A Match Made in Scandal Book

Another Author Who Forgets Genre in Which She Is Writing

Ryan Donnally has received another engineering award and is attending the ball in his honor. He looks up and there is his childhood friend and business partner, Rachel Bailey, whom he has not seen since his wife's death four years ago. Ryan's wife was Rachel's best friend, who lived with her in childhood. Rachel and Ryan have been in love with each other off and on their whole lives. The timing is never "right", and even now Ryan is engaged to another.

Melody Thomas is supremely talented. This book has a complex plot. The words are artistically and powerfully blended. The dialogue is riveting. The story is effectively spread out throughout the book. There is drama, mystery and suspense. This book would probably be a bestseller if it had been set in contemporary eras and was marketed as such. Therein lies the rub. It is set in Victorian England and is marketed as an historical romance.

*****SPOILERS. The author wants us to believe that these two very self-disciplined, successful, above average in intelligence, people with a Victorian upbringing cannot keep from having sex in carriages, against trees, in priest's houses, and several other incongruous places within hearing, while they both think they hate each other and they would face financial and social ruin if caught. Also, the Hero is engaged to another. And the Heroine has been there, done that, with another with disastrous results that threatens her present and future even now. It was just not believable that these two would be this dumb.

The hero and heroine are Irish, Catholic and are looked down upon and discriminated against in Victorian England. If they all acted like these two back then, no wonder they were censured. And just a little note to the author, no marriage, under any laws, was ever legal if the parties were under duress when the vows. were made. This predicament was unbelievable.

The villain in this piece was a peer and he "worked" in "trade", which was not done in Victorian England, but we are lead to believe that this Lord got by with this, but forbade his son to "work". I could go on, but the gist is that there were too many situations that just defied belief, that were not consistent, and dumbed the characters down and demanded the reader to dumb down as well. Repugnant.

Again, this book is labeled historical romance. The author forgot both in this story. The hero attempted a couple of times to be romantic, and one act did succeed admirably, but the other ended up being a romantic gesture for another, and the Heroine forgotten. The Heroine and Hero spent most of the time disappearing from each other. When they were together, there was hot and steamy sex, but romance? No.

The majority of this novel is an in-depth recitation of high finance and corporate raiding. I was bored through a lot of it. It left little room for the development of the characters' romantic side.

The author tells us up front that the Hero married the Heroine's best friend, but the why of this was never explained and neither character ever discussed this, despite the fact that both parties were supposedly in love even then. Why introduce this plot line if it was not to be explored?

If one does not mind reading a contemporary corporate suspense novel masquerading as an historical romance, you will enjoy this book. The author is talented. I, however, want an historical romance, and I feel duped.