Review: Had great potential
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 07 28, 2013
Before I start the review of this book I must say that I'm not a huge fan of this author. I don't like the way there are always mistresses and other women clinging to her H's. Often they inspire mistrust and difficulties and the H's never try and resolve the issues in a way that makes their h's feel secure.However in this book we have a beautiful but naive h who has recently been widowed. She was married at 17 and 4 years later her husband was killed in a duel over his mistress. The h had no idea that her husband was philandering whilst at court because she stayed quietly in the country and lived a peaceful life. After his death she comes to court to spend time with her friends (the main characters fromYou and No Other (The St. Briac Novels, Book 1), where she discovers her late husband's betrayal. She agrees to an arranged marriage with the H, who is an English Marquess. In the meanwhile the H hears about his arranged marriage and is unhappy about it so he decides to go and covertly check her out, disguised as a common portrait painter. They fall in love and the story progresses.***Spoilers***This is truly not a story about a marriage of convenience and when they do get married later in the book, it is for love. I hated the fact that the H expected the h to give up everything to marry a lowly portrait painter, which she eventually does but he never once disclosed who he is. Everything always seems to be on his terms. The h was very insecure about the H's relationship with his long term mistress and of course he never really does anything to calm her fears.The story does get bogged down in lots of details and there is the side story about the villains attempts on the h's life. Although the author writes well, I think this story was all over the place and maybe it's because the main characters fell in love so early in the book, she struggled to maintain a firm story line through the rest of the book. I think perhaps she should have made a shorter book, rather than meander on.Overall it was a good story but it could have been truly great with a little more thought in the execution.