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A review by aisforawkward
The Bargain by Mary Jo Putney
2.0
Unlike many books I give 2 stars this one I really really liked, and wanted to like even more.
The problems in it however were many, and at times completely undermined the general story for me, which dragged my overall rating down.
Problem the first! Historical anachronisms:
Addiction was mentioned and discussed as a normal medical condition, early on in the story. The problem is from my own reading at least addiction to opium wasn't recognized as a medical condition until 100 years later. Even 50 years after waterloo (which took place 5 weeks before the start of the book) dictionaries had definitions of addiction as being something only women and men who were weak willed to the point of idiocy were susceptible too. In other words a doctor, no matter how forward thinking, wouldn't have spoken the way Ian did about it, and nor would it have been blithely accepted by everyone else as obvious. I constantly cringed throughout this. Not because of the addiction itself, but because of the modern terminology and medical and lay attitudes about it.
This relates to problems I had in general with the description and attitudes towards surgery/medicine. Overall I don't know how accurate other aspects of the treatments and procedures are, but the attitudes and terminology used felt to me overly-modern, which was at odds with the attempt to portray a historical surgeon who was cutting edge for his day.
Another problem with the book, is the marriage itself took place in a hospital. As far as I know at this time the law was that for a marriage to be valid it had to have banns, or a license, and take place in the church. Special license applied to any church, but it still had to be a church to be valid.
The book had several other issues like this, none of which would have truly undermined the story to be fixed (and might even have strengthened it overall) or even required substantial changes throughout.
The next problem is a bit harder for me to explain what I mean... But throughout the book the author has a tendency to rush ahead to slow down and vice versa . That is, important character or relationship development is rushed just in time for an unimportant plot point to be dragged out beyond need, or unimportant character developments are slowed way down to suddenly rush into an important plot point. I don't want to say this was a problem of pacing precisely, though that was part of it. Rather, the amount of attention given to different things was inconsistent, as though the author didn't have a clear grasp on whether the story was character driven or plot driven, or something else. This resulted in sudden unexpected facts coming to light, as though they had obviously been true before, yet without any actual foreshadowing. A plot driven book can manage this since the focus isn't on day to day, but a character driven can't be very well done if character traits suddenly appear without build up or foreshadowing of some kind. The book's confused nature made these things stand out as a result, which meant my immersion kept getting broken every so often.
Also, the break between perspectives was a bit muddled. I didn't mind the various changes in perspectives, but the transition of when and why didn't work so well for me and sometimes broke my concentration repeatedly when a lot of alternating was occurring.
Overall I loved the story concept, especially the marriage of convenience to someone about to die (who then suddenly doesn't). This particular variation on the marriage of convenience trope (which I tend to enjoy anyway) I have only remembered seeing before in Shanna (which is the only OSR bodice ripper I have given a good rating too).
I also liked the concept of the secondary romance, though it was much to rushed and not well enough fleshed out for me.
I liked all the characters, and found them to overall be believable, even if things were too fast/slow throughout.
I probably have more thoughts in my head, but I don't like to have spoiler-y reviews, so I am going to stop now.
Despite the problems, I don't hate it, and would recommend to people less picky about historical accuracy than I am, who can overlook the strange fast/slow nature of the character/plot development.
The problems in it however were many, and at times completely undermined the general story for me, which dragged my overall rating down.
Problem the first! Historical anachronisms:
Addiction was mentioned and discussed as a normal medical condition, early on in the story. The problem is from my own reading at least addiction to opium wasn't recognized as a medical condition until 100 years later. Even 50 years after waterloo (which took place 5 weeks before the start of the book) dictionaries had definitions of addiction as being something only women and men who were weak willed to the point of idiocy were susceptible too. In other words a doctor, no matter how forward thinking, wouldn't have spoken the way Ian did about it, and nor would it have been blithely accepted by everyone else as obvious. I constantly cringed throughout this. Not because of the addiction itself, but because of the modern terminology and medical and lay attitudes about it.
This relates to problems I had in general with the description and attitudes towards surgery/medicine. Overall I don't know how accurate other aspects of the treatments and procedures are, but the attitudes and terminology used felt to me overly-modern, which was at odds with the attempt to portray a historical surgeon who was cutting edge for his day.
Another problem with the book, is the marriage itself took place in a hospital. As far as I know at this time the law was that for a marriage to be valid it had to have banns, or a license, and take place in the church. Special license applied to any church, but it still had to be a church to be valid.
The book had several other issues like this, none of which would have truly undermined the story to be fixed (and might even have strengthened it overall) or even required substantial changes throughout.
The next problem is a bit harder for me to explain what I mean... But throughout the book the author has a tendency to rush ahead to slow down and vice versa . That is, important character or relationship development is rushed just in time for an unimportant plot point to be dragged out beyond need, or unimportant character developments are slowed way down to suddenly rush into an important plot point. I don't want to say this was a problem of pacing precisely, though that was part of it. Rather, the amount of attention given to different things was inconsistent, as though the author didn't have a clear grasp on whether the story was character driven or plot driven, or something else. This resulted in sudden unexpected facts coming to light, as though they had obviously been true before, yet without any actual foreshadowing. A plot driven book can manage this since the focus isn't on day to day, but a character driven can't be very well done if character traits suddenly appear without build up or foreshadowing of some kind. The book's confused nature made these things stand out as a result, which meant my immersion kept getting broken every so often.
Also, the break between perspectives was a bit muddled. I didn't mind the various changes in perspectives, but the transition of when and why didn't work so well for me and sometimes broke my concentration repeatedly when a lot of alternating was occurring.
Overall I loved the story concept, especially the marriage of convenience to someone about to die (who then suddenly doesn't). This particular variation on the marriage of convenience trope (which I tend to enjoy anyway) I have only remembered seeing before in Shanna (which is the only OSR bodice ripper I have given a good rating too).
I also liked the concept of the secondary romance, though it was much to rushed and not well enough fleshed out for me.
I liked all the characters, and found them to overall be believable, even if things were too fast/slow throughout.
I probably have more thoughts in my head, but I don't like to have spoiler-y reviews, so I am going to stop now.
Despite the problems, I don't hate it, and would recommend to people less picky about historical accuracy than I am, who can overlook the strange fast/slow nature of the character/plot development.