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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Love it or hate it. There is no middle ground., July 17, 2004
Personally, I loved this book. This was the first one that I read by this author, now I just finished reading it again and loved it even more the second time.
I know several other reviewers disagree with me, and I have to admit that this book is not for everyone, but if you like a romance that deals with serious issues, without losing the magic, this is it.
Mary Jo Putney combines polemic issues like rape, homosexuality, child abuse and prostitution, an accurate historical background, an interesting plot with a few twists, and a very poignant and passionate love story. What more can you ask for?
All the characters are well developed and three dimensional, and even though I didn't always agree with the way they acted, I was able to understand the reasons, fears and inner conflicts that motivated them. Personally, I loved Gervase and Diana, as well as Diana's son Geofrey. They became real to me, and I cared deeply for them and their happiness.
I won't say anymore because I don't want to spoil the book for those who haven't read it, like some reviewers have done. I'll just say that in my opinion, this a very well written and enjoyable book, one that makes the Romance genre proud.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
a little too dark for my taste, December 12, 2007
Dearly Beloved is an historical romance by Mary Jo Putney. Now then, I love some of her historical romances - River Of Fire, Shattered Rainbows (Fallen Angels), and One Perfect Rose (Fallen Angels) are among my all time favorites Regencies. But this book was a little too grim for my tastes. The fact that the hero rapes a very young virgin in the opening chapter was a big turn off. The fact that this isn't even the darkest/worst thing in his life was an even bigger turn off.
Some of the sex scenes between the hero and heroine were very well done, quite hot, as I would expect from Putney, and I liked the heroine a lot, but I was never able to get over that rape scene (or the even worse thing that happened to the hero that I do not want to spoil).
I had a hard time believing this came from the same author who wrote such a sweet love story as One Perfect Rose (Fallen Angels)
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27 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Boring and totally unrealistic, October 9, 2001
By A Customer
This review is from: Dearly Beloved (Onyx) (Paperback)
I'm an avid MJP reader and couldn't believe it when I started to read this book. One of the most outstanding things about MJP is that she is able to create tormented yet sympathetic and believable male characters who you cannot help but like from the start. Even if the hero doesn't believe or trust in love anymore he is always gentle and caring with the woman he gets involved with. But Gervase is a real turn-off right from the beginning. In the first chapter we see him drunken to oblivion and forced by a mad vicar to marry a 15-years-old girl whom he has unintentionally compromised. Gervase thinks he has been trapped by both-the mad vicar and the girl and brutally rapes her (MJP doesn't spare us the details) merely for vengeance. He is too much of a coward to strike back against the father, who would be the most responsible part in a conspiracy, he prefers to vent out his anger at a little girl. Honestly, can a man sink lower than that? After his fit of rage he disposes Diana like a piece of garbage and condemns her to a life in a tiny village at the end of the world, very much like an imprisonment, determined to never see her again. Here is the first contradiction: Gervase thinks he must do the "honorable thing" and marry the girl, yet after the ceremony he acts like the lowest of villains. Such a character would not have married in the first place, at least not after his life wasn't threatened anymore, which was the case here at some point of the book.
MJP try to make us believe that Gervase has been haunted by the memories of that night ever since which simply isn't true. He feels uncomfortable when thinking about it, but that's all. Like Diana points out in the end, he has never done any action that would prove his regrets which is why he obviously never made inquiries about Diana's welfare in all those years.
As a result of the rape the girl becomes pregnant and nearly dies in childbirth because she's obviously physically too underdeveloped to give birth to a baby (which makes Gervase's rape suspiciously look like child-abuse). Yet she has absolutely no problems in accepting and loving her child right from the start. She even thinks her rapist can't be bad because her child is so lovely. Oh yes, of course and pigs fly. Rape victims who become pregnant don't react that way, especially not if the victim is a mere child. If Diana slowly had come to love her child, though I might have bought that. But MJP is not very subtle or authentic-neither in plot nor in characterization.
To make it even more unrealistic the now grown-up Diana decides to change her quiet rural life-style and go to London to become a courtesan. While it is understandable that a young woman wants to replace her sad memories and make new and pleasant ones it is absolute nonsense that she will choose her rapist to make that memories. And Gervase is not at all the haunted hero who looks out for redemption. This is their first encounter : "The two of them might have been alone in Eden and Diana was aware of nothing but the dark man and her own fiercely beating heart. That austerely handsome face was familiar to her as her own nightmares, and in a flash of fear and awe and tremulous anticipation....She knew beyond the shadow of doubt that this was the man she had come to London to find."
This made me nearly retch. If you tackle a hot issue like rape or domestic violence you have to be very, very careful . MJP has handled that issue with such lightness as if such a crime wasn't a crime at all and doesn't affect the victims in any way. Diana seems not to have suffered at all. What makes it worse that the book is not even entertaining. The courtship of Gervase and Diana and Gervase's spy actions are boring and the villain in the piece is so cruel and bad that it is almost laughable. He is simply put in the story to make Gervase look a little better (in another novel of MJP he would be the villain of the piece and what an icky villain he would be!). Gervase's misogyny and constant mistrust of women in general got on my nerves and his dark, dark secret is simply disgusting. Skip this book and try one of MJP other stories. This novel is highly unsavory.
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