Wanton Angel
Grade : D+

What is it about some romance novels that make them stick in my mind? For me, it's the characters who make a novel unforgettable. Wolf Mackenzie, Eve Dallas, Lord Ragsdale, Jamie and Claire Fraser - they are the reasons I remember their stories. So what about the characters in Shirl Henke's Wanton Angel? She is beautiful and feisty, and he is handsome and studly - and that's about it. Wanton Angel is very much a plot driven book. A lot, and I mean a lot happens in the course of the story, which is a great thing for readers like me who love action. But along with action, I want some character in my characters and I didn't find it here.

Elizabeth Blackthorne is the pampered daughter of a United States Senator. She is a knockout, drop-dead beauty who scorns men, society and all her family's expectations for her. See, Beth is an artist and she wants to follow her muse and be a free spirit. Beth meets Derrick Jamison in Washington DC and the first meeting does not go well. British snob meets American savage.

Beth talks her family into allowing her to go to Italy to study art. Derrick is also in Italy as a spy for the British Foreign Office, playing the part of the wastrel younger son cast off by his family. All the while he is rubbing elbows at court, he is scouting out rumors that Napoleon may be trying to leave Elba. Derrick runs into Beth as she is fighting with a fishmonger on the Naples docks. Beth is all wild red hair, flashing eyes, long legs and even has a cute little knife tucked in her garter. Derrick is long, tall, bronzed and bulging. They are attracted to each other.

As time goes on, the attraction heats up and free spirited (but still a virgin) Beth and Derrick begin a passionate affair. Lots and lots of love scenes here and lots and lots of purple prose. There is not one cliched word or phrase left unused which made me wonder if there really is a Dictionary of Purple Prose out there somewere.

Well, as the plot marches on, Beth is kidnapped by pirates and sold to the harem in Algeria where she is not ravished (too free spirited for them) and rescued by Derrick. When they return to Naples after a long sea voyage (during which they have lots of sex to pass the time), Beth's father greets them with the pronouncement that since Derrick has compromised Beth, he has to marry her. Neither of them are particularly happy about it, but they do the honorable thing despite Derrick's suspicions that Beth has Done It with the pirates and the Sultan, but first they have a marathon sex session to take their minds off the impending marriage.

So Derrick and Beth settle down in Naples where he can work as a shipping agent and she can be a free spirit, and for a time all is well. Oh, they still fight, and have lots of misunderstandings, but they love each other (at least all their friends say so). Then comes word that Derrick's brother has died and he is now an Earl. He's not thrilled about it, and neither is Beth. How can she be a countess and continue to be a free spirit - especially in stuffy old England where they think all Americans are savages? But noblesse oblige calls and off they go to England where misunderstandings and villains from the past and present await them.

Wanton Angel is filled with local color and excitement. Derrick and Beth meet lots of real life people from history. and names are dropped with abandon. Beth takes art lessons from Turner, she meets Madame Vigee-Lebrun, they meet Stephen Decatur, Caroline Murat, Lord Castlereigh and on and on. The locale changes from America, to Naples, to Algeria, back to Naples and then to England. I can't fault the book for lack of action and adventure, but it was too reminiscent of those 1970's bodice-ripping sagas for my current tastes not only for all the adventure, but because of the characters. Can you say hair-tossing heroine and he-man hero?

The problem was the characters. They were perfectly handsome, perfectly beautiful, and perfectly dull. There were times I wondered if Derrick Jamison's last name wasn't Zoolander. I felt no sympathy toward them, they didn't make me care about them, they didn't even make me mad - they were simply there so the plot could have some characters to propel it along. As I read Wanton Angel, I often wondered what it would have been like if an interesting, engaging couple had been the hero and heroine. I finished the book, and wrote the review. Now I think I may go back and re-read a couple of chapters of Outlander. It has action, adventure and Jamie and Claire Fraser - now there's a couple with character!

Reviewed by Ellen Micheletti
Grade : D+

Sensuality: Hot

Review Date : April 23, 2002

Publication Date: 2002

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Ellen Micheletti

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