A Bride by Morning
By: Katrina Kendrick
Expected Publication: 03 Aug 2023
336 pages
Genre: Adult, Historical Fiction
Source: Publisher via NetGalley (Thank you!!)
*Note: The above link to Amazon is an affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.
Goodreads description--He is a heartbreaker...Gabriel St. Clair, the Earl of Montgomery, has a reputation for being the most charming gentleman in London. But to Miss Lydia Cecil, he is the man who jilted her and shattered her heart. Gabriel would rather Lydia hate him than learn the truth: he's spent the last ten years as a British spy—and his enemies are closing in.
She is a wallflower...
Lydia has settled into a life as a companion for her elderly aunt. But when she witnesses Gabriel gather intelligence on a foreign enemy, she's suddenly thrown into his dangerous, bloody game of espionage. To save her life, Gabriel is forced to marry the girl he once abandoned.
As husband and wife match wits, their greatest threat may not be the assassins on their heels, but learning to set aside their pasts or risk losing their love for good...
I'm finally sitting down the day I finished a book to type up my review. But I'm still breaking one of my rules about reviewing my oldest books first. Oh well.
Other than ol' dude leaning in a bit too forcefully on the cover, I wouldn't have had any inclination that this book intended to get steamy. And while I'm not a prude, I also have a fairly low tolerance for physical scenes. At least my preference lies towards clean romance than descriptive. A Bride by Morning had some weird terminology for certain parts of the body that sometimes happens in romance books. Overall these scenes left me curling my nose up more than anything else.
As a matter of fact, I felt like the language used throughout this book was extreme. The word shattered was used 15 times. I mean maybe 15 isn't much, but I feel like that's one of those words that should be used sparingly so that it has an impact when it is. And that's just an example. All of the descriptors throughout this book were complete extremes, mostly related to emotional experiences. I guess to increase the drama that the reader might feel, but ultimately, it left me feeling like it was unrealistic, overly dramatized, and poorly executed.
I did feel bad for Lydia. She was in love, and Gabriel asked her to wait for him. And she did, but then he stopped responding to her letters. And when he did return, he didn't acknowledge her as more than a passing acquaintance and certainly didn't seek to fulfill his intentions to marry her. Ten years went by. That's a long time to be pining for someone. I felt like everything was explained in a way to make Gabriel's reasons make sense. When it comes down to it, something about the story just felt off, and the word I keep thinking the most is "over-dramatized."
I didn't highlight any quotes to share with you.
I will say that this was a fast and easy read, which is a point in favor. But yeah, this book just wasn't for me. Originally, I thought I might give this 3 Stars, but after really typing up my review, I'm landing on 2.5 Stars for A Bride by Morning? Have you read this book? What did you think? Let me know!
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