Liviania’s review of Love and Other Scandals (Scandals, Book 1) by Caroline Linden
Regency romance published by Avon 30 Jul 13
I have a massive soft spot for Caroline Linden since she is one of the first romance authors I ever read. Luckily, her books rarely require me to lean on that soft spot. Her recently completed series, The Truth About the Duke, was rather intensely plotted – there was quite a bit going on in every book. Love and Other Scandals is a lighter, more lively affair. There’s very little to it aside from the romance between Joan Bennett and Viscount Tristan Burke. Luckily again, it’s a good romance. But maybe I shouldn’t say lucky, since it’s all due to Linden’s writing.
Joan is a type of heroine that I’ve been enjoying lately. She’s a heartbeat away from being a spinster. This hasn’t made her desperate to marry, but she is even more aware than she was as a child of the things that a woman cannot do, even an independent one. She’s stubborn but fully under the thumb of her equally stubborn mother. She can basically see how her life is going to play out, full of unflattering clothes and keeping quiet on the sidelines but doesn’t know what she can do to change that. Her life starts to change when some new influences enter her sphere. The first is Tristan, and the second is her twice-widowed and rather scandalous aunt. Both help her figure out how to push for the things she wants.
Tristan is cut from a rather standard hero mold. His parents died young, his aunt and uncle who raised him disliked him, he spends his days and nights having fun, he’s ridiculously rich. He’s good friends with Joan’s brother, and when he meets her as an adult he’s instantly captivated by her personality and thinks she would look beautiful if she stopped dressing like an umbrella. (He makes the unfortunate mistake of telling Joan that last bit.) I really love how Linden weaves together Joan and Tristan’s physical attraction with their attraction to the way the other challenges them. Honestly, the chemistry between them is so strong the only unbelievable thing is that it takes so long for marriage to come up. Tristan’s objections to marriage (his mother’s death from a broken heart, his aunt and uncle’s cold marriage) are rather faint, so Linden smartly mentions them once and then moves the story along instead of having Tristan dwell on them.
I can see Love and Other Scandals disappointing some of Linden’s more recent readers. However, it is very much in her style and similar to her earlier books. Thus, I enjoyed it greatly. I also don’t think it’s a bad thing for a romance novel to be all about the romance. Sometimes subplots are needed, sometimes they aren’t. It certainly works better not to have one at all than to shove an undercooked one into place. It is also nice to read an angst-free romance containing an orphaned and neglected hero. (Not that those aren’t good reasons, for angst. It just gets same-y sometimes.)
I am looking forward to the rest of the Scandals series, which looks like it will be following Joan’s two best friends as well as the girls’ favorite story, a Fanny Hill-esque novel called Fifty Ways to Sin. (No guessing what inspired the title.) Anyone betting on the author and the true identity of the Fifty Ways to Sin heroine yet? I know I am, and I know that I’ll be back for It Takes A Scandal, coming out next month.
Grade: B+
Summary:
Joan Bennet is tired of being a wallflower. Thanks to some deliciously scandalous—and infamous—stories, she has a pretty good idea of what she’s missing as a spinster. Is even a short flirtation too much to ask for?Tristan, Lord Burke, recognizes Joan at once for what she is: trouble. Not only is she his best friend’s sister, she always seems to catch him at a disadvantage. The only way he can win an argument is by kissing her senseless. He’d give anything to get her out of her unflattering gowns. But either one of those could cost him his bachelor status, which would be dreadful—wouldn’t it?
Read an excerpt here.
Other books in the series:
