16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
His Lady Bride, August 21, 2000
This review is from: His Lady Bride: Brothers in Arms (Paperback)
Shelley Bradley has seamlessly woven actual history with a compelling love story. This book combines history with elements of the classic fairy tales Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast.
I felt Aric's turmoil as an essentially good man comes to realize that he trusted an evil man, Richard III. Aric realizes his ambition blinded him to Richard's flaws and made him an unwitting participant in the death of the 'little princes'. Aric is sickened by what he has become and renounces all and leaves to live the life of a hermit.
Forced into marriage with the volatile Gwenyth, who has been banned from her Uncle's castle and given the choice to marry Aric or be killed, he tries his best to ignore his wife. Gwenyth is singularly unignorable.
Bradley's writing gives an immediacy that let's the modern reader understand what it was like to be pressed from both sides into decisions one doesn't want to make. Aric is forced to return to fighting as both sides press him to join them. If Aric doesn't choose the winning side, his family will suffer and he will be hanged as a traitor.
Amidst all this angst, Bradley provides comic relief via Gwenyth's quick tongue and imaginative insults for her husband, who gives as good as he gets--this pair is passionate in all that they do.
This is the first in a trilogy and I will be looking forward to reading about the other 'brothers' Drake and Kieran, who are introduced here and look very intriguing. I highly recommend this for the fan of the historical and for those who like a strong character driven work that truly gives one the 'feel' of those terrible times. Linda Hurst Reviewer Under The Covers Pandora's Box/All About Romance
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gwenyth and Aric will make you smile, July 24, 2000
This review is from: His Lady Bride: Brothers in Arms (Paperback)
Tired of war, death and guilt Aric Neville leaves his life as a warrior to live the quiet, solitary life. A loner in a small village that believes he is a sorcerer, Aric plans to live his life peacefully. When the villagers find him a bride and demand that he marry her or else she will be killed, Aric finds himself wed to the fiesty young woman.
Gwenyth de Auburd had her sights set on another man, but when her scheming uncle forces her into marriage with Aric she plans to get out of the marriage. But Aric has other plans. Slowly his reluctant bride thaws, bringing the two closer together and the couple eventually fall in love. But could he give up his honor to fight for a king he does not trust to please his bride?
Shelley Bradley wisks the reader away to medeival England, bringing to life two wonderful characters. Aric and Gwenyth will bring a smile to your face and leave the reader wanting more. Highly recommended.
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Wonderful Story!, July 31, 2000
This review is from: His Lady Bride: Brothers in Arms (Paperback)
In November 1484, Aric Neville--also known as the White Lion for his strength and bravery in battle--was going home. The princes of England were dead and King Richard III--the boys uncle-- was on the throne. Aric had been a warrior his whole life, but he could do it no more. He left behind a title, lands and money, to live in seclusion in the woods in a ramshackle cottage with a dirt floor.
Lady Gwenyth wasn't having a good day. It was April, 1485 and she was being forcibly removed from her home where she had resided with her uncle's family since the death of her parents years earlier. He had never wanted his niece in his home in the first place and had taken her in grudgingly, only to make her slightly better than a maid. He had finally decided that she would either be married to the local sorcerer or be killed, the decision to be made by the sorcerer.
The Sorcerer was Aric, and he hadn't minded the locals incorrectly thinking of him that way. It had assured him the peace which he desperately needed but which was going to come to an abrupt end by the looks of it. Unable to see Gwenyth killed he agrees to wed her, something he doesn't completely regret once he witnesses her warmth and spirit.
Not happy with Aric's apparent lack of wealth, yet finding herself thinking of him in a progressively more wifely manner, Gwenyth is happy to discover that he is actually titled and rich. Returning to his former life to aid a friend, Aric is dismayed that the woman he has started to care for apparently is able to say she loves him once she finds out the truth whereas she couldn't while they lived in the cottage. Convinced that she is only after his money and power, he heads off to war with the King, where he is unable to get thoughts of her out of his mind.
These two people have many issues they need to resolve before they are going to live happily ever after. Aric despises the hypocrisy of the titled people--Gwenyth craves the lifestyle. Aric would be happy living in the woods with nothing but the love of his life--Gwenyth can't stand the thought. It boils down to trust and love and how these two strong-minded, passionate and desperately in lust people are going to get past their differences to see if that lust is actually love, and if it's strong enough to make their differences irrelevant.
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Shelley Bradley has done it again! She loves writing the most powerful, strong and dynamic men, and then she throws them into the middle of the most tortured, passionate scenarios. In HIS LADY BRIDE, both Aric and Gwenyth go through some life altering situations courtesy of Shelley, and both must grow and learn in order to be able to make it through.
From Aric's honor and pride to Gwenyth's interesting vocabulary, readers of historical romance are sure to love this latest offering from Shelley Bradley. Based on actual events of the time, HIS LADY BRIDE is a fast paced, exciting story in which the author has taken advantage of the horror of the truth and worked it to her advantage, making her characters that much stronger for having lived through it themselves.
~sue
Sue Waldeck
Road to Romance
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