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Publisher:
Avon Books (HarperCollins) |
Release
Date: November 2003 |
ISBN:
038077352X |
Awards:
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Format
Reviewed: Paperback |
Buy
it at Amazon US
|| UK |
Read
an Excerpt |
Genre:
Historical Romance [1820s London and various] |
Reviewed:
2004 |
Reviewer:
Rachel A Hyde |
Reviewer
Notes: Some Sex |
Copyright
MyShelf.com |
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Dreaming
of You
By Lisa Kleypas
This
is the sequel to Then Came You (also reviewed on this site)
and features the romantic adventures of Derek Craven, the cockney
whose origins may have been the gutter, but whose vast wealth and
fabled gambling palace makes him the envy of royalty. After Lily
Lawson’s marriage to Lord Raiford, Derek thinks that the only
woman he has ever loved is lost to him and thus he embarks on a
series of shallow affaires. But genteel country mouse Sara Fielding
is about to come into his life, save it and turn it upside down.
The authoress of the hugely popular novel Mathilda, she is researching
a new book about gamblers and has come to his gambling house for
research. Somehow nothing will ever be the same again, although
it certainly isn’t going to be all plain sailing. For starters,
she is already engaged, and what will Lady Ashby do when she hears
about Derek’s latest love?
Just like Then Came You,
this is another well-plotted Regency romance that manages to avoid
falling into many of the clichéd pitfalls of other similar
novels. For one thing, there is no contrived misunderstanding to
separate the protagonists for several chapters, which makes a nice
change. This is less humorous than the earlier book, but is still
absorbing and imaginative; the character of Derek is sufficiently
interesting to make a good hero, even as Sara is rather more predictable,
though realistic enough for what she is. So once again Kleypas has
delivered the goods, and the fact that this has stood the test of
time since its original publication in 1993 shows that this is a
cut above the average, although personally I thought that Then Came
You had the edge, being like a cross between P G Wodehouse and Georgette
Heyer, which is surely what many Regency authors aspire to but seldom
manage. I’ll certainly be adding Lisa Kleypas to my wishlist.
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