Movie Review: The Magnificent Seven (2016)

I know, I know - I'm a hypocrite.  All I ever seem to do is bitch complain about how Hollywood is gutless, lacks imagination and sticks the audience with Superhero Movie #498 and endless remakes.  So what did I do?  Practically wet my pants when I saw the teaser trailer for The Magnificent Seven.  Not only a remake, but the second remake.  So why was I so excited about this movie?  In case you're new around here:

1) Western
2) Denzel.  As a cowboy.
3) Western
4) Cowboy Denzel.
5) Western
6) Denzel riding a horse. Oh, and he's a cowboy.

I walked into this movie wanting one thing, and one thing only.  A Popcorn Movie.  I wasn't expecting Citizen Kane.  I was expecting cowboys, cowboys shooting bad guys, action, and fun.  Basically if Ocean's Eleven was a western - that's kind of what I wanted.  I wasn't expecting depth.  I wasn't expecting deep.  So what did I get?  Well....

The story opens in a traditional, throw-back, heavy-handed sort of way.  Peter Sarsgaard is our one-dimensional villain, a robber baron mine owner named Bogue who wants to run everybody off their land because...well, he wants it.  An altercation at the town church leaves Emma Cullen's husband, Matthew (Matt Bomer in a blink and you'll miss him role) dead.  Emma and some other guy (named Teddy Q, their relationship isn't really explained), end up another town over or so which is where they meet Chislom (Denzel) a bounty hunter who rides in and shoots up half the saloon.  They convince him to help dispatch of Bogue, and in turn pick up wandering gambler Faraday (Chris Pratt).

On their way back to town they recruit confederate sharpshooter Goodnight Robicheaux (Ethan Hawke), his knife-throwing partner Billy Rocks (Byung-hun Lee), Mexican bandit Vasquez (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), ex-Indian hunter (niiiice) Jack Horne (Vincent D'Onofrio), and a lone Comanche with no tribe, Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier). 

One of the reviews I read slammed the use of the cast - basically saying that hey, it's great that we have a diverse cast but they're literally shallow pools.  To be fair?  None of these characters, regardless of race or ethnicity can be confused with "deep."  This is a very surface movie.  Even Denzel, who is The Star, is kept at arm's length.  Further highlighting the shallowness is that there are frustrating teasing glimpses of what could have been.  The relationship between Goodnight and Billy Rocks is destined to launch a thousand slash-fiction ships (and I'd read them all).  There's a history between Chisholm and Goodnight that doesn't really go anywhere.  Jack Horne made a living hunting Indians and now he's fighting alongside a Comanche.  Vasquez is a wanted man recruited by the bounty-hunting Chisholm.  Faraday is the comic relief but beneath the surface you can detect self-loathing.  There's a lot of dynamics that could be put in play here that never really are.

What we have is a movie that clocks in at a smidge over 2 hours, and that's the problem.  It's an action movie and given the plot you know there has to be a fair amount of time spent on the fight to free the town.  The big long action scene is great, but what is sacrificed along the way is any sort of character development that goes beyond the surface broad strokes.  Everything about this movie, from the surface-only characters to the music to the villain is about as subtle as a sledgehammer and it's all telegraphed very early on.

All that being said, I didn't hate this - and I didn't hate it for a couple of reasons.  1) Those teasing glimpses are compelling and 2) Haley Bennett as Emma Cullen is a revelation.  If you are a romance author, especially if you write historical westerns - heck, even if you're just thinking about it?  This is a romance heroine right here.  When everybody else in town is too scared to fight, she goes out and finds Chisholm.  She doesn't dissolve into a puddle of goo when she gets around all those handsome men with dubious reputations and she gets to shoot a rifle.  A lot.  And she doesn't need any of the men to TEACH her how to shoot that rifle!  She already knows how and she's darn good at it!  This. Girl. Is. Awesome.

I can see all the faults of this movie (which I've just blathered on ad nauseam about...) and you know what?  I'm not sure I care.  And if you are already inclined to like westerns and, you know, Cowboy Denzel?  You'll likely feel the same way I did.  If you're ho-hum on westerns?  This one is unlikely to change you mind.

Western Fanatic Wendy Grade = B-
More Realistic Grade = C-

Final Note: Given the plot of this movie it's a given that not everybody is going to walk out alive.  Even though the characterizations are mighty thin, I still found myself kind of bummed about that - although who ends up living and who ends up dying is a fairly compelling statement unto itself. 

Mini-Reviews: Sheikhs and a DNF

Work has been busy, which means Wendy has been tired, which means Wendy is still limping along with her reading and not blogging a whole lot.  Plus I had to watch my Detroit Tigers not make the post-season.  Well, hey.  No more baseball to watch, so maybe I'll start reading again?  One can hope.  That said, I do have a few recent reads where I don't have a ton to say, so it's time for another round of mini-reviews!

The Widow and the Sheikh by Marguerite Kaye is the start of a new series and was a garden variety "It's OK" read for me.  It was a pleasant way to pass the time, but it didn't light a fire in me the way some of Kaye's other work has.

Julia Trevelyan is a botanist and widow now traveling in the middle of the Arabian desert fulfilling her husband's dying wish.  Complete his magnum opus on exotic plant species, see it published, and get him all the accolades he so richly deserves.  Julia is a skilled illustrator and while not a love match, she did share her husband's passion for the work.  But now she's stranded in the middle of an oasis after her feckless guides drug and rob her.  She's rescued by Azhar, a wealthy merchant passing through on his way home.  Turns out Azhar is a Prince, and with his estranged father's death is now the sheikh - a position he's conflicted about considering his father's last words to him involved disowning him.

Azhar wrestles with his past, family baggage, and expectation.  Julia wrestles with memories of an unhappy marriage (no abuse, more like disinterest) and completing the book.  They spend time together, fall in love, yada yada yada.

There was nothing overtly wrong with this story, I just wasn't entranced by it.  I generally like Kaye's work (the Armstrong Sisters series is especially strong), so I'll read the next book in the series.  I've seen other positive reviews so this is likely a "It's me, not you" sort of thing.  Final Grade = C+

 Never Seduce a Sheikh by Jackie Ashenden was a Kindle freebie that I downloaded based on author name recognition.  Many moons ago I was asking the Twitter hive for recent sheikh books, and Molly O'Keefe suggested another title in this series, but since I already had this one in the TBR I started here.

Lily Harkness is the newly minted CEO of Harkness Oil and has a lot to prove.  1) She's taking over for her father and 2) She's a girl.  She's visiting Sheikh Isma'il al Zahar's country in the hopes of securing their oil rights.  Isma'il has inherited the kingdom from his tyrannical father and has a lot to prove.  He needs to work out the best possible deal for his country and he's not convinced Lily Harkness is the woman for the job.

In a nutshell - ball-busting businesswoman trying to make everyone get over the fact she's a woman and a hero who felt like a bit of a throwback to me.  Very Alpha.  Very challenging.  A heroine who is supposedly tough (and a former Olympic swimmer to boot) but is vulnerable and still struggling with past event that haunts her (spoiler: not rape, but a sexual assault by a trusted adult).  I found this to be a very challenging read mostly because of the skewed power dynamics.  There were elements at play here that felt Old School Harlequin Presents in some ways.  Also I can totally see some readers being displeased by yet another portrayal of a "tough businesswoman" who really isn't all that much.  Then there's the ending.  While I appreciated that the author addressed ethical issues, the final resolution will likely displease some.

All that being said, this is the first book I've read in a while that really stuck with me in the respect that I thought about it afterward.  It had me puzzling over issues addressed, the authorial choices made, and I spun it around in my head for a couple days after.  This is, quite frankly, a minor miracle given the way my reading mood has been of late.  Certainly not for everybody, and my recommendation is really reserved, but I'm not sorry I read this.  Final Grade = B-

Magnate by Joanna Shupe is a book that was tailor made for me.  Gilded Age New York!  Robber barons!  A hero raised in Five Points!  This should have been Wendy Catnip.  And it was...until it wasn't.  Minor spoilers ahead.

Elizabeth Sloane is a blue-blooded miss with a head for stock trading.  The problem being that she's a woman, women can't trade on the exchange, and her brother would never hear of it.  She wants to open her own brokerage firm and goes to see Emmett Cavanaugh, steel magnate, and a man she thinks is her brother's friend (ha ha ha ha ha! Uh, no.) to propose a partnership.  A self-made man, Cavanaugh has a massive chip on his shoulder and Lizzy's proposal has him suspecting that maybe her brother's railroad isn't as healthy as it seems.  He sees this as an opportunity to take William Sloane down a few pegs.

So this sounds great, right?  A heroine bristling against society conventions, who wants to work, meeting her match in a ruthless self-made man who has an ax to grind with her brother.  The world-building is wonderful, Shupe paints the opulent excess of the Gilded Age marvelously and doesn't shy away from portraying her robber baron characters as ruthless and skirting the boundaries of fair business practices. Basically, they're jerks of the first order.  Hey, Carnegie did build a ton of libraries but he wasn't a nice guy either.

And then it all goes to heck in a hand-basket.  Lizzy and Emmett get caught in a compromising position and William basically blackmails Emmett into "doing right" by his sister.  Lizzy is shocked, SHOCKED I TELL YOU, that her brother thinks she needs to now marry Emmett (why should anyone care?) and is horrified when she finds out that blackmail was involved and that Emmett was "forced" to marry her and doesn't love her.

OH COME ON NOW!!!!!

Given how great I found the world-building to have this devolve into yet another historical romance featuring a heroine who has nary a care in the world when it comes to societal mores and who is determined to marry for twu wuv drove me batty.  The Sloane parents are dead - but Lizzy gets out in society.  She has a best girlfriend.  How could she think for one second that she couldn't NOT get married after being caught in a compromising situation?  Of course her brother would force the issue to protect her reputation.  As a woman YOUR REPUTATION IS ALL YOU HAD!!!  A passionate kiss in a private dining room?  Lizzy girl, you're basically a whore now.  She's never heard gossip about other society chits who "got into trouble?"  She never saw a "whore" get shunned by her former social circle?  Really?!?!?!  REALLY NOW!?!?!?!?!

I cannot express how much this irritated me.  It irritated me so much that even though I'm halfway through the book the thought of finishing it just irritates me even more.  For some this will seem like a silly thing to nit-pick over, but ugh - Wendy irritated!  Wendy smash!  There's a lot glowing reviews out there, so obviously I'm in the minority here - and Lord help me I'll likely try another book in this series to see how it goes because after all...Gilded Age New York.  I am nothing, if not predictable.  But seriously, what could have been.  Final Grade = DNF

Mini-Reviews: Women In Peril

I've gotten in the habit of "wish listing" potential audiobook listens from work.  Instead of putting myself on a wait list, when I need something to listen to, I check my wish list, gauge my mood, and download what's currently available.  I was ready for suspense, so went with The Pocket Wife by Susan Crawford.  For those keeping track, this is post-Gone Girl and was published the same year as The Girl on the Train.  It reminded me more of the latter, but it's similar to both in the fact that it's a book about miserable people, living miserable lives and the moral of the story seems to be don't get married.

Dana lives in a quiet New Jersey suburb not far from Manhattan, is at a loss now that her son is off to college and the cracks in her marriage to her lawyer husband, Peter are starting to show.  Complicating matters is Dana's bipolar disorder, and the brutal murder of her neighbor and friend, Celia.  Dana was the last person to see Celia alive, they were both drunk, they argued and....that's it.  Dana has blacked out.  Between the alcohol and being in a manic phase she's not sure what's reality and what are just thoughts bumping around in her head.

This is another thriller that employs the Look At Me I'm A Serious Writer method of writing.  There's a lot of musing and rambling words strung together and yada yada yada.  It mostly works given Dana's mental state, but thank Jeebus that this book isn't only told from her point of view.  I found myself much more interested when Detective Jack Moss was the one at the narration wheel.

This is OK.  I pretty much had it figured all out by the 75% mark and it wraps up tidy.  It's not the sort of book I will scream from the rooftops about, but if you loved The Girl on the Train and want another book in that vein?  Yeah, this one.  For me it was a pleasant way to pass the time but I wasn't enthusiastic about it.

Final Grade = C

Her Forbidden Gunslinger by Harper St. George is a short (around 60 pages) western that was an impulse download.  I wanted a quick, one-sitting read for my lunch break at work, went diving into the Kindle TBR and pulled this out.  This was OK, a pleasant way to kill an hour, but ultimately rather forgettable. 

Sophie Buchanan's uncle wants to marry her to one of his loathsome cronies.  She is going to run away and, being skilled in billiards, decides to hustle the few funds she has to a bigger payday.  However the bloke she's playing doesn't take kindly losing to a woman and she finds herself getting pulled out of the fire by Gray, a half-Comanche gunman who works for her uncle.  Naturally these two have had the hots for each other, but haven't acted on them because - well white woman, Comanche man, he works for her uncle yada yada yada.  With her wedding day looming closer, can Gray find a way to rescue Sophie?

This was an OK read, but suffers from the short word count.  Even making it a longer novella (150 pages) would have gone a long way to fleshing out this story.  This did the job of entertaining me on my lunch break, but it's not something I would say you have to drop your life in order to read.  Since the publication of this short St. George has gone on to write full length Harlequin Historicals (which I have in my TBR - because of course I do).  I liked the writing here, which means I'm now looking forward to bumping up those longer books in my reading queue.

Final Grade = C+

#TBRChallenge 2016: The Cowboy Way

The Book: The Cowboy Way by Anna Alexander

The Particulars: Contemporary romance, first book in series, 2014, Self-Published, In Print

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: This was an impulse grab at an RWA conference during their Indie Book Signing.  Either the 2014 or 2015 conference.  My cataloging notes for this title are non-existent.  Anyway it's a western, there's a guy wearing a cowboy hat on the cover - that was enough for me.

The Review:  I know some romance readers who have jumped whole-hog into self-publishing that they're literally only reading self-published authors these days.  I'm not one of those readers.  I have nothing against self-publishing.  I think it affords many exciting opportunities.  What I want is a good story and strong characters - whether it comes from a traditional print publisher, a smaller digital-first press or it's self-published, I don't rightly care.  The issue I see with some self-published books though is that they could strongly benefit from either a hard-a$$ beta reader and/or critique partner or the eye of a keen editor.  And that's kind of where I'm at with The Cowboy Way.

Ranch owner Trey Armstrong wakes up in the hospital.  Seems there was an accident.  His ranch hands got worried, went out to look for him, and found him on the ground, with a bloody head injury and his horse standing near by.  His accident, naturally, has repercussions.  While he remembers his name and some other details of his life - he's blanked out on a big one.  His wife.  Trey does not remember his wife, Greta.  The doctor says it will come back in time, and Trey goes home to begin unraveling the mystery that is his marriage.  But the more time he spends with Greta?  The more he realizes that it wasn't all sunshine and roses.  What happened between them?

Amnesia is a perenially popular trope in Romancelandia, but one that is especially hard to pull off.  In this instance, there's a good story here.  Alexander goes the smart route by not biting off more than she can chew.  Trey's amnesia is selective.  He remembers his ranch hands, but not his wife.  He remembers his old horse, but not his new one.  But his home office looks cold and impersonal.  He can't remember how to work a computer.  And the decorating in the house (namely the bedroom he supposedly shares with his wife) feels "off."  I honestly kept reading this story because I was curious about the secrets that Trey's amnesia was covering up.

Where this story didn't work was in character development - there really isn't any.  Trey and Greta never really elevate themselves past "characters."  There's never enough life breathed into them to make me feel like these could be "real people."  All I really know about Greta is that she's curvy like a 1950s pin-up and apparently the best cook in six counties.  Seriously all she seems to do in this story is cook for the men and have sex with her husband.

And that's the the other thing - the sex.  The reader knows immediately that this is a marriage that wasn't on the surest footing prior to the accident.  Trey may have selective amnesia, but Greta does not.  Greta knows what's been going on in her marriage.  This is a category length book (around 200 pages).  So given the baggage of the marriage going sour, and Trey's amnesia - the fact that these two jump into bed enough to warrant multiple sex scenes felt really off to me.  In fact the tone in general of this story is like a mash-up of a Harlequin Western (the former American line) and an erotic romance - and there's even flashback scenes tossed on to the fire.  It's not always an easy mix.

In the end I mostly kept reading this because I'm a sucker for marriage-in-trouble stories and I wanted the moment where Trey's amnesia is "cured" and he must confront what happened.  But these characters are just never fully fleshed.  I was completely ambivalent that this "stuff" was happening "to them."  As a reader, that's the goal.  I want to care about these people - and I finished this book feeling like I didn't even really know them.  They weren't real (and yes I know characters in a novel are never real but you all know what I mean...)

Is this the worst thing I've ever read?  No. Believe me, I've impulse-grabbed worse books at conferences.  But there wasn't anything here to light a fire under me to continue with this series or possibly investigate another book by this author. 

Mileage always varies on these types of reviews but....meh.

Final Grade = C-

Review: Bound to the Warrior King

Harlequin Presents were ALL ABOUT THE FEELS before New Adult was a gleam in it's self-published mama's eye.  That's the appeal of the Presents line.  At less than 200 pages a Presents can't waste time flailing about looking for emotional purchase.  The line, at it's best, means high intensity, strong attraction, and enough chemistry to burn off your fingerprints.  And because of this the line has a tendency to feature a strong "fairy tale" component.  Not in all of the books, but in a decent amount of them.  Bound to the Warrior King by Maisey Yates is a very, very good book - but the reader has to be willing to check reality in and collect it after the final destination.

Tarek al-Khalij (yes, we have a sheikh book) was never meant to rule Tahar (yes, we have a made-up country/royalty book).  The former sheikh was his brother, a monster who ordered the murder of their parents and then tortured Tarek.  At the hands of his brother's "tutelage," Tarek became a fierce warrior - living as a nomad, protecting his country's borders - while his brother debauched his way through women and drugs until the latter killed him.  Now Tarek is the sheikh and to put it bluntly?  He's barely housebroken.

Dowager Queen Olivia of Alansund is a young widow desperate to find her place in the world.  With her husband, the King, dead and her brother-in-law now ruler, Olivia is at a loss.  She desperately wants a home.  She wants to be useful.  And to her way of thinking that's another royal marriage.  Tarek seems like a good candidate....until she actually meets him.  But before he can throw her out on her butt, she suggests that he give her 30 days.  30 days to show him that he needs her.  She can housebreak him in the ways of being royal.  She can polish him up.  And she has 30 days to show him just how invaluable she can be to him and maybe, just maybe, convince him that a permanent partnership between the two of them would not be the worst thing in the whole world.

I've read category romances in recent memory where the author went a little crazy at The Trope Smorgasbord and the book reads like a hot mess.  Somehow Yates does the exact same thing and manages to pull it off.  I think because she doesn't overdo it on any of her ingredients.  This story features everything from subtle Pygmalion and Beauty and the Beast themes to Ye Olde Fake Royalty and Virgin Hero Ahoy! tropes.  She pulls all her ingredients together beautifully and not one overpowers any of the others.

Olivia is a complicated heroine and I suspect if readers will have issues with this story it may be with her.  She's an American who met her royal husband at university.  She's the sort of heroine who has a lot of polish on the outside but is secretly vulnerable.  In this instance, it's due to a lifetime of neglect from parents who were distracted taking care of her sickly sister.  Olivia is the sort of heroine who wants people to notice her, to value her, but when she opens her mouth to demand it, it comes back to bite her in the butt.  I could sympathize with a  teenage Olivia who just wanted her parents to acknowledge her birthday, but for some readers Olivia's baggage will likely come off as First World Problems.

Tarek's baggage is much more extreme - what with the Evil Dead Brother and the life he lived from about 15-years-old on.  His whole life is wrapped up in control and being the exact opposite of what his brother stood for.  Honor, duty, sacrifice for his country - these are all very important to Tarek.  But he's not exactly a "people person" - which is where Olivia comes in.  He's very much our Fairy Tale Beast - no polish, with rough edges, but underneath it all he's a good man, with a good heart.

What I really liked about their relationship is that from a sexual chemistry standpoint Olivia is the aggressor.  Tarek is all about restraint and control - which means denying himself his baser instincts.  Olivia is attracted to Tarek almost instantly, and having had a healthy sexual relationship with her first husband, knows exactly what she has been missing the past two years.  I don't read a ton of Presents, but Olivia making the early first moves on our sheikh hero felt very....different to me.  In a good way.  This, of course, ramps up the tension quite a bit and these two set off some serious sparks.  I found myself anticipating the consummation of their relationship and it's been a while since I've been able to say that about a romance (sad, but true).

Yates has written a straight-up Fairy Tale Fantasy.  I'm hard pressed to find much reality in this story, but the author owns it, and runs with it.  It's intense, it brings ALL THE FEELS, and I inhaled every single word of it.  Yates has quickly become my go-to author for Presents.

Final Grade = B+

Note: I actually listened this on audio.  My first ever Presents listen on audio.  I walked into the experience knowing it would either be a success or an unmitigated disaster.  The audio version definitely drew the "over the top" feel that the Presents line can have into stronger focus - especially Tarek's dialogue.  I felt his dialogue fit well with his overall character but....yeah, a little over the top.  Also it took me a little while to get used to the narrator, Arika Rapson, whose voice was a little on the "breathy" side.  I'm not sure I'd listen to an unknown-to-me Presents author on audio, but since Yates was a known quantity?  I could roll with it all.  And I did enjoy it.

Reminder: #TBRChallenge for September

For those of you participating in the 2016 TBR Challenge, this is a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, September 21.  This month's theme is Random Pick!  Basically the theme is that there is no theme.  Go wherever your current reading mood takes you.  Think of it as making up your own theme.

You can find more information about the challenge (and see the list of participants) on the Information Page. 

Review: Wendy Poo-Poos The Rat Catcher

Disclaimer: This book has been out since 1999 and I think I'm the last romance reader on the planet to read it - but just in case....this review will be riddled with spoilers.  Also, I listened to this on audio and one of my chief gripes may be because I listened to it on audio.  I'll be curious to see if folks who "read" this book feel the same way I did about a certain scene.

I'm a sucker for a good Pygmalion story and the premise of The Proposition by Judith Ivory is one that intrigues.  That is, what if My Fair Lady wasn't a lady but a lad?  Our hero is Mick Tremore, affable London rat catcher who finds himself being made over by Lady Edwina Bollash, discarded relation to a sour old distant cousin (a Duke) who makes her way in the world schooling young misses navigating society.  There's a to-do in a tea house which brings Mick to the attention of the twin Lords, Emile and Jeremy Lamont.  The Lamonts like to amuse themselves with various bets and wagers and think it would be great fun to see if Edwina can make over Mick to the point where they can pass him off as a Viscount at her sour old cousin's annual ball.  There's no love lost between Edwina and the Duke, plus she's fascinated by Mick's blend of cockney and Cornish speech patterns - so why not?

So where did it all go wrong?  Well, not a lot happens in this book - at least until the final 5 or 6 chapters.  Mick flirts, keeps calling Edwina "Winnie," takes her to a pub to show her a good time, and wheedles her (and not in a good way) incessantly.  Winnie is conflicted over her feelings for Mick, propriety and wrestles with her own feelings of self-worth.  I know this book is late Victorian, but honestly this felt like a Traditional Regency idea bloated up to give us 380+ pages.  But Ivory can write.  Her world-building is very good.  I felt like I was reading a historical and not a modern piece with characters wearing costumes.  So even though the plot and conflict are a bit thin, the world-building kept me engaged.

There are bigger issues at play here though.  The first major stumbling block I had was during the scenes were Edwina is needling Mick to shave off his mustache.  What follows is quid pro quo.  Winnie is a tall woman with legs that drive Mick wild.  Basically he'll shave off the mustache if she lifts her skirts to show off her legs.  Which in an era where it was a shocking scandal to expose your ankle - you can understand Winnie's horror.  But she wants the mustache gone.  However Mick keeps upping the ante, finding loopholes to create more demands - to the point where Winnie is practically in tears.  On the audio version her discomfort is palpable.  I don't know if I would have had the same reaction had I read the book as opposed to having a narrator read me the book - but Mick basically comes off as bullying a gentle woman - someone raised in an environment where being comfortable with her own body and sexuality was basically unheard of.  It's not forced seduction, but Winnie's state during these scenes made me, as the listener, extremely uncomfortable.  Honestly I can't believe I kept listening, but I did.

It took a while for me to get over all that.  I don't expect my romance heroes to be paragons of virtue, but I do expect them to treat the heroine with some respect.  And those moments where Mick is pressing Winnie, wheedling her, had me squirming in my seat - and not in a good way.

After that unpleasantness, we're back to not a lot happening until it's time to find out if Mick the Rat Catcher can successfully fool the ton at the Duke's ball into thinking he's Michael the Viscount.

And this would be where the book completely jumps the shark.

Judith Ivory cops out.  She totally and completely cops out on this story with the Fairy Tale ending.  Because it turns out that Mick is NOT a Rat Catcher.  He's NOT some working class slob from Cornwall.  OH NOES!!!!  He's actually the long-lost grandson of the Duke who was kidnapped when he was a toddler!

BECAUSE OF COURSE HE IS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gee, it would have been too darn messy to have Mick actually BE a Rat Catcher.  To actually have him BE a working class slob and for the author to flex some muscles to figure out how to make the happy ending between a Rat Catcher and a Lady work.  OH NOES!!!!  Let's just make him the long lost heir to a Dukedom!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Am I being too hard on this book?  It was written in 1999, published by a major publisher who probably loved the fairy tale ending.  But here's the thing - I don't think I am.  This was just as much of a cop-out 17 years ago as it is today.  I'm sorry, it is.  I want my romantic couple to have to work for their happy ending, not to just have a Dukedom conveniently fall in their laps from the sky.

All of which highlights some amazing (and sloppy storytelling) coincidences.  The Lamonts just happened to find Mick who just happened to be the Duke's long lost grandson and they all just happened to meet Lady Edwina, the Duke's distant, discarded cousin in a tea shop and she just happened to agree to their bet to polish him up.  So on and so forth.

And never mind that the Duke has no love for Edwina and basically calls her ugly and an idiot in front of Mick and HE SAYS NOTHING TO DEFEND HER!  After she's poured her soul out to Mick on how her family ignored her, belittled her and dismissed her her whole life.  No, Mick will just buy her a pretty dress and get back the house she grew up in for her and la de da.

Seriously.  I don't get it.

In fact I really don't get it because over the years one of the few criticisms I've read of this book is that Winnie is a "snob."

WELL OF COURSE SHE IS!!!!  She's a frickin' Lady who has been stuck in society her whole life.

But no mention is made of the mustache scene and the cop-out ending or the amazing coincidences that lead our characters on this whole merry chase.

I have no idea how to grade this one.  I'm so irritated by the glowing love for this book and my visceral reaction to it that this probably should be a D.  But the world-building is too good and the writing too solid for me in good conscience slap it with such a grade.  No matter how irritated I am.

Final Grade = C-