Upon her husband’s death, a shocked Lady Sophia learned that custody of her children went to a humble country vicar. Although he knows of her tarnished reputation, the clergyman believes children need their mother-and soon, he needs Lady Sophia too.
This is the first Jo Manning I have read, so I didn’t read the first in the set (The Reluctant Guardian). Since the heroine of this book sounds like she was the villain of the previous, it might make it more interesting.
Lady Sophia is a bombshell beauty and a well loved (ahem, cough-cough) lady. Having survived three marriages (the first two disastrous, the third a marriage of convenience), she is summoned back to her late husband’s estate to finally see to her two boys. She has been largely absent from their lives and is surprised to hear the local vicar has been appointed guardian.
Lucky for her, he is a young hottie who has crushed on her since first seeing her portrait.
Sounds really interesting, right? Not so fast!
This is where the book suffers from an identity crisis. It starts with a really funny, risque scene. Then it moves into moralizing. Then back again with the introduction of a villain. Is it mass market historical? Traditional? Inspirational (the third act goes down that track and it gets weird, real fast)?
The character arcs are great and the one thing that saves this book from being a hot mess. I liked the heroine and hero plenty, Manning seems to know something about the genre and era, and I like some of the unique details–calling servants incorrect names, for example, was a great touch. I just never got into the romance because I was confused about what I was reading. At some points I suspected it was supposed to be traditional, but then it would start dithering into sexier territory and I would think I was in mass market land. Then, smash! the inspirational language would appear (or maybe it was meant to be era appropriate? I am still confused!)
In summary, I thought this was going to be fun and funny, or at least fun and sexy, and it ended up being weird and moody. Not destined for my re-read queue.
If you do decide to give it a whirl, I think maybe trying out Reluctant Guardian first might give this one enough context to smooth the passage. In other words, Seducing Mr. Heywood didn’t work great as a standalone.
2.75 out of 6 Great character arcs in an otherwise confusing mash up of genre subtypes
| Content Rating/Heat Index | |
|---|---|
| Mature Content |   |
| Adult themes, including gambling, murder, casual sex | |
| Intimacy | |
| Kisses and one intimate scene | |
| Violence | |
| Lots of talk of violence and an extended scene. | |
| Overall |  |
|---|---|
| Teetering on the line between traditional and mass market, this Reg Rom has enough innuendo and a scene at the end to make it too steamy for fans of a clean read. | |
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