Passion and Pretense is a book with a promising plot, but the author’s voice and shallow characters keep it from reaching its full potential. The lack of emotional connection meant I had to push to get through this book.

Penelope Rastmoor is a TSTL heroine right off the bat. She has already been engaged four times in the past. In a period where only one failed engagement was enough to ruin a woman, the fact that she has been able to pull off four – and her family is still well received in London society – is quite a stretch. Not only is there no social stigma, Penelope has no fear or concern about consequences as she plans yet another pretend engagement with a man who has been cast off by society – solely for the purpose of convincing her brother to send her to Egypt to dig mummies. Presumably, her brother will agree when she is broken-hearted after her fifth broken engagement.

So Penelope starts the book by kissing this social cast-off hero, Lord Harris Chesterton. There are no explanations in the book for his outcast status, but it is clear he is not invited anywhere and is living on the verge of poverty until he inherits sometime in the future. She then proposes her plan, and he agrees because he wants to rise in social graces with his uncle, the trustee of his future wealth, by being associated with her. He needs some money from his uncle to rescue someone called Professor Oldham in Egypt, who is being held hostage by Egyptians because they believe he has stolen priceless valuables that he excavated. The remainder of the book is about them carrying on their pretend engagement, while Harry supposedly works on rescuing Professor Oldham.

It is a struggle to try to think of the positives to list in this book. The primary one that springs to mind is an action-filled plot. In fact, it is so action-filled that I had to stop about a quarter of the way in and wonder if the author really had more to write for the remainder of the book. Most romances expand what was crammed into the first quarter of the book and call it done.

I had trouble with the author’s voice and her choice of words throughout the book. It worked against a smooth flow, and her characters became annoying. It was very heavy-handed. One of the following expressions started at least four or five sentences or paragraphs on almost every page: “Good heavens,” “God, but,” “Heavens gracious,” “Oh my,” “Hell,” “Damn,” “Goodness, but”, “Oh God”, “Heavens above,” etc. Both Harry and Penelope thought with these expressions non-stop. It didn’t even matter whether it was an action packed kidnapping scene or a love scene. London society and I expected Penelope’s behavior to be more in line with that of a gently bred lady.

There are also glaring inconsistencies in what the characters think and do according to the customs of the time. I should have expected that after I read about Penelope’s four engagements, but it was still tough to reconcile. As an example, when they are caught making love in a closet after they are publicly engaged, Harry expects Penelope’s brother to ask him to break the engagement while Penelope expects her brother to call Harry out for a duel. Both expectations would have been incorrect; they should both have been worried about being hurried to the altar – which is what the brother asks them to do. But seriously, how could Harry and Penelope be that out of sync with social expectations?

There is much else that is unbelievable. The characters are bi-polar: Loving, then hating, then trusting, then convinced the other can kidnap/steal/hurt them within one sentence or thought after the previous conflicted one. I would be remiss in not talking about the scarab. Penelope wears this Egyptian necklace not only to every party in the first two weeks of our acquaintance with her, but also for drives and shopping and anywhere else that she can formally or informally. All these parties and musicales, three of them within one week, happen in the same person’s house. This person’s wife then turns out to be part of the nefarious suspense plot later. In total, I believe we visit her home five times. Also unbelievable are Harry’s actions as we learn more about Professor Oldham, who is his real father. He keeps forgetting to rescue his kidnapped father throughout the story because he is around Penelope, and even makes time to shag her (in his words) between knocking a goon out to escape from captivity to finding his father and stolen treasure in a single night.

There is so much promise in the plot that is weighed down with the flaws. I kept struggling with wanting to like the book better, and think the author was truly courageous to fill in so many elements and such constant action in her plot. I would perhaps like to read Susan Gee Heino again, but only if her voice is softened down a bit and her characters are not as shallow and unbelievable.