Rating: 
Summary: Original setting, compelling story
Review: Set at the end of the Roman Empire in Britain, the story of Wulfred and Melania are classic romance in setting rarely used. Melania is a Roman whose villa is conquered by Saxon invaders, with Wulfred leading the conquering party. With the death of her father and the loss of her land, Melania defies Wulfred in every way she can imagine. Wulfred, who seeks revenge against any Roman, wants her alive and well to live under his power.Overall, I liked this story. The Roman vs. Saxon history isn't a typical romance setting, therefore it was interesting and engrossing. I liked the creative way Melania thought to thwart her captors-- a strong heroine who didn't "submit" after a token resistance. The only problem I had with this story is that Melania did "get over" the fact that the Saxons killed her father. If it had been a different Saxon group that killed him, it would have been a bit more believable.
Rating: 
Summary: Abysmal
Review: This book is really abysmal. We get no clear sense of either culture, Roman or Saxon. It is not Medieval, but the Dark ages, and very dark they are too in this book. The two of them snarl like a couple of wolves in heat. There is no sense of genuine commitment or love and the sex is pretty uninteresting. The book is littered with semi-colons I found myself counting them per page, 4 on average at the start of the book.
Her heroic struggle: to commit suicide by starving herself or working herself to death? She just ends up seeming like a selfish, short-sighted twit.
His heroic struggle? None so far as I can see. Abusing one Roman woman to get even for being made a galley slave is just too trite for words. Not to mention vindictive and foolish. This author really needs to have her very bad habits squashed out of her. The worst offence being that she is still writing bodice ripper style books which could have been done in the 70s or 80s, certainly I can't think why they are getting published in the 2000s. There is little of interest here for the modern, clued-in sensual young woman reader. Non-consensual sex scenes offend me.
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