Lady of Sin
On paper, it’s all here: Intelligent, likable characters; a not-overly “done” plotline; and a smooth writing style. So, why did I never really care about the characters here and – even more puzzling – why was my interest never really caught? To be totally honest, I don’t have the answers.
Set in the 1830’s (though the author doesn’t provide a date so I can only tell you that because of the connections to previous books), Lady of Sin tells the story of defense attorney Nathaniel Knightridge and the widowed Charlotte, Lady Mardenford. As the story opens, Charlotte virtually barges her way into Nathaniel’s bachelor rooms, ostensibly in order to solicit his support for her efforts in reforming the divorce laws. But, even though she may not even admit it to herself, Charlotte also seeks out Nathaniel to console him on the day that one of his former clients is executed. Not long after her arrival, Nathaniel (who is drunk) and Charlotte share a passionate encounter that is interrupted by the arrival of Nathaniel’s aristocratic father.
Nathaniel and Charlotte are famous in their social circles for not liking each other – but, hey, in romance-land we know what that really means, don’t we? Turns out that Nathaniel and Charlotte were once intimate at an orgy held at the home of Charlotte’s old friend. The virtuous Charlotte had attended the gathering following her widowhood due to a mixture of curiosity and desire, but never expected to experience her own encounter. Though Charlotte is aware that her lover is Nathaniel, he is unaware of the true identity of the masked woman he will never forget.
Nathaniel and Charlotte have further opportunities to explore their attraction when he finds himself believing that an orphaned young man who bears a strong resemblance to the widowed Charlotte’s brother-in-law is actually connected in some way to the family. This particular plotline is, quite frankly, a bit meandering and might well be the key as to why I never got more caught up in the story than I did.
So, there you have it. Charlotte and Nathaniel explore their mutual attraction and Nathaniel occupies himself in discovering the truth of the young man’s birth – a truth that might well rock Charlotte’s safe and conventional world.
So, if the plotline was a bit meandering, what about Charlotte and Nathaniel? To be honest, while I liked them both, I never felt engaged by them. In fact, I never really worked up any kind of feelings about this book. On the positive side, this means there are no TSTL moments, awkward prose, or Big Mis. On the less than positive side, it also means that there was simply nothing here to really engage me.
With two recent less than satisfactory experiences with Madeline Hunter, I think I’m going to have to check out for a while. As all of us know so well, time is valuable these days and I’ll be waiting for reviews of her upcoming books by my fellow reviewers before investing any of mine in the author again.
Recent Comments
I’ve just finished reading all of the books in this series as well as revisiting some of Mary Jo Putney’s biggest hits (titles in AAR’s Top 100 lists), and I find the Hunters work better for me than the Putneys. C+ and B- grades when these reviews were first published weren’t particularly bad grades – these grades were meant to indicate decent, better than average reads. Today, as R10 below suggests, they’d probably be given B+ here at AAR. But I’m having trouble with these books getting C+ while MJP’s Uncommon Vows gets an A (shaking my head).
BTW, this series has 7 books in it:
The Seducer
The Saint
The Charmer
The Sinner
The Romantic
The Lord of Sin
The Lady of Sin
Putney’s work is not, usually, for me. Whereas Hunter almost always works for me.
I don’t think I’ve ever read anything by Putney but Hunter is one of my favourite authors. So sad there’ll be nothing new from her anymore
The two most specific things I can point to differentiate between these two authors are the handling of the bad guys and the sex scenes.
Putney’s villains are cartoonishly boilerplate. I can almost see them twisting their pointy mustaches. I think I said elsewhere that I think Putney doesn’t like writing bad guys. OTOH, her romantic suspense subplots are unnecessarily complicated IMO. It isn’t enough for the villain to kidnap the heroine at some point in the story. One or both of the MCs must be assaulted and then robbed and then black mailed and then kidnapped and then . . .
Putney’s sex scenes are far fewer and tamer. That isn’t a criticism – it doesn’t affect my ability to enjoy her work in The Rake for example – but just an FYI. For some romance readers, it does affect their enjoyment.
The Romantic is my favourite of the series
I think I enjoyed The Seducer, The Saint and The Romantic about equally and would put those 3 a step above the others in the series. But each in the series is worth a read.
I think that Putney is more dated. If that is the right word for it.
At the time, her way of describing emotions and her heroes, who are much more men of older times, worked very well. Now, they seem overbearing and the heroines seem weak for tolerating their behavior. Apart from a very few books, such as the Rake, the Bargain and Petals from the Storm, the emotional journey of both main characters does not resonate in the same way. At least, that’s how it is for me.
When they first came out, they felt like As to me, and now, Uncommon Vows, and Dearly Beloved, make me cringe.
And her more recent books suffer a lot from too much drama, and those very weird villains. I agree with others in this thread, she has difficulty writing good villains.
Completed Lady of Sin B+ I think.
That tracks. I gave it 4 out of 5 stars back in the day.
I thought the first half was better than the second half. And it’s better than most historical romance written today so maybe my expectations were low. I did like Nathaniel and Charlotte especially Nathaniel ;-)
I’m going to put it on my TBR!