Aug 19 2009
REVIEW: The Viscount’s Kiss by Margaret Moore
Dear Mrs. Moore,
After I had read “A Lover’s Kiss,” I fell in love with the secondary character of Lord “Buggy” Bromwell, friend to the hero of that book and the ones that preceded it. So when I checked out the August Harlequin Historical releases and realized that this was Buggy’s book, I pounced.
Justinian “Buggy” Bromwell never expected to meet the love of his life in a mail coach traveling from London to Bath. Just as Nell Springely didn’t expect to find her heart’s delight with a man who adores spiders. Still that’s what happens among other things including impersonation of a noblewoman, standing up to one’s parents, fending off nasty, brutish noblemen and traveling around the world in the name of scientific exploration.
Oh, this book started off so well. Buggy and Nell meet and have instant feelings for each other though neither one intends that these feeling should go any further. Nell plays her role of being Lady Eleanor, daughter of a Duke, though she eventually fesses up to Buggy and his mother instead of letting things continue until the end of the book. Buggy’s father eventually comes around and tells his son how proud he is of him, of the book Buggy wrote based on his last expedition and agrees to Buggy marrying a woman of no rank or fortune. And even the real Lady Eleanor doesn’t mind the fact that Nell used her name. We also get updates on Drury and his wife Juliette as well as their friends.
Yet as the book progressed, many of my “oh dear” buttons kept getting pressed. What starts as old, family retainers telling Nell all about Buggy as a young boy turns into servants apparently not turning a hair to find their master’s son in compromising circumstances with a young woman who is not his wife. Buggy and Nell almost trip over each other in their race to outdo each other in Noble Selflessness to the Point of Idiocy. Drury seems to have turned into a mushy, love-besotted husband while Juliette spills her innermost secrets to a woman she’s just met. A noblewoman threatens to leave her husband and, in front of non-family members, tells the reason why. And then there’s the last chapter and epilogue which drag in almost every past leading character in a flood of syrupy excess.
I wanted to love this book. I wanted to give it a sterling grade. Really, I did. But I just can’t. I’m sure readers who want to catch up on these past characters will want to check it out, as I wanted to because of Buggy. And I hope they enjoy it more than I did. Because for me, it’s a C.
~Jayne
This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.
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Aug 19, 2009 @ 16:01:27
Thank you for taking the time to read and review The Viscount’s Kiss. I really wanted you to love this book, too. I have sought consolation in chocolate mousse.
One thing I must correct, though – The Viscount’s Kiss is an August release, not September.
Aug 19, 2009 @ 16:47:10
Oops, so sorry. I got my books and dates mixed up. I can haz corrected it now.
I will help console you by eating some chocolate too. Perhaps the next book will work better. There is a next book in the series, isn’t there?
Aug 19, 2009 @ 17:19:21
Thanks for fixing.
No sequel is planned at the moment (which explains why everybody showed up at the end of The Viscount’s Kiss), but I’ve learned to never say never!
My next book, THE HIGHLANDER’S KISS is also a Regency, though. Since I apparently can’t get enough of lawyers, the heroine is a solicitor’s sister who would have been a darn fine lawyer herself if only she’d had the chance. :-)
Aug 19, 2009 @ 17:22:35
Is there not something planned for the Duke’s daughter and the Naval guy?
Aug 19, 2009 @ 17:25:38
I wouldn’t put it as strongly, but I had a similar reaction. It’s a bad sign in a romance when you like the chapter headings much more than the chapters themselves. I did like Buggy very much, as a refreshing change from ultra macho alpha borderline sociopathic heroes that are so much in fashion these days, and I tried really hard to stay interested because of him, but I just couldn’t.
I don’t have problems with the plot elements as the reviewer did; if that’s what the author said happened, then that’s what happened, and there’s nothing absolutely impossible about the actions related. My problem was that the writing seemed flavorless & flat, and I was never emotionally engaged at any point.
However, nobody hits them out of the park every time, and I have every intention of giving the author’s next regency another ‘at bat’.
Aug 19, 2009 @ 17:29:45
I did like the chapter headers too. It showed Buggy had a fine sense of how to tell his expedition story. The solicitor’s sister heroine sounds interesting too.
Aug 19, 2009 @ 19:14:55
Unfortunately, Charlie faded a bit for me over the years. However, I do have a few thoughts of where I could take that couple – I’m just not sure it’d be enough for a novel. But I had a blast writing an Undone (coming in October) about another couple who were going to be abandoned otherwise (Trefor and Bron from The Warlord’s Bride), so…maybe if not a book, there might be some kind of future for them. My writing time is rather committed at the moment, though.
I’m glad you found something worthwhile in The Viscount’s Kiss, Janice, at least enough to encourage you to try another of my books.
Aug 19, 2009 @ 19:50:41
I think that sometimes one is more disappointed in a less pleasing book by a ‘good’ author than one would be by that same book coming from an author for whom lesser stuff was the norm. Perhaps it was an ‘off day’ for me as well :)