Rating: 
Summary: Perry's best!
Review: "A Breach of Promise" is Perry's best work ever. This book was such a satisfying read, from start to finish. I'm a big fan of Perry's & I'm particularly fond of her Monk series. In fact, the book that introduced me to her novels was "The Face of a Stranger",the first Monk book. I highly recommend all of Perry's books, especially her Monk series.
Rating:
Summary: Quintessential Perry
Review: A Breach of Promise begins slowly as Anne Perry sets her scene in the courtroom drawing us into Oliver Rathbone's latest and perhaps most frustrating case yet. Ms. Perry is a master manipulator of her audience and despite the rather plodding nature of the first hundred pages or so the reader is so completely joined in Rathbone's simultaneous frustration and determination, that one must see the case through with him. The pace picks up, however, as soon as Monk and Hester enter the story, their peculiarly intense interaction having always driven this series beyond the bounds of most Victorian mysteries. But despite the fact that Breach is quintessential Perry, with the requisite stunning twist in the main plot, and a moving subplot involving the household in which Hester is currently employed, the nature in which the two plots become connected struck this reader as somewhat contrived considering the usually tight and highly individual manner in which Perry handles her material. Ultimately though, Perry's amazing talent for conveying emotion through the details of place and character enable her to rise above a slight thinness in plot. A Breach of Promise is an emotionally satisfying tale, and in addition, a powerful social commentary on not only the Victorian era's valuing of beauty and marriage, but on our own culture's preoccupation with these issues as well.
Rating:
Summary: Anne Perry gets better and better with each novel.
Review: A Breach of Promise exemplifies everything wonderful about Anne Perry's work: complex characters, a detailed plot driven by those characters, and a rich, historical setting. Whenever I finish one of her books, I feel I have learned something new about the human psyche and its darker side. Hester, Monk, and Rathbone, with all their tension and awkward friendship, are fascinating, and watching them grow as people over the course of this series has kept this reader immensely satisfied. Add to that satisfaction the interest and complexity of each "case" the three have worked on together, and you will understand why Anne Perry has so many devoted fans.
Rating:
Summary: A thinking woman's romance, plus spell-binding whodunit.
Review: A Breach of Promise is the first novel of Ann Perry's that I have read, and I cannot wait to read more. She combines the best of historical romance, unpredictable whodunit and charming character development. A very satisfying read.
Rating:
Summary: Another tour-de-force from Anne Perry!
Review: Anne Perry has done it again! "A Breach of Promise" is the best yet in the William Monk/Hester Latterly/Oliver Rathbone series, and Perry succeeds brilliantly in portraying the fog-bound hypocrisy of Victorian England. The atmosphere of cold, foggy and drizzly Victorian London can be almost be felt and the attitudes and behaviour of the English aristocracy of the time are harshly, yet compassionately, portrayed. And if that is a contradiction in terms, read the book to find out why.The plot itself is well thought-out although the denouement fell curiously flat, almost as though Perry ran out of stamina. And the relationship between William Monk and Hester Latterly is growing by leaps and bounds - I look forward to see how Perry will develop this theme in her subsequent books. I feel that Monk and Latterly are a more hard-edged couple than Perry's other creation of Thomas and Charlotte Pitt - although both William Monk and Thomas Pitt are examples of people from outside the charmed social circles who carry considerable loads of cynicism and angst.
Rating:
Summary: Another tour-de-force from Anne Perry!
Review: Anne Perry has done it again! "A Breach of Promise" is the best yet in the William Monk/Hester Latterly/Oliver Rathbone series, and Perry succeeds brilliantly in portraying the fog-bound hypocrisy of Victorian England. The atmosphere of cold, foggy and drizzly Victorian London can be almost be felt and the attitudes and behaviour of the English aristocracy of the time are harshly, yet compassionately, portrayed. And if that is a contradiction in terms, read the book to find out why. The plot itself is well thought-out although the denouement fell curiously flat, almost as though Perry ran out of stamina. And the relationship between William Monk and Hester Latterly is growing by leaps and bounds - I look forward to see how Perry will develop this theme in her subsequent books. I feel that Monk and Latterly are a more hard-edged couple than Perry's other creation of Thomas and Charlotte Pitt - although both William Monk and Thomas Pitt are examples of people from outside the charmed social circles who carry considerable loads of cynicism and angst.
Rating:
Summary: Enormously Satisfying!!!!
Review: Anne Perry is marvelous! She manages to add just the right amount of information to her books that leaves you tingling with anticiption of the next book. Breach of Promise is definitely toward the top on my list of favorites. The Monk novels are just wonderful!
Rating:
Summary: Another excellent novel
Review: Anne Perry once again returns to a favorite theme -- People will go to great lengths to avoid exposure of a deeply held secret. In this novel there are several persons who are concealing their pasts and identities and the last revelation is the most surprising.
Her knowledge of Victorian England, of Victorian police procedures at this time and of Victorian class structure and inhibitions is once again revealed by the authenticity of her
narrative.
Anne Perry knows a great deal more than most persons about the most dynamic woman of Victorian England -- Florence Nightingale -- and her knowledge enriches her portrayal of Hester Latterly and of the post-Crimea period in England. Nightingale was a suffragist (one of the first signers of a petition for woman suffrage which was circulated by her friends, John Stuart Mill and his wife Harriet Taylor); one of the first statisticians -- and one of the first members of the Statistical Society in England; a consultant to Queen Victoria and her consort, Prince Albert and a pragmatic and dedicated visionary who spent her life in the service to the sick to which she had dedicated herself when she was only 17. Unfortunately she contracted what was then called "Crimean Fever" during her service in the dreadful British military hospitals of the Crimean War. Recent research indicates that it was probably Brucellosis, caused by
an organism which is and was epidemic and endemic in that region and is characterized by remittant fevers and malaise. (It also occurs in the U.S. among persons who work with cattle and recent cases have been reported in the Western U.S.) Since the germ theory of disease was not available at that time, Nightingale was not diagnosed properly, though she shared the ailment with many others who had served in that region at that time. Hester reflects frequently on her admired mentor and role model, though she mistakenly describes Nightingale's intermittent illnesses as "hypochondria."
Rating: 
Summary: good book, poor reader
Review: As a long-time fan of Anne Perry, I decided to check out this one as a book-on-tape (after all, that's how I stumbled on my first Anne Perry novel, Pentecost Alley). That was a while back, and I am now reading the novel, because I finished the audio version with a bad taste in my mouth. I confess, it is a different experience to read a mystery when you already know the resolution. Basically, I am advising people to check out the book, but not the audio version. I was very disappointed with Mr. Jones' representation of Hester's character, among others; listening to him read, she came off as a whining shrew. My advice? Read the book, skip the book-on-tape.
Rating:
Summary: How will it end?
Review: Before "The sin of the wolf" was my favourite, but this time I really couldn't stop reading...Mrs Perry writing and descriptions of the characters are so deep that it's impossible not to think and behave as one of them. My favourite one is of course Monk! I'm so romantic so at the end of this book I found me jumping of joy, laughing and running from one toom to another. I bet with a friend of mine about the relationship among Hester- Monk- Rathbone. I was sure Monk would be the right person for her. Now, I' m really looking forward to reading Mrs Perry next book. How will this love end?
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