Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s Reviews > Azalea

99c Kindle Regency romance. I found the hook so interesting that I had to give it a shot: Our American heroine is married (at age 13 1/2) to a handsome English young man who's about 5 years older ... for her own protection, as she has an uncle who's stolen her rightful inheritance in England. So it's to be a marriage in name only for a few years, and her husband Christian heads back to England with his father. Unfortunately there's a shipwreck, and all are lost.

Or maybe not. Five years later the orphaned Azalea (yep, that's her name) heads to England herself. There she unexpectedly meets Christian, who's now a lord ... and who has absolutely no recollection of ever meeting her, let alone marrying her. To make matters worse, Chris is engaged to Azalea's cousin, who she's living with. And Chris has a major chip on his shoulder against Americans, even beautiful redheaded ones. And let's not forget the dastardly conniving uncle!

I will say it was a fun read if you like Regency romances, but in the cold light of morning the contrived nature of the plot, and all of the many coincidences, was just too much for me to take it even a little bit seriously. Read for brain candy only!

Content note: a couple of intimate scenes, including one short but explicit bedroom scene. Of course they are actually married ... (view spoiler)[and by the time they sleep together he has remembered that. But the earlier kissing scene, in which clothing starts to come off even though Chris doesn't know they're married, really has no place in a traditional Regency novel. It's totally unbelievable. (hide spoiler)]