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34 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Good Read; A Terrific Heroine; & A Very Flawed Hero & Plot, August 31, 2003
As my review title suggests, I did enjoy reading Jude Deveraux's "The Velvet Promise," primarily because I admire and appreciate her heroine Judith Revedoune Montgomery's character. Judith's qualities of intelligence, ingenuity, courage, inner strength, her loving, kind heart and unselfish nature make her truly admirable. Judith, however, is far from perfect. She has her flaws, as all people do. And these flaws, along with her many excellent traits, form a very believable young woman. I wish I could say that Ms. Deveraux is consistent in her character development, but she is not. The characters of her hero, Gavin Montgomery, and his lover, Alice Valence, are so flat they are almost caricatures. I found that these distorted, comic-book-like figures, intruded and impeded my enjoyment of the novel. Wealthy heiress, Judith Revedoune, is forced by her brutal and abusive father to agree to marry Gavin Montgomery. Judith was raised to enter a convent and become a prioress; ruling lands, estates, villages, and knights. Her two elder brothers have recently died, and now she is the only heir. Her father desperately wants grandsons and the continuation of his bloodline. The Montgomery family is an old and noble one, dating back to the Norman conquest. The Montgomery brothers, led by Gavin, also offer protection from the Scots for the Revedoune borderlands. Gavin Montgomery, at first glance, would seem all that a maid could ask for in a mate. Yes, he is a handsome hunk - aren't they all? He is intelligent, in the I.Q., "left side of the brain" sense of the word, knightly, of noble birth, bearing, and sensibilities, and has assumed responsibility for his entire family since his parents' deaths when he was sixteen years old. He is also wildly infatuated with the obviously sociopathic Alice Valence, and has been her lover, and blind to her fatal faults, for two years when the story begins. He believes that Alice was a virgin when they were first "together." Meanwhile, she had been sleeping around since her early teens. (Sorry for the cattiness - I got carried away by our hero's stupidity!). Anyway, Gavin is truly, madly, deeply, etc. He has proposed marriage many, many times and Alice has always put him off with excuses - which he always accepted. She desires social position and wealth, which Gavin does not have, but she also wants Gavin's undying and exclusive devotion. She finally tells him that her father has insisted she marry a wealthy earl, and persuades him not to go to her father and pay a handsome bride price for his own suite. No one, except a green boy would believe this nonsense, without the slightest suspicion. What we have here is a naive hero, with tunnel vision, who is a poor judge of character, and stubborn to the extreme. Alice is a woman so obviously evil, and demented, that even though the Montgomery brothers warn Gavin about her, he remains oblivious. Alice is another cardboard character, whose flatness really unbalances the entire novel. The author has portrayed her without any redeeming characteristics whatsoever. There is no real background material to explain why she has developed into such a despicable wretch. Our hero and heroine meet on their wedding day. Gavin is surprised by Judith's unusual beauty, and dignified manner. She is taken by Gavin's gallant behavior, and thinks there may be hope for her marriage. Then she witnesses Gavin kissing Alice, and declaring his undying love for her, in the garden during the wedding feast. Judith has a bit of a declaration of her own. She vows to Gavin that she will never give herself to him freely. Thus, with this auspicious event, we have the main storyline - which gets tiresome, in spite of a few interesting subplots that Ms. Deveraux has devised. She does attempt to redeem Gavin at the book's conclusion, but by this time, he has become such a cartoon figure that it is difficult to blame or forgive him. I am also disappointed with Jude Deveraux's portrayal of historic figures and lack of adherence to historical detail. She shallowly depicts England's King Henry VII and his Queen Elizabeth as a loving, happy couple, which history disputes. They chat and gossip together like old chums, a veritable "Harry" & "Liz." Their anachronistic behavior was extremely distracting for me. There is little detail of court intrigues and politics, so very prevalent at this time - and at all times. After reading this novel, one is left with the idea that the English court had little to do except gossip about love affairs, and petty, personal intrigues. I will attempt to read book two in the series. I liked what I read of Stephen Montgomery, Gavin's brother and the main character in "Highland Velvet." This was my first Jude Deveraux novel, and I must say that "The Velvet Promise" was a disappointment for me, and certainly not up to what I expected from this well-known author.
JANA
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19 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Promise me I won't have to read it again., August 13, 2004
Gavin Montgomery is deeply in love with Alice, a young, impoverished lady from a neighboring estate. Alice's father rejects Gavin as a suitor and then promises her to another man. Devastated that his lover will be marrying someone else, Gavin succumbs to pressure from his family and decides to marry an heiress whose lands border his to the north.
Forced by her brute of a father to accept a betrothal to Gavin, Judith Revedoune is distraught over her fate. Her mother raised her to be a nun and she'd had no idea she would ever marry. Things look up, though, when she meets Gavin at their wedding ceremony. They seem to have instant chemistry and it seems that maybe marriage won't be so bad. Until, that is, she overhears Gavin swearing his undying love to Alice in the Garden during their wedding feast.
Jude Deveraux's books are really hit-and-miss for me. I've liked some of them, and I've really hated others. It had been quite a while since I read anything of hers, but I followed a listmania list and ended up buying a few titles in the "Velvet" series and was not impressed with any of them.
Judith is a so-so heroine. She's got the barebones of a heroine you'd enjoy, but she does some really dumb things and then rants about how she doesn't have to answer to anyone and then she readily participates in the "big misunderstanding" by acting like a spoiled child. Sure she was independent, and all of those tough heroine things, but the way her independent spirit was written made her seem bratty and petulant.
Gavin was an unintelligent jerk. He was one of those wholly selfish beings who is incapable of seeing the world from anything but his own point of view. At first when the author introduced this as a trait of one of the psychotic villains I thought she would use it to teach Gavin a lesson about himself, but self-awareness was a little too much to hope for, from the author and the hero.
If life isn't going Gavin's way, he lashes out at anyone around him. The new wife doesn't accept him just the way he is, so he smacks her one. She doesn't want to sleep with him? He'll just rape her. And so it goes, on and on. She saves him from the villain, but he'll believe everything the villain says about the naughty things she's done. Don't be mislead, he's not an alpha hero, he's a megalomaniacal tyrant. I hate him, he has no redeeming qualities.
"The Velvet Promise" is a velvet mess. The "other woman" is one of the most over-the-top slut/whore characters I've ever seen, but this isn't really a campy story, so she just doesn't fit here. We're supposed to hate one and love the other, but I find both of Judith's parents unlikable: her father for being a neanderthal, and her mother for being a reactionary shrew. There's just no one to like in this book, because the villains are as one dimensionally awful as the author wants them to be and the heroes are so self-centered and stupid that you almost wish everyone would just die of the plague.
The story is cohesive and almost interesting, but the characters suck. I give this book one star. Don't waste your money or your time.
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15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good introduction to the Velvet Quarter, July 27, 2005
Judith Revedoune has lived a sheltered life. Bearing the weight of her father's hatred for being born a female, she was raised by her mother away from the public eye, and prepared her for a life in a convent. But when her two brothers died, her father turned his attention to the daughter whose existence he barely acknowledged, and ordered her to marry so she could produce the heirs he so desired. When she refused, he broke her mother's arm in front of her and made further threats unless she complied. Fearing for her mother's life, Judith was left with no other choice but to marry the man chosen by her cruel father.
Gavin Montgomery was only sixteen when he and his brothers were orphaned. Being the eldest, he managed the Montgomery estate and has been the lord and protector of his brothers and people for over a decade. When Robert Revedoune offered his daughter's hand in marriage, the Montgomerys knew it would be a good match for Robert's daughter comes with a very large dowry, which would immensely help the Montgomerys financially. But Gavin had already given his heart to Alice Valence, a woman whose coldness is apparent to everyone but Gavin himself. A woman whom Gavin has put upon a pedestal.
When Gavin learns that Alice is to marry a wealthy earl, he is heartbroken but still falls for Alice's treachery, believing that her father forced her to marry the old earl, not knowing that it was Alice herself who chose the earl in the hope of advancing her current position. So Gavin reluctantly agrees to Revedoune's offer and accepts Judith for his wife. Come the wedding day, everyone rejoiced but nobody was more shocked and delighted than the bride and groom. Both were mesmerized by each other's looks and actually looked forward to getting to know each other better... then entered Alice. With her crocodile tears and feigned heartbreak, she took advantage of Gavin's love for her and made him vow to love her regardless of whom they're with. Locked in a passionate embrace, Judith witnessed everything, and hurt by the truth, she vowed to never let her husband rule her heart.
THE VELVET PROMISE is the first book in the Velvet Quartet featuring the Montgomery brothers. Featuring a great storyline and well-drawn characters, I enjoyed reading the book and learning about the characters. Judith is well educated, kindhearted and unaware of her beauty. I liked how she wove her magic net around Gavin's brothers and his people, not so much by her beauty, but by her kindness and intelligence. I enjoyed how her brothers-in-law became her biggest admirers and protectors, the way they stood up for her and berate Gavin for his foolishness in vowing eternal love for Alice are some of the best part in the story. There were actually moments when I wished that someone would just give Gavin a big whack in the head for his stupidity, and at times I wished that Judith married Raine instead of him. But for all his foolishness, Gavin made me laugh sometimes. The way he got jealous over the way his brother fawned over Judith, or his shock over the way she seemed to be able to manage his estate better than him was fun to see.
Although there are a couple of subplots that I could have done without, this is a nice introduction to the Montgomery brothers. There is enough sensuality to keep the pages burning, and you will enjoy seeing the villains meet justice. Best of all, the author has done well in depicting Stephen, Raine and Miles, which left me wanting to read their own stories.
The other books in the series are HIGHLAND VELVET, VELVET SONG and VELVET ANGEL.
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