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bannisterb 's review for:
My Sweet Folly
by Laura Kinsale
Meh. This isn't really a story about couple who fell in love via letter and had to navigate their connection once they met in real life. No, it's more the story of a poorly-thought out political overthrow and revenge scheme that involved the easily manipulated hero and his tangential romantic interest, a frivolous and dim-witted mother hen who thinks she is smarter than she really is because of her ability to run a household and be a stepmother to a woman only 8 years her junior.
The heroine became TSTL once she met the hero and read more like a naive old woman than a 30-year old. The couple had no chemistry except in their once-a-year letters at the very beginning of the book (honestly, it could stand alone as a sweet, yet sad, story of two unhappily married people who had a connection). I'm not really into the mentally unstable, weak hero with no self-confidence, which may be this author's favored theme. I like healthy relationships, and this has zero honesty. I found myself skimming towards the end just to get past the drawn out mystery and misunderstood romance and see how everything wrapped up. It was overly convoluted, frustrating, and boring. I really thought the hero was insane for most of the first half, and with his first marriage being so awful (on both sides), how is the reader supposed to like him? I've no idea. And the mysticism (also present in Kinsale's Shadow and the Star) is so dull and hand-wave-y to gloss over the lamer parts of the plot and action. A great way to make every other character look stupid and rip me out of my suspension of disbelief.
Just a big no for me.
The heroine became TSTL once she met the hero and read more like a naive old woman than a 30-year old. The couple had no chemistry except in their once-a-year letters at the very beginning of the book (honestly, it could stand alone as a sweet, yet sad, story of two unhappily married people who had a connection). I'm not really into the mentally unstable, weak hero with no self-confidence, which may be this author's favored theme. I like healthy relationships, and this has zero honesty. I found myself skimming towards the end just to get past the drawn out mystery and misunderstood romance and see how everything wrapped up. It was overly convoluted, frustrating, and boring. I really thought the hero was insane for most of the first half, and with his first marriage being so awful (on both sides), how is the reader supposed to like him? I've no idea. And the mysticism (also present in Kinsale's Shadow and the Star) is so dull and hand-wave-y to gloss over the lamer parts of the plot and action. A great way to make every other character look stupid and rip me out of my suspension of disbelief.
Just a big no for me.