13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good story, unfortunate choice for reader, March 12, 2009
Having listenened to the other titles in this series, and throughly enjoyed them, I was disappointed in this one. The reader just did not do as good a job as Kate Reading. Kate was much more adept at differentiating between various characters, both male and female. Also, this reader pronounced the main characters' name, Eloise, as "El-Waz". Doesn't someone oversee these things? I should think someone would have said "let's not do that, it will be very distracting for the readers as they've become used to hearing this character called Eloise". I hope the series continues, but I sincerely hope they go back to Kate as the narrator for the next one.
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15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Most Charming Flower Yet, January 24, 2009
Inevitably in any popular series, sooner or later the writing gets stale - character arcs become unbelievable, plots are rehashed, or the reader can simply feel the writer's own weariness for the once beloved storylines. Not so for Lauren Willig! If anything, The Temptation of the Night Jasmine is the strongest book in the Pink Carnation series so far.
Framed once again by the research and relationship trials of graduate student Eloise Kelly, the Night Jasmine opens after Eloise and her new-beau Colin have been together for three months. A week-long romantic getaway to Colin's home in Surrey, not to mention his library's inexhaustible cache of historical archives, leads Eloise to a new discovery in her study of the aristocratic spy, the Pink Carnation - a plot involving french spies (naturally), betrayal of a king, and the infamous Hellfire Club.
Enter Lady Charlotte Lansdowne and Robert, the Duke of Dovedale, the real stars of this Carnation installment. Robert, newly home from a decade long stint in India, is on the trail of his mentor's murderer, but is unprepared for both the attraction he feels for the bookish Charlotte (a very, very distant cousin) and the real forces at work in his friend's death.
Like the other Pink Carnation books, the mystery here is well plotted out and the excitement high enough to keep the pages flying well into the night. The true strength lies within the romance of Robert & Charlotte, however. Both characters show very strong growth over the course of the book: Charlotte must deal with her realization that real life is not quite how it is in books (which can be a good a thing), and Robert has to grapple with not only his dubious past, but that of his father. As you would expect, a happy ending lies in wait for these two, but not without a few bumps along the way. Even more so than past books, the reader will truly find herself rooting for these two.
So, the verdict - if you loved the previous Carnation books, definitely pick up The Temptation of the Night Jasmine! You won't regret it. If you're new to the series,I recommend starting at the beginning (with The Secret History of the Pink Carnation) so you'll be fully in the loop when secondary characters appear, as well as up to speed on the framing romance of Colin & Eloise. Happy reading!
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Temptation is the best so far, not so fond of reader, May 7, 2009
I adore the Carnation series by Lauren Willeg, especially in Audio Book format, but I really missed Kate Reading for Temptation. With all respect to Justine Eyre who is bravely stepping into a series already in progrss (her Charlotte is spot-on), she just doesn't compare. I would have been more tolerant of the change if she hadn't mispronounced Eloise as EloWHAZ. Gasp.
Wonderful story. One of the best of the series. The audio version was not my favourite.
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