Lord of Fire review
Jan. 5th, 2011 01:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearLord of Fire, by Gaelen Foley, is unashamedly a Regency bodice-ripper.
For example, the hero is introduced in the first paragraph thusly:
"[The candle's] shifting radiance glimmered over his raven-black hair and caught the Machiavellian glint of cunning in his quicksilver-colored eyes."
It's basically the plot of Beauty and the Beast, with the added intrigue of a plan by angry Americans to blow up London on Guy Fawkes' Night.
The heroine is suitably strawberry-blonde and blue-eyed, with the purity and innocence to reclaim the hero's spirit from the taint of his past dark deeds, and is utterly unable to resist him, despite the horrendous way he treats her at the beginning.
I enjoyed this book in the same way that I enjoy The Rasmus - it is an excellent example of its genre and I appreciated the qualities that required, but I also found it very, very funny. I'm sure there are readers out there who take these kinds of books entirely seriously, but I do wonder if the people who write them can actually do the same, or if they realise how ridiculous it all is.
I skipped the graphic sex scenes as those rarely do anything for me (read one, read 'em all), and I felt the plot got a little repetitive towards the end (the hero and heroine perhaps fell out and made up again one time too many), but overall I threw myself wholeheartedly into the romance and excitement of it all, albeit laughing at the sometimes cringe-worthy narrative phrasing and more outrageous plot points.
I don't read these kinds of books often (more than once in a while would be far too much) but I generally enjoy them when I do.
For example, the hero is introduced in the first paragraph thusly:
"[The candle's] shifting radiance glimmered over his raven-black hair and caught the Machiavellian glint of cunning in his quicksilver-colored eyes."
It's basically the plot of Beauty and the Beast, with the added intrigue of a plan by angry Americans to blow up London on Guy Fawkes' Night.
The heroine is suitably strawberry-blonde and blue-eyed, with the purity and innocence to reclaim the hero's spirit from the taint of his past dark deeds, and is utterly unable to resist him, despite the horrendous way he treats her at the beginning.
I enjoyed this book in the same way that I enjoy The Rasmus - it is an excellent example of its genre and I appreciated the qualities that required, but I also found it very, very funny. I'm sure there are readers out there who take these kinds of books entirely seriously, but I do wonder if the people who write them can actually do the same, or if they realise how ridiculous it all is.
I skipped the graphic sex scenes as those rarely do anything for me (read one, read 'em all), and I felt the plot got a little repetitive towards the end (the hero and heroine perhaps fell out and made up again one time too many), but overall I threw myself wholeheartedly into the romance and excitement of it all, albeit laughing at the sometimes cringe-worthy narrative phrasing and more outrageous plot points.
I don't read these kinds of books often (more than once in a while would be far too much) but I generally enjoy them when I do.
