You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by desiree_mcl
The Chief by Monica McCarty
3.0
Full disclosure: I'm not usually the biggest highlander/scottish romance fan...I don't know why. I want to love them, I keep trying and occasionally there are some that I love and adore but as a whole I tend to rate them 3 or 4 stars. Rarely are they home runs for me.
So with that here's my review for The Chief.
3 stars.
Tor is the Chief of his clan, he is content to stay out of picking sides between England and Scotland, however not everyone is content with that. Christina is a young woman who dreams of knights and epic love. She's abused by her father and her main goal is to get her and her sister away from her father and hopefully to an abbey. However that doesn't quite work out when she's forced to sneak into Tor's bed and trick him into marriage.
The first 100-ish pages I was on board, a little bored here and there but sometimes that's the downside of the first book in a series, the set up can drag the pacing down. But I started getting tired of the same set up and same issues cropping up, Christina would do something (good or bad), Tor would get distant or mad at some point after he found out or it was pointed out, tell her to stay out of it, he would leave, he'd start to feel a little guilty for being a jerk, he'd come back a few days later, they'd have sex, then the whole cycle would start up again. After the third time I was tired of it.
First off the romance between Tor and Christina didn't work for me. It should have but it didn't. Tor is this cold, gruff, guy who is attracted to Christina but who has very set in stone ideas about what a wife should do. Christina is a woman who just wants to make Tor happy and has a bright disposition and tries to make the best of things. And seeing them try to work out this marriage and figure things out should have been fun to read. It should have been, it wasn't. Any time she would do something nice for him, he wouldn't notice. Any time she tried to get him to talk to her he would be curt and closed off. The only thing they ever connected on was sex and because they didn't connect in any other way except sex and being annoying to each other even that wasn't fun. At the end of their journey (at least in this book) I didn't buy that everything worked out or that Tor really loved her.
Secondly, Tor and Christina annoyed me. They were equally annoying for different reasons. Tor was annoying because of how cold he was. On page he was emotionless, which I understood because of his life and also his backstory but he showed no or very little regard for Christina. There were moments with Lady Janet, a childhood friend and former lover, where he had more interaction and connection with her. Then Christina annoyed me because she kept putting herself out there to essentially get pat on the head and have Tor say 'good dog' even after he had been cold and cruel to her. There were a couple times when she would insert herself somehow and it would cause a legitimate safety issue for herself or the clan.
Thirdly, the sex scenes were meh. We were constantly bombarded with sentences that stated how passionate they were in the bedroom. Or stated that the one place they were completely connected was in bed. I never felt that. Tor was cold but even the writing in general for those scenes felt cold and just a way to keep them connected the tiniest bit.
Oh, also, apparently Tor has 2 kids from his previous marriage. We never meet or see those children, just told they are being housed somewhere else.
Overall, I did finish this, I do want to try at least one more of this series but will I try it any time soon, probably not.
So with that here's my review for The Chief.
3 stars.
Tor is the Chief of his clan, he is content to stay out of picking sides between England and Scotland, however not everyone is content with that. Christina is a young woman who dreams of knights and epic love. She's abused by her father and her main goal is to get her and her sister away from her father and hopefully to an abbey. However that doesn't quite work out when she's forced to sneak into Tor's bed and trick him into marriage.
The first 100-ish pages I was on board, a little bored here and there but sometimes that's the downside of the first book in a series, the set up can drag the pacing down. But I started getting tired of the same set up and same issues cropping up, Christina would do something (good or bad), Tor would get distant or mad at some point after he found out or it was pointed out, tell her to stay out of it, he would leave, he'd start to feel a little guilty for being a jerk, he'd come back a few days later, they'd have sex, then the whole cycle would start up again. After the third time I was tired of it.
First off the romance between Tor and Christina didn't work for me. It should have but it didn't. Tor is this cold, gruff, guy who is attracted to Christina but who has very set in stone ideas about what a wife should do. Christina is a woman who just wants to make Tor happy and has a bright disposition and tries to make the best of things. And seeing them try to work out this marriage and figure things out should have been fun to read. It should have been, it wasn't. Any time she would do something nice for him, he wouldn't notice. Any time she tried to get him to talk to her he would be curt and closed off. The only thing they ever connected on was sex and because they didn't connect in any other way except sex and being annoying to each other even that wasn't fun. At the end of their journey (at least in this book) I didn't buy that everything worked out or that Tor really loved her.
Secondly, Tor and Christina annoyed me. They were equally annoying for different reasons. Tor was annoying because of how cold he was. On page he was emotionless, which I understood because of his life and also his backstory but he showed no or very little regard for Christina. There were moments with Lady Janet, a childhood friend and former lover, where he had more interaction and connection with her. Then Christina annoyed me because she kept putting herself out there to essentially get pat on the head and have Tor say 'good dog' even after he had been cold and cruel to her. There were a couple times when she would insert herself somehow and it would cause a legitimate safety issue for herself or the clan.
Thirdly, the sex scenes were meh. We were constantly bombarded with sentences that stated how passionate they were in the bedroom. Or stated that the one place they were completely connected was in bed. I never felt that. Tor was cold but even the writing in general for those scenes felt cold and just a way to keep them connected the tiniest bit.
Oh, also, apparently Tor has 2 kids from his previous marriage. We never meet or see those children, just told they are being housed somewhere else.
Overall, I did finish this, I do want to try at least one more of this series but will I try it any time soon, probably not.