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A review by katiev
A Lady of the West by Linda Howard
2.0
Hmmmmm..... Hard to rate. I'm thinking 2.5, but I just can't quite bring myself to round up. If it hadn't been for the one action I'll discuss below, I probably would have rated higher or given that full 3 stars.
SPOILERS AHEAD
It's no secret that I'm a fan of the old school bodice rippers, so the consent issues didn't bother me. I have a big disconnect in my head between acceptable in RL and acceptable in Romancelandia. It's almost like a split personality :-/
This was a typical old school rape/forced seduction plot. The heroine was in love with the hero and wanted him, but thought he didn't love her and therefore tried to hold herself back. The hero was determined to have her and seduce her through her defenses. Basically if he'd said the 3 magic words then the consent issues would go out the window. It's a standard bodice ripper trope.
What did bother me was that he slapped her once, so hard that it threw her into the wall, bruised her face, and busted her lip. Again, I have that disconnect, but the hero hitting the heroine and hitting her that hard are hard for me to swallow period. It's weird that the forced seduction/rape tropes don't get me but hitting does.
The heroine does not let him off easy. Thank god for that. It takes him 3 months to get back in her bed and that's because he forces the issue. After that she still keeps herself aloof from him right up until the final pages of the book.
In a historical I can put up with things that I can't in a contemporary. Social mores were so different that I know it had to effect the way men/women interacted. At that time it was perfectly legal for a man to do almost whatever he pleased with his wife. Doesn't make it right, but I'm not a fan of historicals that simply put a 21st century character in a fluffy dress or cowboy hat. Howard did not do that, these two were definitely not modern characters, but something was missing in the delivery that I really wanted.
I can forgive a fictional character for bad deeds, but I have to see the remorse. The hero did have remorse, but it wasn't expressed well. Yes, he did apologize and he didn't get instant forgiveness, but I needed *something* - some sort of heartfelt scene that we never got. Despite the sex scenes there was a real lack of intimacy between the H/h that we never see breached. There are hints of it at the end, but I'd liked to have seen it. We were privy to all of his and her internal thoughts, but I never got that scene between the H/h that would have satisfied me. I needed that scene where they laid themselves open to one another. Instead we get a very hard, aloof man who doesn't express himself well and a very staid, proper and proud woman who also doesn't express herself well.
SPOILERS AHEAD
It's no secret that I'm a fan of the old school bodice rippers, so the consent issues didn't bother me. I have a big disconnect in my head between acceptable in RL and acceptable in Romancelandia. It's almost like a split personality :-/
This was a typical old school rape/forced seduction plot. The heroine was in love with the hero and wanted him, but thought he didn't love her and therefore tried to hold herself back. The hero was determined to have her and seduce her through her defenses. Basically if he'd said the 3 magic words then the consent issues would go out the window. It's a standard bodice ripper trope.
What did bother me was that he slapped her once, so hard that it threw her into the wall, bruised her face, and busted her lip. Again, I have that disconnect, but the hero hitting the heroine and hitting her that hard are hard for me to swallow period. It's weird that the forced seduction/rape tropes don't get me but hitting does.
The heroine does not let him off easy. Thank god for that. It takes him 3 months to get back in her bed and that's because he forces the issue. After that she still keeps herself aloof from him right up until the final pages of the book.
In a historical I can put up with things that I can't in a contemporary. Social mores were so different that I know it had to effect the way men/women interacted. At that time it was perfectly legal for a man to do almost whatever he pleased with his wife. Doesn't make it right, but I'm not a fan of historicals that simply put a 21st century character in a fluffy dress or cowboy hat. Howard did not do that, these two were definitely not modern characters, but something was missing in the delivery that I really wanted.
I can forgive a fictional character for bad deeds, but I have to see the remorse. The hero did have remorse, but it wasn't expressed well. Yes, he did apologize and he didn't get instant forgiveness, but I needed *something* - some sort of heartfelt scene that we never got. Despite the sex scenes there was a real lack of intimacy between the H/h that we never see breached. There are hints of it at the end, but I'd liked to have seen it. We were privy to all of his and her internal thoughts, but I never got that scene between the H/h that would have satisfied me. I needed that scene where they laid themselves open to one another. Instead we get a very hard, aloof man who doesn't express himself well and a very staid, proper and proud woman who also doesn't express herself well.