1.0 out of 5 stars Wooden-let it go!
I am sorry, but I have truly given up on Ms. Dain as an author. Nearly all of her supposed love scenes are nonconsensual. Please, can the romance ‘industry’ get away from the bodice rippers of the 70s already? Intelligent modern readers want so much more. The deflowering of women is just not an entertaining topic, and especially not when done with such graphic and down right crass mishandling.
William finds out the heroine is not a virgin, and immediately blames her without ever once stoping to look around him at the ruined mansion he has got thanks to marrying a total stranger. She is just a possession to him like everything else. He just can’t bear the thought of anyone sharing fun with her except him. He doesn’t understand that every time he calls her Cat and falls upon her like a starving man on his dinner, that this is what her attacker used to do to her. He hardly even bothers to try to understand her point of view until it is forcibly shoved under his nose.
William is not quite as Neanderthal as her other heroes but he comes pretty close. Then we have her rapist Lambert going about scot free and trying to reclaim her. He tries to kill her, and at last she fights back for about a minute. Graphic violence ensues, and that includes William being stabbed in both sides with swords and still surviving to kill the villain. PUH-LEEESE.
We never see any commitment warmth or fondness in any of these books, just unremitting doom and gloom, and miserable lives for all her female characters. This was not really characteristic of the period at all and yes, invasion is not pretty, but life does go on, with love and Christian hope and forgiveness. Again, authors should always beware of imposing their modern sensibilities on their historically based characters, because they then lose a lot of the point as to why they would set the book in that time period on the first place.
This is not quite as depressing as some of Ms. Dain’s other books, but the characters are flat and insipid and not people I ever care about even though we are supposed to admire her as a victim. and him for ‘forgivng’ her for having been raped.
I would rather admire my characters for being brave, noble, loving and committed to one another. As most intelligent readers of romance would. Let this one go for sure.
The first thing you can teach ever author who comes to you for editing advice is, “A romance is the hero and heroine falling in love, and working toward a happily ever after ending.” I wish romance writers would remember that.
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