Reviews for The Diamond Slipper

The average rating for The Diamond Slipper based on 2 reviews is 2 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-10-14 00:00:00 James Rose The following review was originally posted on my book blog The Book Challengers. When I purchased my copy I didn't try to read other reviews on Goodreads (or anywhere on the web for that matter) and hoped that the blurb on the cover would give me the right idea about a possible Cinderella retelling. Even if it would be a very loosely based story but unfortunately it was not to be. Instead I got a story of a 16-year-old girl who "falls in love" (more like in lust, if you ask me) with a man 12 years her senior. And he seems to fall for her as well... Despite the fact that he's to be her proxy-husband for almost a month till they travel from Vienna to Paris where Cordelia is to be married to man 30 years her senior. Alright, I can live with this. It has happened before that the people who are to be married are not in love. Maybe she won't go with her marriage in Paris and Cordelia and Leo will marry instead? Yeah, too much to ask for. I try to understand that this novel is loosely based on real historical events in the late 1760's, but I still find it pretty difficult to believe that the readers of today are all that comfortable with a couple where the girl is only 16 years old. I'm all for couples where one partner is older than the other one, but I must admit that I have to draw the line somewhere and my line is here. Here, where a sadistic man in his late 40s rapes his wife and we have to read about it more than once. Here, where a man in his late twenties seduces a teenage girl who didn't seem all that grown-up to me. Whatever a 28-year-old seemingly sensible man saw in this silly teenager, I did not understand even when I finished the novel. Feather could have made us see why Leo liked Cordelia besides her spirit, but she didn't use the opportunity to tell us more about their journey from Vienna to Paris. If these two were supposed to get to know each other for almost 3 weeks on that journey and the readers actually get a short glimpse of only the beginning of the journey... well, I must say that something's amiss and maybe Feather could have cut down on the intimate scenes instead. About those intimate scenes... Yeah, Cordelia had her first orgasm with Leo, but I find it highly improbable that a girl such as herself would escape from her marriage bed (where her husband had just raped her, mind you) and ask Leo to make love to her. Or is it just me that finds this a bit cringe-worthy? So much for a Cinderella retelling that I hoped for...

Review # 2 was written on 2012-07-07 00:00:00 Jason Ridley 2.5 stars. I love a heroine in pursuit and the heroine in this book was the one pursuing the honorable hero, but something just wasn't right. The hero was a little too dull, and the words of the villain "too gullible" for my liking, and the heroine a little too immature at the age of 16! Her antics just wasn't cute and I kept thinking the poor thing was just a child that didn't know better. It's weird because I read Almost Innocent which pretty much had the same story-line but I enjoyed that one a whole lot more than this.