Customer Reviews

So Wild A Heart

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have to admit I am someone who has their nose stuck in a book a good majority of the time ... I have read so many excellent authors over the years (I am proud to be a grandmother) however, for some odd reason I have missed reading Candace Camp ...I picked up So Wild a Heart with my last grouping of romance books and once I started it I didn't want to put it down ... it was darling! I was "caught" from the very beginning which is something I really like in a book. I didn't think I was going to like Dev to begin with, (which often makes it difficult to really enjoy a book) however, like everyone else I fell in love with this man who was taught that he had to hide his feelings to be a "real man" ... it was so nice when he started showing that a "real man" shows his feelings (speaks a wife who is still head-over-heels in love with her sensitive husband of 35 years). ... books like this are a dream come true ... Miranda is a woman much ahead of her time, which I personally enjoyed ... not just pretty face without a thought in her head, which so many of the women of that era are portrayed as (and sadder yet, they actually were). There is so much anticipation of happiness, mixed with the frustration (you would like to reach through the book and grab a couple of people by their necks ... no I am NOT a violent person!!!) ... and topped off with excitement of a love fulfilled ... and so much more ... Where this may have been my first Candace Camp book I am now 3/4 the way through the 3rd book of this trilogy "Secrets of the Heart" and I am finding it just as wonderful. As I am writing this I am thinking that the one thing that this book definitely has is the ability to make one want to keep turning the pages ... I couldn't put it down ... and I am going back to the bookstore to purchase more ... what an absolute joy from beginnng to end. I truly don't think this is a book you would be disappointed in reading.

Wow, it was really very hard to like the "hero" of this book. He spent years and years mounting anything that didn't move in every hellhole in London and all of its slums, he was completely manipulated by his controlling mistress, he was a raging consumer of alcohol and deeply mired in self hatred. Could my heart beat any faster? Yes, I concede that Miranda made him change once he got away from his mistress, but that really just makes it worse for me. What that really boils down to is that this man can be manipulated by anyone. And, I know the author never calls him an alcoholic but really. You drink that much for that long ....

Anyway, Miranda was great. So very nice to see a determined woman who is not a petty, spiteful whiner. I adored her. But, I just couldn't get past Devin's past. And really, he must have picked up several STD's on his way through the scores of myriad women, not to mention those he contracted from his mistress who was even more flagrantly promiscuous. All in all, loved the heroine, couldn't get past the hero's past.

I know it is a romance novel and so I am supposed to suspend my belief in reality but there is a limit past which I just cannot return. This was a decent read, but I felt the need for a strong dose of penicillin when it was over.

I read this book within 2 days, and was really enjoying it until the very end! The fact that Hero had a child with the Heroines STEP-MOTHER ruined the whole thing for me! Did this happen to anyone else? I just couldn't get over it.

Candace Camp just gets better and better. Miranda is one of the best heroines I've met in ages. Smart, self-confident, knows what she wants and how to get it. It's lovely to watch Devin go from the dark hell of debauchery and enthalldom to a truly vicious mistress to the love and life that Miranda offers him. And how she gets him to that point is wonderful to watch.

I really appreciated the fact that Miranda is not of the Too Stupid To Live variety. Or the fact that h/h didn't fight from page 1 till the next to the last page before they called it "love". Their fights were believeable and fun to watch. They progressed the story. All in all, a very satisfying read. I highly recommend.

I love Candace Camp's books, especially when she has feisty heroines like Miranda. But the hero totally disgusted me -- I just couldn't get past his depraved lifestyle (drinking, adultery, threesomes, etc.). Devin Aincourt slept with any female that breathed and he lives his life in a constant alcoholic, sexual haze. He sponges money off his sister, mother, and brother-in-laws, and owes everyone money. With all this going for him (NOT!), I found it hard to swallow that Miranda, the strong, smart heroine would fall for this loser. It stretched my belief that she would overlook all this and "see the good and kind man inside" simply based on feelings (and his paintings). We warn our daughters not to choose a guy based on "feelings", looks or charm, but based on his character. Will he be faithful? Can he be a good provider? Will he live a sober life? Will he be kind and loving? There's nothing about Devin to indicate that the answer to any of these questions would be a "yes", so why does a smart girl like Miranda fall for him?

I also agree with the other reviewer regarding the STDs Devin would have contracted. How Miranda could get within touching distance of him was beyond me! Yuck!!

Candace, please please don't give us disgusting heros like Devin anymore! Devin's brother-in-laws are so much better models for your heros.

C. Camps gift for detail is amazing. I envisioned myself in the book. Her characters are easily identifiable. However in the middle of the story there was a lot going on. The point of view was switched and at times hard to follow. The heroine although was strong was a bit naive...I suppose that was her charm. The interaction between the english and american characters were very interesting... very pride and prejudice like. At the end the twist was exciting. Although I have to admit Leona was my favorite character. Over all very sexy story!

The first time I read this book, I gave up very early on and donated the book to a charity shop. Then I had another look at the reviews and decided that I had perhaps been a bit hasty. After all, all those 5 star reviews couldn't be wrong! So I re-ordered the book and I'm very happy that I persevered, because I loved it. The hero was extremelely flawed. In fact there's a sex scene in the beginning, which I found quite shocking, considering it's a Mills & Boon, Super Historical Romance. It's a sex scene, which almost put me off the hero. It's a threesome, involving the hero, a strange woman and the hero's long-time lover, NOT the heroine. Rather, she is the villain of the story, and a truly wicked character at that. She's a beautiful, but lying, manipulative witch who has led the besotted hero down the wrong path. The heroine, an American girl who falls for him almost instantly, has her work cut out, but she's a highly intelligent woman. She's a feminist, and I mean that in the best possible way. She's very sweet, but she's a business woman, which means that she's independent and in control of her destiny. The way she gets the hero to fall in love with her was very clever indeed! So, after a false start, this proved to be a 5 star read after all!

Wealthy & blunt American heiress changes her mind about refusing rake Hero's half-hearted marriage proposal. She sees it as a challenge to make Hero, who's been devoted to his married mistress for 14 yrs, fall in love with her. Hero agrees to wed her b/c of his dire financial straits but later finds himself wanting more from their marriage of convenience than he originally intended.

My 1st Camp book & I liked it. It was absorbing & fast paced. Good sensuality. The heroine was plucky but not in an emotionally distant or somewhat uncaring way that other plucky heroines are often portrayed in romance novels. I especially liked how Hero's struggles between degradation & goodness were detailed & realistically portrayed. One thing that niggled me was the possibility that Hero's new obssession/"love" for heroine is just a replacement of his long-time obssession/"love" for his mistress. I guess I wasn't totally convinced that his love for heroine was all that different than his mistress, except for the fact that heroine was more morally upstanding than evil mistress.

Recommended.

I usually enjoy Candace Camp's books, but not this one. Miranda was a little too perfect and Devin was way too passive; I didn't buy them as a couple and kept thinking Miranda could do a lot better for herself. Warning: spoilers follow. Don't read further if you don't want to know what happens in the book.

In addition to having no clue that he was being robbed blind, Devin managed to spend his entire adult life in love with (and participating in a lot of depraved behavior with) one woman and yet we are meant to believe that he had no idea what she was really like. He also didn't recognize a woman he once had an affair with, despite the fact that (a) this woman was currently living in his house, (b) he married into her family, and (c) he had supposedly been torturing himself for years about how the affair ended. (Maybe he needs glasses?) Then add in the fact that Devin's wife totally manipulated him into doing what she wanted and he not only didn't put up a fight but he never had the slightest idea that she was playing him. But the ultimate "seriously, Miranda, don't help this man contribute to the gene pool" argument is the fact that fairly early on Devin spotted evidence of a murder attempt and yet he didn't bother to warn anyone. Really? Even if he thought it was aimed only at him despite Miranda having been injured as a result, shouldn't he have warned the others so they could be on the alert? And then, oh I don't know, maybe tried to figure out who was behind the attempt? Even the second time Miranda is nearly killed doesn't stir Devin to action. How am I supposed to root for Miranda to live happily ever after with an ineffective dimwit?

Camp doesn't help matters with her cavalcade of villains at the end of the book, which left me doubting Miranda's and her father's intelligence, too. As sharp as they're supposed to be, it would have been nice if they'd suspected at least one of the two plots against them. In fact, Miranda wondering if someone was embezzling from Devin could have added a nice layer of tension to the story, leaving her trying to investigate the facts without prematurely accusing someone her husband felt loyal to.

If you want a believable redeemed rake story, try Lord of Scoundrels (Five Star Standard Print Romance) by Loretta Chase. If you want a good Candace Camp book, try pretty much anything else she's written, such as most of the Matchmakers series -- it starts with The Marriage Wager (Matchmakers) -- or try the duo of An Independent Woman and A Dangerous Man.

Overall I really did like this book, and I would read more by this author. Devin and Miranda were great characters, and the "who's the bad guy?" mystery that was the backbone of this story was quite interesting and hard to guess. Devin is quite the desirable dark hero too, and Miranda was intelligent and spoke her mind (but not in an annoying way.) The passion between these two was heated, but don't read this book looking for a "sizzling read". It's not that type of romance book. Bedroom scenes come very late in the book, and they were rather glossed over. My ONLY true complaint was that the ending was wrapped up with such hyper-speed. The last 30 or so pages had many of the main characters confessing and purging their hidden secrets at an alarming pace just to wrap up the story. There was no reason for much of the confessions either - they were just spewing stuff like "I never wanted anyone to know, but I must confess!" It just felt so phony. The conclusion of the story was quite cleaver though, I just didn't like the style of delivery.