Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Lord of Scoundrels

Lord of Scoundrels is the book that turned me back onto romance. I hadn’t read a romance novel in like, 13 years or something and now, thanks to Loretta Chase (no really, thank you Loretta Chase, I love you lots), I am HOOKED. It doesn’t hurt that with my handy Kindle, I can read romance novels and not feel embarrassed by the cover.* And believe me, it takes a lot to embarrass someone who’s used to wandering around with books that have dragons, elves, dwarves, and/or mystical ponies on the covers. Anyway, onto the summary!

Lord Dain is a wicked Marquess living in Paris. Jessica Trent is a spinsterish blue-stocking trying to get her brother away from Dain’s bad influence. Naturally, when Dain and Jessica meet, there is a whole lot of tingling in their nether bits. Dain is, as Jessica refers to him later, “the biggest whoremonger in Christendom” so this is to be expected because Jessica is a very, very pretty lady. Jessica, being a 28 year old spinster and single by her own choice, is appalled at being all lusty about Dain. They spend the first third of the book trying to out-maneuver each other. Then there is some smooching, some dancing, a BIG MISUNDERSTANDING, a marriage, a semi-annoying sub-plot, true love, The End. Plus, hot sexy-sex. Mostly it’s sexual tension between Jess and Dain, but there are a few sex scenes that are fairly frank (not quite explicit, but “breeding instrument” is used as a hilarious euphemism for cock).

Loretta Chase is a master of funny, witty, sarcastic dialogue that is just fun to read. She is also really good at character building, descriptive imagery, pacing, and all that other stuff that makes a book good. Of all her books, Lord of Scoundrels is one of my top two favorites. However, as much as I love this story, I am NOT a fan of the “This woman is awesome but all other women are cum dumpsters” trope. I know why it was used, and it worked (as much as something like that can work) within the confines of the story and the hero was mostly redeemed, but of all the tropes used in romance, it is one of my LEAST favorites.

All in all, this book is infinitely readable, even considering the occasional misstep.

Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase

*I understand why there are half-naked men and women (or M/M or W/W or M/W/M or W/M/W, whatever, to each their own) but sometimes, it really isn’t appropriate. For instance, there is tortured writhing on one of the covers for LoS and it really misrepresents the depth of the story. And I don’t mean the depth of its thrust. Zing!

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