Review: Read VIENNA WALTZ instead.  This one is not so good.
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 04 17, 2011
(2.5 stars rounded up to be nice.)  As a Tracy Grant fan, I don't feel happy about writing this review.  This is the fourth Charles and Melanie Fraser book that I have read and it is most definitely my least favorite.  The plot has its usual mystery to be solved.  There are spies of all ilks running around, members of the peerage having illicit sexual or romantic liaisons, mostly extramarital, huge numbers of possible suspects, plots and twists of plots, with historical characters thrown in the mix (but this time to no advantage).In other words, it has all the trappings that I usually like in a Grant book, but this time it didn't work for me.  I can enjoy a convoluted plot with a huge cast of characters, but the writing here was not polished, the story advanced almost exclusively through dialogue and seemed choppy, and the descriptive passages were mainly of some action/adventure within the story:  running from bad guys, chasing bad guys, fighting with bad guys, captured by bad guys and escaping, cleaning up after the misadventures, etc.  I felt like I was reading a very, very busy movie script.Another thing that bothered me was the lack of growth in Melanie and Charles' relationship.  They don't seem to me to be any closer emotionally in this book which takes place in the year 1820 than they were in VIENNA WALTZ, which takes place in 1814.  They work together well solving mysteries but need to solve the mystery of their own relationship.  I'm getting tired of this marriage of strangers who seem to be making little effort to get closer and to have a frank and open relationship.  Some couples use sex to avoid real conversations.  Charles and Melanie run around solving convoluted mysteries as their avoidance mechanism.  Supposedly, they love each other, but there is little demonstrative evidence of this. (And, no, I do not mean I want sex scenes in the books.  I want their interaction to be less cool.)Additionally, I must add that I don't believe I have encountered any really happy couples in any of the 4 Charles and Melanie novels.  Well, it's one thing to be realistic about love, romance and relationships and it's another to be downright pessimistic.  Come on, Ms Grant.  What's up with that?  Does everyone have to be unfaithful or emotionally distant?One more peeve I have involves the Kindle formatting.  It hugely needed editing.  There are mistakes on almost every page.  Words are left out, incorrect words, such as "dose", are used in place of the correct ones, in that case the word "close", etc.  Well, it was only $2.99.  You get what you pay for, I guess.BTW, two very good Grant books, IMO, are her latest VIENNA WALTZ and her earlier SECRETS OF A LADY.  They are definitely worth reading.  If you have never read Tracy Grant before, this one should not be your first.