can do that, so her happy end must make it every reader's, too *bitter* To think this was the book that started it all and reverberated right into the latest one, and then to have not just the heroes this time but the actual plot be less than it seemed in the retelling in sequels?
The second spoiler apart from the "rape" is also told of right in the first pages - the heroes twin brother is gay. And again, the disappointment is so huge because what a smart twist, to make him another victim of the villain, to have them both drugged, to have him have to fuck the supposed whore to prove he's not gay (Beverley read "Bent"?), then to want to atone! Except - Beverley makes him effeminate and positively amoral in claiming his brother had raped her, then blackmailing his brother. I'm worried she will kill him off in the future - sadly I have half a dozen more books already in the mail to me.
But, repeating myself again, there is nothing worse than seeing this huge WASTE of characters and storylines, of the possibility of a truly arranged marriage, how getting-on-the-horse-again right away (ie. having sex with the husband) also isn't immediately the perfect lust, how homosexuality might really have been handled (Kit is extra stuffy and careful due to permanent fear), how Nicholas is forced to prostitute himself for his country (he's visibly suffering from having to be Therese's toy, but of course everyone blames him) ... WASTED. All of it, including actually plausible actions and reactions, due to the usual damn laziness of the editor and a writer who might be better than most others in the field, but never once reaches potential.
The ending though turns a disappointing book into her (hopefully?) worst ever. Beverley has the unbelievable bad taste to follow a tedious hero-retells-everything and tediouser heroine-sends-him-away-another-month (there B. gets worse than Diane Perkins!) with the disgusting ending of her asking him "wtf did your brother rape me" and then indicating it's all a grand old joke, like not understanding "erotica" - less the so-called "rape" (and I'd never have thought I'd see the opposite of a boddice-ripper rape as equally bad), not even that the child might be the gay brothers, but that the whole "gay" thing is meant to be amusing. And then it ends without a single romantic intercourse, the woman already a mother and yet not even daring to show or feel any want for her husband. Revolting and depressing (- at least me).
Beverley would have had working ideas - or at least original twists on old ideas - but to start with the rape (both participants drugged/forced) that's sadly often the norm in bodice rippers, and then to have that "nightmare" just be half a sentence and never dealt with, except in occasional miffed thoughts of the heroine?! Beverley was aware of it, too, because there is one half line where the heroine gets to think that she must be not a lady because she "dealt" with it so well. Except her enjoying shop windows the morning after, and generally being insufferably pleased with herself despite the text telling us the usual tropes - how she's insecure and worries about the obligatory female rival - makes her my least liked/most hated of Beverley's heroines.
She's probably perfectly tuned to the expected audience though, an unremarkable woman that is then called beautiful, doing nothing except tear out facial hair and arrange ornaments in order to incite deep lust and love - why, any woman can do that, so her happy end must make it every reader's, too *bitter* To think this was the book that started it all and reverberated right into the latest one, and then to have not just the heroes this time but the actual plot be less than it seemed in the retelling in sequels?
The second spoiler apart from the "rape" is also told of right in the first pages - the heroes twin brother is gay. And again, the disappointment is so huge because what a smart twist, to make him another victim of the villain, to have them both drugged, to have him have to fuck the supposed whore to prove he's not gay (Beverley read "Bent"?), then to want to atone! Except - Beverley makes him effeminate and positively amoral in claiming his brother had raped her, then blackmailing his brother. I'm worried she will kill him off in the future - sadly I have half a dozen more books already in the mail to me.
But, repeating myself again, there is nothing worse than seeing this huge WASTE of characters and storylines, of the possibility of a truly arranged marriage, how getting-on-the-horse-again right away (ie. having sex with the husband) also isn't immediately the perfect lust, how homosexuality might really have been handled (Kit is extra stuffy and careful due to permanent fear), how Nicholas is forced to prostitute himself for his country (he's visibly suffering from having to be Therese's toy, but of course everyone blames him) ... WASTED. All of it, including actually plausible actions and reactions, due to the usual damn laziness of the editor and a writer who might be better than most others in the field, but never once reaches potential.
The ending though turns a disappointing book into her (hopefully?) worst ever. Beverley has the unbelievable bad taste to follow a tedious hero-retells-everything and tediouser heroine-sends-him-away-another-month (there B. gets worse than Diane Perkins!) with the disgusting ending of her asking him "wtf did your brother rape me" and then indicating it's all a grand old joke, like not understanding "erotica" - less the so-called "rape" (and I'd never have thought I'd see the opposite of a boddice-ripper rape as equally bad), not even that the child might be the gay brothers, but that the whole "gay" thing is meant to be amusing. And then it ends without a single romantic intercourse, the woman already a mother and yet not even daring to show or feel any want for her husband. Revolting and depressing (- at least me).
June 1, 2021
***Caution: a rape is referenced w/ thankfully few details***
Regency. 1814. Too much spyin' & not enough sparkin'.
Had mismatched leads.
I did not 'buy' the storylines: Nick was forced to wed
Eleanor by his only brother. Because his bro the earl
raped Ellie when baddies drugged his drink. Really?
Earl hedged in his apology to Ellie. Nick recounted how
he was recruited to spy for the Crown. His former lover
+ her thugs planned to restore Napoleon to power. Nick
charmed women of all ages, but at x's it felt an empty
manipulative gesture. Nick went missing, later his story
lacked credence, detailing where he'd been.
Nick seemed indifferent toward his new wife Ellie, and
she couldn't account for all his absences. Nick kept her
in the dark. These 2 had low chemistry for each other.
Nick's Co. of Rogues friends all seemed more interesting
than he.
Regency. 1814. Too much spyin' & not enough sparkin'.
Had mismatched leads.
I did not 'buy' the storylines: Nick was forced to wed
Eleanor by his only brother. Because his bro the earl
raped Ellie when baddies drugged his drink. Really?
Earl hedged in his apology to Ellie. Nick recounted how
he was recruited to spy for the Crown. His former lover
+ her thugs planned to restore Napoleon to power. Nick
charmed women of all ages, but at x's it felt an empty
manipulative gesture. Nick went missing, later his story
lacked credence, detailing where he'd been.
Nick seemed indifferent toward his new wife Ellie, and
she couldn't account for all his absences. Nick kept her
in the dark. These 2 had low chemistry for each other.
Nick's Co. of Rogues friends all seemed more interesting
than he.
September 5, 2008
Don't Hate... :D
Not sure about this one yet. I am a big fan of arranged marriage books, not sure why! This one did have some aspects that I liked and some that I really didn't. The part I hated the most was the fact that he had to be a Man-Ho for the government. What was that?? That just made me feel weird and didn't start me off with a good vibe for the whole relationship. I think I would've liked the book a lot more without that whole thing in there. Don't even get me started on the whole rape thing!
Not sure about this one yet. I am a big fan of arranged marriage books, not sure why! This one did have some aspects that I liked and some that I really didn't. The part I hated the most was the fact that he had to be a Man-Ho for the government. What was that?? That just made me feel weird and didn't start me off with a good vibe for the whole relationship. I think I would've liked the book a lot more without that whole thing in there. Don't even get me started on the whole rape thing!
October 8, 2022
Fantastic story, about abuse of power. The H is involved in espionage, torn between his duty, and building a life with his new wife, who he does not love. The h is great, not at all sweet as she juggles the men in her life who all hurt her. I liked that the H saw her strengths and trusted her, while he was being used and abused by his brother, evil OW and the British government. Loved it.
July 21, 2015
I know it is hard to like this book because of the unusual plots. It rubs people the wrong way and I can well imagine why it pushes people's boundaries just a tad too much. My problem with the book however, was not with the rape or the infidelity. I think it is a book with good writing but poor plot development and characterization.
As I read on I actually appreciate Jo Beverley's writing. But writing about such explosive plots, the book is shockingly bland. I have read reviewers who talk about this book being to angsty. I wonder, where is the angst? Yes the rape and infidelity are really tough subjects. But they are simply underexplored. It seems an awful waste to incorporate such plots to piss off 90% of the readers and to miss out on capitalizing such heavy-weight plots.
I think her chracterization is off too. This is true for all 3 major charcters, the hero, the heroine and the rapist. As for the "rogues" well, they could all be the same guy. You hardly have a face for them. I think the characters behave strangely in this book. The person who should be angry is not angry, the one who should be disgusting is actually not so disguting, the person who should not get married so easily married someone he hardly knew in a blink of an eye just because his brother said so.
I really did not have any problems with the plots. They are the reason I read the book. I wanted to see how a writer would approach such taboos in a romance novel. But the book is a disappointment in plot development characterization. The intriguing plots are just wasted. So is Beverley's writing.
A few things that I kept wondering about reading this book:
1. The "violent" part is not explicit. The angst is very much downplayed.
2. I keep feeling a bit disconnected. Considering the magnitude of the events, the characters are extremely cool-headed about the entire business. The rapist is not exactly a villain. The hero is taking this "my brother asked me to marry the woman he raped" thingy in strides (should we pat him on the shoulders?). The heroine very quickly made peace with the fact that she had to marry her "rapist" who is actually the rapist's brother. And nobody was screaming or flipping off. The rapist offered to help and saved the heroine from killing herself. The hero tied himself to a woman who has been raped by his brother. And the heroine actually began to like the hero. And all of this happened without anyone even batting an eye. I mean, how is that humanly possible? Then the heroine had problems with her husband having a "mistress"? Wait, she decided to marry in such a circumstance and had problems with extra-marital relationships? Woman, priorities!
3. I am not really appalled by the events, which in itself, is appalling.
4. I like the hero better than the heroine. I know people have problems with his "infidelity" but honestly it was not as if he was in love with heroine. Maybe I am of loose morals, I don't know. Shxt happens. Sometimes it is about how you overcome such things as a couple that makes the love story. It cannot always be picture-perfect.
5. Some reasoning really failed to convince me. Eleanor becoming pregnant after the rape for example, how could they know that she was pregnant after scarely a month? It wasn't as if there was a Durane Reade down the block. And Nicholas sleeping with her the first time because then "there may be a chance that the baby is his". I mean, the rape happened a few weeks ago before the wedding night. It really does not take a genius to figure out whose baby it is. or am I being to scientific here?
As I read on I actually appreciate Jo Beverley's writing. But writing about such explosive plots, the book is shockingly bland. I have read reviewers who talk about this book being to angsty. I wonder, where is the angst? Yes the rape and infidelity are really tough subjects. But they are simply underexplored. It seems an awful waste to incorporate such plots to piss off 90% of the readers and to miss out on capitalizing such heavy-weight plots.
I think her chracterization is off too. This is true for all 3 major charcters, the hero, the heroine and the rapist. As for the "rogues" well, they could all be the same guy. You hardly have a face for them. I think the characters behave strangely in this book. The person who should be angry is not angry, the one who should be disgusting is actually not so disguting, the person who should not get married so easily married someone he hardly knew in a blink of an eye just because his brother said so.
I really did not have any problems with the plots. They are the reason I read the book. I wanted to see how a writer would approach such taboos in a romance novel. But the book is a disappointment in plot development characterization. The intriguing plots are just wasted. So is Beverley's writing.
A few things that I kept wondering about reading this book:
1. The "violent" part is not explicit. The angst is very much downplayed.
2. I keep feeling a bit disconnected. Considering the magnitude of the events, the characters are extremely cool-headed about the entire business. The rapist is not exactly a villain. The hero is taking this "my brother asked me to marry the woman he raped" thingy in strides (should we pat him on the shoulders?). The heroine very quickly made peace with the fact that she had to marry her "rapist" who is actually the rapist's brother. And nobody was screaming or flipping off. The rapist offered to help and saved the heroine from killing herself. The hero tied himself to a woman who has been raped by his brother. And the heroine actually began to like the hero. And all of this happened without anyone even batting an eye. I mean, how is that humanly possible? Then the heroine had problems with her husband having a "mistress"? Wait, she decided to marry in such a circumstance and had problems with extra-marital relationships? Woman, priorities!
3. I am not really appalled by the events, which in itself, is appalling.
4. I like the hero better than the heroine. I know people have problems with his "infidelity" but honestly it was not as if he was in love with heroine. Maybe I am of loose morals, I don't know. Shxt happens. Sometimes it is about how you overcome such things as a couple that makes the love story. It cannot always be picture-perfect.
5. Some reasoning really failed to convince me. Eleanor becoming pregnant after the rape for example, how could they know that she was pregnant after scarely a month? It wasn't as if there was a Durane Reade down the block. And Nicholas sleeping with her the first time because then "there may be a chance that the baby is his". I mean, the rape happened a few weeks ago before the wedding night. It really does not take a genius to figure out whose baby it is. or am I being to scientific here?
March 16, 2011
I'm glad I picked up a couple of the later books in this series before I read this one, because had I read this one first, I'm not sure I would have read further. As it is, I got two in from the library at the same time and will quickly move on, beliving that "An Arrnged Marriage" is a fluke. I've enjoyed other books by Jo Beverley as well, so I know I often like her stuff.
This one, though...it was off from the start. Eleanor's reprobate of a brother hatches this elaborate and senseless plot to get her raped (I'm sorry, I still don't get why he did that). The Earl of Stainbridge was the culprit, though he was drugged, and the next morning he returns to the scene of the crime to find Eleanor about to kill herself. He rescues her, takes her home with him, and tells her that his twin brother, Nicholas, was the one who raped her.
She agress to marry Nicholas, believing he raped her. And yet she begins reacting to him as a man from the second they meet. As soon as he explains the truth to her, they easily make love, and she's already hoping that he won't spend so much time away from her (as his brother suggested would be the case).
Now, as if it isn't bad enough that she's already put her traumatic rape and suicide attempt behind her, Nicholas treats her badly. Oh, he was nobly sacrificing himself for king and country, on the altar of a whore he was trying to extract information from. He even refused to make love to his wife or even treat her very well because he didn't feel right doing that while he was with this other woman.
Aiiieee!
Infidelity aside (and honestly, that wasn't the part that bothered me the most, though I understand why it got to others), he treated her badly. He lied to her, kept his distance from her, and almost intentionally made it seem as if she didn't matter to him.
Now, I ask you: Why did she fall in love with him?
This one, though...it was off from the start. Eleanor's reprobate of a brother hatches this elaborate and senseless plot to get her raped (I'm sorry, I still don't get why he did that). The Earl of Stainbridge was the culprit, though he was drugged, and the next morning he returns to the scene of the crime to find Eleanor about to kill herself. He rescues her, takes her home with him, and tells her that his twin brother, Nicholas, was the one who raped her.
She agress to marry Nicholas, believing he raped her. And yet she begins reacting to him as a man from the second they meet. As soon as he explains the truth to her, they easily make love, and she's already hoping that he won't spend so much time away from her (as his brother suggested would be the case).
Now, as if it isn't bad enough that she's already put her traumatic rape and suicide attempt behind her, Nicholas treats her badly. Oh, he was nobly sacrificing himself for king and country, on the altar of a whore he was trying to extract information from. He even refused to make love to his wife or even treat her very well because he didn't feel right doing that while he was with this other woman.
Aiiieee!
Infidelity aside (and honestly, that wasn't the part that bothered me the most, though I understand why it got to others), he treated her badly. He lied to her, kept his distance from her, and almost intentionally made it seem as if she didn't matter to him.
Now, I ask you: Why did she fall in love with him?
April 5, 2018
An Arranged Marriage sounded like something I would like - a couple struggling to find common bonds . This was not exactly the case with this book, however. The characters were not that likable and the situations they find themselves in are pretty off putting. However I did read the whole book and did find points of interest here and there.
February 9, 2025
Not for me
November 11, 2024
A ver... La trama tiene temas muy delicados, o complejos, y lo lleva medianamente bien.
Advertencia: hay una escena de violación que se me hizo difícil de leer.
La primera parte se me hizo bastante entretenida y le seguí el hilo, pero al final con todo el desenlace fue medio flojo, lo leí muy por encima.
No destaca el romance. No sé cuando surge el amor o si "realmente" surge el amor entre ellos. Es muy raro todo (?). No lo sentí orgánico.
La protagonista me pareció bien, con todo lo que le pasó actuó como podia, pobre mina. Sin embargo, el chabón es un boludo barbaro. Me imaginaba el típico gato que siempre se gana a la gente por ser fachero y simpático, hace lo que se le da la gana. Una pesadilla.
Ese tal Lord Stainbrigde, el hermano gemelo del protagonista masculino, un forro. Cancelado (?).
Advertencia: hay una escena de violación que se me hizo difícil de leer.
La primera parte se me hizo bastante entretenida y le seguí el hilo, pero al final con todo el desenlace fue medio flojo, lo leí muy por encima.
No destaca el romance. No sé cuando surge el amor o si "realmente" surge el amor entre ellos. Es muy raro todo (?). No lo sentí orgánico.
La protagonista me pareció bien, con todo lo que le pasó actuó como podia, pobre mina. Sin embargo, el chabón es un boludo barbaro. Me imaginaba el típico gato que siempre se gana a la gente por ser fachero y simpático, hace lo que se le da la gana. Una pesadilla.
Ese tal Lord Stainbrigde, el hermano gemelo del protagonista masculino, un forro. Cancelado (?).
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