Wild and Wicked
Grade : F

So, you want to be a romance writer? Here are a couple of questions to see if you have what it takes.

1) You are a young, beautiful lady of noble birth. You are in charge. You are broke. Your people are starving and very sick. You must marry, but you refuse all suitors because: a) Lord X is old and fat and you cringe when you think of him touching you; b) Lord Y is young and rich, but too handsome and arrogant and possibly cruel and you recoil whenever you think of him touching you; c) Lord Z is thirty-five, handsome, kind, intelligent, wealthy and gentle but you don't love him and you get a headache whenever you think of him touching you; d) None of the above. You lie awake nights wondering how to help your people, but will not do the one thing required to make it happen. Oops. There goes another dead peasant. So sad.

2) You are advised to go to wealthy Black Thorn Castle (can also be Black Hawk, Black Heart, Black Wood, etc.) and seduce one Lord Hunky. You balk at this because Lord Hunky: a) is reputed to have murdered his first wife and unborn child; b) is reputed to be sinister, angry and unreasonable; c) is rumored to eat kittens for breakfast; d) None of the above. You go there and find the dark and brooding man magnetically attractive. You lust for him even as you find him terrifying and repulsive. Your nipples pucker whenever he is near. Really.

Okay, I have a name for books like Wild and Wicked: McRomance. Carefully packaged, lots of filler, and little nutritive value. Generic, lackluster, uninventive. You know exactly what you're going to get before you get it. Occasionally leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Wild and Wicked is a McRomance, sub-genre McMedi. Thin plot, unsympathetic characters, purple prose, anachronistic language. A t'was here, a nay there. That about takes care of the medieval authenticity. A big McWaste-of-time.

The story takes place in Wales and uses the Welsh Principle of Y. Take any name with an "I" in it and substitute a "Y" affixing double-Ls and double-Ns as required.

Lady Apryll takes her bastard half-brother Payton's advice and goes to see Lord Devlynn of Black Thorn to try to seduce him into marriage. However, while she's at the revels rubbing up against her host, Payton is busy kidnapping Devlynn's son, Yale (yes, Yale). When Devlynn discovers the deception, he believes Apryll is his enemy and locks her up. After he fondles her a little.

She escapes. He follows. He captures her. He fondles her some more. She tries to escape. He fondles her even more. Escape. Fondle. Escape. Fondle. This is pretty much the theme of the book. Apryll stays Devlynn's prisoner (and subject to his manly hands) throughout the remainder of the story.

Apryll didn't realize her brother was such a bad guy, and only wants to find Yale and take him back where he belongs. But she doesn't want any harm to come to Payton or Serennog (their home) so she doesn't tell Devlynn the whole truth. Of course. Why do that? He might behave in a reasonable manner if he knew what was really going on and who Payton really is.

There is a chase, a traitor or two, and a good priest and a bad priest in minor roles. There's a sorceress and a sister and lots of secret offspring. Ten year-old Yale is probably the best character in terms of personality (he has one). Throughout the entire story, Devlynn keeps Apryll tied up and subtly threatens her with rape. He bares her breasts whenever the spirit (or his manhood) moves. Apryll likes it, no! she hates it. They are enemies! But, oh, those hands. Ultimately, there is no foundation of love or trust between these two, yet they manage to fall in love in a completely unrealistic way. They go from distrust and lust to forever after in the span of two pages and without ever having said more than a few sentences to each other.

Nothing in this book engaged my emotions, my imagination, or my interest. It has no humor. None. There is very little actual dialogue as most characters think about stuff rather than speaking to each other. And there are anachronisms. For example: Apryll's posture was "ramrod" straight. Since cannons and guns hadn't been invented yet, there was no such thing as a ramrod in 1283. Apryll uses the latrine. No, it was called a garderobe and readers of medievals know that.

As for purple prose? Get out of town! There are enough stirring and twitching manhoods to set off a seismograph. I'll spare you most of them, but two of the worst examples of purple are the following. "She tasted of heaven . . . the tips of his fingers exploring her cleft, massaging that sweet muscle as he suckled." Sweet muscle. Well that's a new one on me. "Her legs were upon his shoulders, the scent of her strong. 'Apryll,' he whispered into that delicate, exquisite cave . . ." Gosh, you think he heard an echo in there? Lord Devlynn aka Lord Spelunker? Don't get me started, oh, except for the part where both Apryll and Devlynn "relieve" themselves at the same time, on different sides of the bush (he has to watch her to make sure she doesn't try to escape). This was all too much! Give me a McBreak!

If you give this one a try, I sure hope you like it better than I did.

Reviewed by Marianne Stillings
Grade : F

Sensuality: Hot

Review Date : May 15, 2002

Publication Date: 2002

Review Tags: 

Recent Comments …

Marianne Stillings

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
0
What's your opinion?x
()
x