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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Lush Regency Romance, January 16, 2010
This review is from: The The Lady Flees Her Lord (Paperback)
THREE QUICK POINTS:
* Point 1: The descriptions were lush and beautiful. I felt as though I were in the 19th century countryside along with them and experiencing everything they were experiencing.
* Point 2: There were huge flaws in the character development. Lucinda (Lady Denbigh) is an intelligent and strong-willed woman who somehow manages not to do the first thing most intelligent and strong-willed women would do after fleeing Lord Denbigh and it rang false. Hugo has the weakest "fear" that rang even more false than Lucinda's actions.
* Point 3: This book was written and edited in stages. As I was reading, I'd go through long stretches without a single noticeable grammatical or spelling error, then I'd come to a patch where there was literally one every other page. It was quite easy to figure out which sections were done at different times.
SHORT SYNOPSIS:
Set in 19th century England, the story starts in London and then shifts to the countryside, when Lucinda (Lady Denbigh) escapes from her physically and emotionally abusive husband before she can be made into a prostitute at a party.
After a child is abandoned in her care, Lady Denbigh takes up residence in a home on Lord Wanstead's property. When he returns from the war, he's a grumpy man laden with guilt (to put it mildly), but he's instantly attracted to Lucinda's strong carriage. Despite doing everything in his power to avoid a romance with her, their feelings for one another are too strong and spicy carnal pleasures ensue.
Since bliss rarely lasts forever, theirs comes to an abrupt end when Wanstead inadvertently finds out Lucinda's secret and Wanstead is forced to reveal his and both are faced with difficult decisions to make.
MY THOUGHTS:
The book started out smoothly with Lucinda trying to flee her home. During the set up, we're shown that Lucinda is a strong woman who is a little self-conscious because of the continued verbal and physical abuse issued by her husband, Lord Denbigh.
The descriptions were lush; it rendered the scene so clearly that you could almost feel the grass between your toes and the cool country air blowing across your face.
No, the descriptions and prose are not what I had a problem with at all. My gripes arose due to ponderous character flaws in the two main characters.
Lucinda admittedly came from a happy, healthy family who loved and cared about her. Yet, when she fled Denbigh, she didn't try to get in contact with them. The question kept nagging at me: Why not? Based on the information given, they would certainly have helped her had she gone to them, and Lucinda is not a weak-willed or stupid woman. She's painted as a strong woman who can hold her own in games of skill and strategy. Aside from this, her character was well developed. I liked her, but I would have liked her more if she had tried to contact her family. (It would have been more plausible had she tried to contact her family and failed.)
Hugo (who may have been Hugh at some point--at least according to the Freudian slip made on page 216), having returned from the war was feeling incredibly guilty about the deaths of his mother and his Spanish wife. Constantly he's talking about how guilty and bad he feels. The first couple of times he eluded to it, it sparked curiosity, but as it continued on it became annoying. At one point (about 200 pages in), I actually opened my mouth and told him to either spill the beans or shut up about his having "killed" these two woman (not to sound insensitive or anything). Then, when his big secret is revealed, I truly wanted to fling the book against the wall. Rather than beat up an otherwise good book, I decided to roll my eyes and sigh instead.
Barring those two transgressions, the book was a quick and entertaining read. It was a nice way to pass an evening while sipping on a glass of wine and enjoying some chocolate delights. (As the dedication implies.)
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Hit and Miss, January 28, 2010
This review is from: The The Lady Flees Her Lord (Paperback)
Lucinda runs away from her husband after he tells her that she has to 'entertain' his good friend at an up coming house party. She picks up an orphan and some widow's weeds and makes her way to Kent posing as a war widow. All too soon her new landlord returns and decides he is in lust with the buxom widow. Thus begins our tale. The beginning is very very strong and I found myself really cheering for Lucinda and Hugo, but after about the half way point things start to go down hill.
This is a personal pet peeve of mine and I know it won't bother others but I have to warn those it will bother. I strongly dislike when historic heros ask their lady love to live with them as their mistress. In that time period that would make Lucinda nothing more than a whore, and being she was gently raised, and raising her adopted daughter Sophia, I can't fathom why Lucinda would begin to accept moving in with him, or why it would enter into his mind to ask. Talk about teaching your child how to be disrespected by men. I know our modern view is much different but to ask her to live with him unmarried is just an insult, just as if a man expected his wife to stop working and take care of him is an insult in a contemporary set novel.
His questionable honor, based on his view of keeping Lucinda as a mistress made it hard for me to believe Hugo would get so angry about concealing Lucinda's location from her heel of a husband. It went against his honor to break the law hiding a wife from her lawful husband but asking a respectable woman to shack up with him didn't put any dings in his honor? Also Hugo's behavior later in the book I found . . . annoying. I don't think he was acting out of character but I disliked that Hugo lived down to his character instead of living up to it, making Lucinda humble herself after all she had suffered from her husband, something I didn't enjoy reading. And I am sorry to say their last love scene was just, well ridiculous. Not the writing or anything like that, but it just went so far out of Lucinda's character as to almost be laughable.
Basically what I liked was Lucinda, Sophia and the sundry of town folks, the 1st half of the book, and a real tangible problem to keep the two lovers apart, which let's face it is not always present. What I disliked was Hugo asking her to shack up with him, the fact that there had to be more issues than Lucinda being married to keep them apart (seriously redundant), and some of Hugo's behavior towards the end of the book. But my number one biggest problem is I never really believed they were in love. They obviously were fond of each other and attracted but neither of them did anything to prove their love, and Hugo's reason for avoiding marriage is so inconsequential to 18th century life as to make me wonder if he felt much of anything for her is so little a problem would keep them apart. Even after I read the whole thing, I still find it unconvincing.
A really strong start, but bogged down by a wishy washy hero in the 2nd half that really makes this one a dud, at least compared with all the promise the 1st have showed. But check this out if you are more forgiving of hero's than I am or love stories with plus sizes gals. 3 stars.
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Overall good, but missed its potential of being so much more., November 25, 2008
This review is from: The The Lady Flees Her Lord (Paperback)
A regency historical pairing a runaway countess (Lucinda) posing as a military widow, with a penniless lord (Hugo) who recently returned to his rundown country estate after 10 years of war in France. Overall it was fast and enjoyable read but it had a few parts that frustrated me.
The story itself is simple; Lucinda has fled London and the emotional and physical abuse of a horrible husband. Hugo is instantly attracted to her and is set on having a physical affair. In the day-to-day adventures of life in the small village, she keeps crossing paths with Hugo until their passions sweep them away.
The story kept me engaged, but I found myself getting upset with the hero and heroine for different things. For the heroine, I understood her need to lie about her identity, and I can even look past the fact that she was `cheating' on her husband as that behavior was more acceptable and typical for that era. But her continued lack of honesty with Hugo, and then her seemingly lack of remorse for it, set my nerves a blaze. I didn't hate Lucinda, but in the end I didn't like her either. And as hero's go, Hugo was only OK too. I think this is where the story really fell short, as he is a hero type I normally would love but we never got to fall in love with him. We didn't really get to know him as a person, and the author did one thing that drives me nuts: she gave him a plot device where he blames himself for something that anyone with any common sense knows was completely out of his control and not his fault.
This book does have it strengths and the story is quite compelling in many places, but it missed the potential of being so much more. I can't say I'd recommend this one to all historical romance fans, especially to those readers who do not abide a cheating hero or heroine under any circumstances, but the writing was good and the story different from what is typically published.
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