Review: The Neighbor (or rather, book) from Hell
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 11 12, 2013
Wow, still scratching my head over so many five star reviews. I read this hoping for an enjoyable Regency romance (as advertised) but only made it a third of the way through.**SPOILERS**The author clearly didn't spend a lot of time researching this book's contents because the vulgaries and expressions are completely out of place in the Regency period. (Elizabeth wanted to hit Robert "upside the head"? Robert "wanted to hurl"? And speaking of Robert, he sure was "pissed off" a lot. Um, did the author mean "pissed" (drunk) or was Robert supposed to be telling someone to "piss off" (f*** off)? It was really difficult to enjoy the story while trying to understand what the expression/term/word used actually meant for that place and time.Most jarring of all was at the beginning of the tale, when a gently-bred young lady decides to leave a ball, strip naked in a well-lit glassed-walled room and have her first sexual encounter with a stranger. A stranger whose name she refuses to accept. A stranger who is a confirmed bachelor yet suddenly decides he will offer marriage to the afore mentioned young lady (because she loves As You Like It, and because she's really, really sexy when taken on the orangery divan).I couldn't get through the beginning of the story fast enough (wish I had a dollar for every angry expression and curse word in just a half dozen pages) and the Regency (I used the term loosely) part of the story I read was so poorly written I gave up. I'm sure Shakespeare is rolling over in his grave knowing his name is mentioned in this book.