LynneC’s review of Defiant in the Desert by Sharon Kendrick
Contemporary Romance published by Harlequin Presents 1 Dec 13
Sharon Kendrick’s Defiant in the Desert is definitely a book of two halves, as our football pundits over here have it. I nearly stopped reading after the first few chapters, and the dislike engendered for the hero never really wore off, but he did his best to redeem himself in the second half. If I were grading the halves separately, the first half would get a D and the second half a B. Like a Manchester United match, where they’re all over the place and then suddenly Moyes brings on Van Persie and Rooney and it all gets sorted.
But the heroine is another story. She’s stupid all the way through, and that does go to help me with the hero. Although she’s supposed to be intelligent, she is really dumb as a rock.
Let me explain, if I can. Sara Williams is a half-English, half-Arabian princess who is working as a graphic designer for an ad agency in order to escape from an arranged marriage she doesn’t want. Suleiman is the enforcer sent to bring her back. He does that with ruthless efficiency, even though he wants her very much and always has.
If there’s a bad decision, Sara makes it. At first she does something reasonably sensible – she contacts a newspaper and sells her story. Then it magically gets retracted when she changes her mind. I’m not sure why she changes her mind or why she doesn’t go to the police. Since she has British citizenship, applying for protection should work, or at least should delay the case a bit while she gets her ducks in a row. I can’t see the press letting go of a juicy story for a start.
Then Suleiman has some weird urges where Sara is concerned. He wants to bite her breasts. Not nibble, but bite and really leave his mark. Outside BDSM where it’s consensual, that struck me as weird and definitely off-putting. I nearly stopped reading at that point. He denigrates Sara in front of her assistant at work. That is so not cool, not PC, not respectful. I hated him for doing that and not apologizing.
But I kept reading, because, man, he doesn’t deserve Sara. Nobody does. I have to tell you this bit. When they get to Mythical Arabian Kingdom, she takes a camel and rides off. Without a compass, extra water or anything but hoping she can follow the tracks back to the airport and persuade someone there to take her home. Then why go in the first place? Why get on the plane? And since she’s a half-Arabian princess and she knows the desert a bit, why so stupid?
Ah, right. So the hero can rescue her.
The problem with the arranged marriage – blink and you’ll miss it. But the bit that I like kicks in now. Suleiman makes a real effort to change. He wants to become what she needs because he’s falling for her (though heaven knows why, except she has the magic vagina). She’s a pseudo-virgin, that is, she has extremely limited sexual experience and it wasn’t satisfying, so he can do it all and in the course of one night. I actually don’t mind that as much as some reviewers, so I won’t go on about that, but really, I’d prefer it if she had some decent experience to compare him to or none at all. The “Tried it, didn’t like it,” doesn’t work awfully well for me. But I do enjoy Suleiman’s reform. Then, of course, she’s stupid again. This woman is consistent in her stupidity.
Because there are definitely elements that are refreshing in this book, and being Kendrick, it’s well-written, the style smooth, the pacing even, and because after a bit of hair-pulling, Sara actually makes me laugh out loud a few times with her idiocy, I am definitely up for the next one. Which will probably be the Sultan. I’ll go check.
Grade: C
Summary:
Sara Williams’s hand in marriage was bought to cover a debt. But she’s determined never to marry anyone!
Diplomat Suleiman Abd al-Aziz must deliver Sara to her desert destiny. But with Sara set on escaping her marriage by seducing him, his iron will is sorely tested!
Read an excerpt.
