Avon Impulse, $4.99, ISBN 978-0-06-231579-3
Historical Romance, 2014
Delaney McFarland, our heroine in Vivienne Lorret’s Finding Miss McFarland, has been thinking.
You see, her parents married for money, and her mother was miserable as a result.
Delaney’s father settled a huge dowry on Delaney, so Delaney knows that men would want to marry her for money.
Therefore, Delaney knows that she is doomed to become as miserable as her mother, unless she marries a fortune hunter.
Are you still with me, or do you have to take a break after following the heroine’s impressive mental gymnastics? Do bear with me, it gets better… I think.
Delaney has everything planned, you see, because she knows that money and love cannot exist in the same dimension.
She would marry the worst fortune hunter ever – one allegedly such a gambler that he’d go through all her money within a few weeks – because, that way, she can get him to agree that she’d live alone and content while he does his thing.
After all, it’s not like her husband has any control over her money or her property. Even when the money is gone, she’d still be able to live in a nice house and has lots of money to gambol around town! When her husband is paupered, he’d never bother her or harass her for money, because Delaney is worldly and wise and knows all about life. Her wisdom comes from years of sucking her thumb and lounging around in her home doing things that cute heroines do.
Our hero, Griffin Croft, overhears her plan and can’t in good conscience allow her to go through her madness. Naturally, Delaney is happy enough to sleep with him, but they will never ever, ever, ever get together in a permanent way because Delaney knows, people. She loves him, but because she has a big dowry, she can’t ever, ever, ever be with him because her money would ruin everything pure and sweet about her love for him and she’d get hurt and die. It’s better to marry a fortune hunter who cares not for her even a little, because that way, she’d never ever, ever, ever be hurt… ever.
Ooh he felt her up again last night
But ooh, this time she’s telling him, she’s telling him
They are never ever ever getting back together
They are never ever ever getting back together
She go talk to her sisters talk
To his parents talk to her
But they are never ever ever ever getting back together
Like… ever!
The author has a nice bouncy way with vibrant humor and what not, but honey, I already have so many authors like Julia Quinn and Eloisa James under the Avon imprint alone who do the same thing. Right now, the only reason to read a story by Vivienne Lorret is if I want to experience death by stupidity. Come on now, please don’t do this to me.
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