Pleasure for Pleasure Book

I skipped book 2 and 3 just to read about Mayne. And truthfully I was a bit entertained and disappointed at the same time. I love Josie and I admit, I adore Mayne, but bugger, I want more of them instead of the secondary characters although I love Griselda and I think she deserved to find her man and Darlington was kinda okay, but I didn't like them taking up so much space, it was tiring to read so much of their lovey dovey moments on the first half of the book, duh! (although I admit the age different really make it really really cute) and I don't care much about Hellgate anyway, with a horribly written memoirs like that I wouldn't even buy the book, how could they actually give an award for the author for that? blah.

"I'm not sure," he said slowly. "I only read about half of the book before I threw it away."

I'm with you there, Garret.

First I have to say that the synopsis above is misleading, it was not what exactly happened in the book. Josie was the last of the Essex sisters to be married; unfortunately in her first season, she was stuck with the nickname Scottish Sausage so no one wanted her company. So she wore this corset to make her body looked slimmer but it actually made her even more look like a sausage O_o so Mayne, who was a good friend of the sisters and their husbands, taught her to be more ladylike (I'm not gonna explain how Mayne ended up with a skirt here O_o); he told her to get rid of her corset and taught her how to kiss (while wearing the skirt O_o anywaaay...) - so Josie did, she got rid of the corset, ordered new gowns that would make her shine, and she did it. She looked marvelous and sexy. Until a young man who was angry because Josie was now looked like a renaissance goddess instead of a sausage cornered Josie in a stable and molested her (well, not quite, he did kiss her forcefully but she completely kicked his ass). Mayne who found her with her gowns torn and face dirty thought she was raped, and he tried to be a hero by marrying her.

Mayne was a reformed rake since book 1, he really wanted to find a wife, and after finally gone through his first ever heartbreak with Lady Godwin (or whatever her name was) he actually preferred chaste, inexperienced ladies, thus he was engaged to Sylvie. This was what some readers find it so annoying why Mayne could switch so easily from Sylvie to Josie. But I don't think that Mayne really loved Sylvie (despite how florid he described about her qualities) - he just saw her as someone who was completely different from any other women in his previous life. She didn't care much about being kissed, didn't enjoy it even (although in the end we understand that it wasn't because of Mayne, instead it was because Mayne was, well, a man? lol). But with Josie, he found someone who could really love him *and* actually had the guts to tell him what she wanted, their chemistry was just too cute.

This could get 4 stars, but too much Griselda and Darlington really made it 3.