A Proper Affair

Rating:
Summary: No history in a so-called historical romance
Review: A PROPER AFFAIR is the unveiling of what can happen when we have preplanned views of how life should be, without regard for the reality of unpredictability. It shows how following a path set for us by others or one that we trod, without benefit of wise counsel, can both be disastrous.

Lady Cassandra Abbott wants to be the proper English lady. She follows the advice of her mother. She assists her father wherever possible. She even writes a ladies' etiquette handbook for other young ladies. Much to her detriment, she marries a rich old man, as planned by her parents. The marriage turns out to be disastrous. Her husband has no love. He's abusive and stingy. When he dies, he leaves her penniless. At this time, Cassandra comes to the conclusion that being proper may have been a mistake. She should have been more independent and carefree.

Lord Bryce Keene wants to ignore society's rules. He gaily flits from one affair to the next, but settles on and marries an exciting, exotic beauty. His wife soon tires of him and openly flaunts her infidelities with other men. When she dies, it's almost a relief. Also, Bryce's brother dies, leaving him the family title of duke and a headstrong niece. Now Bryce has come to the conclusion that being a selfish rake was a mistake. He should have been more proper.

Cassandra is in need of a husband with sufficient funds and Bryce is in need of a proper wife to help rear his niece. Bryce finds out Cassandra's circumstances, makes an offer and draws up a contract. Cassandra makes fifty-six provisions to the contract and accepts. The highlights of this book are the provisions, how they're revealed and executed. The time taken to work their relationship out lets these two people get to know, appreciate and love each other.

The author lends tremendous insight into the revelation of having made bad choices and the willingness to start over. In addition to being humorous, it's a sensuous love story. It's a good romance novel.

Rating:
Summary: A MEETING OF MINDS
Review: A PROPER AFFAIR is the unveiling of what can happen when we have preplanned views of how life should be, without regard for the reality of unpredictability. It shows how following a path set for us by others or one that we trod, without benefit of wise counsel, can both be disastrous.

Lady Cassandra Abbott wants to be the proper English lady. She follows the advice of her mother. She assists her father wherever possible. She even writes a ladies' etiquette handbook for other young ladies. Much to her detriment, she marries a rich old man, as planned by her parents. The marriage turns out to be disastrous. Her husband has no love. He's abusive and stingy. When he dies, he leaves her penniless. At this time, Cassandra comes to the conclusion that being proper may have been a mistake. She should have been more independent and carefree.

Lord Bryce Keene wants to ignore society's rules. He gaily flits from one affair to the next, but settles on and marries an exciting, exotic beauty. His wife soon tires of him and openly flaunts her infidelities with other men. When she dies, it's almost a relief. Also, Bryce's brother dies, leaving him the family title of duke and a headstrong niece. Now Bryce has come to the conclusion that being a selfish rake was a mistake. He should have been more proper.

Cassandra is in need of a husband with sufficient funds and Bryce is in need of a proper wife to help rear his niece. Bryce finds out Cassandra's circumstances, makes an offer and draws up a contract. Cassandra makes fifty-six provisions to the contract and accepts. The highlights of this book are the provisions, how they're revealed and executed. The time taken to work their relationship out lets these two people get to know, appreciate and love each other.

The author lends tremendous insight into the revelation of having made bad choices and the willingness to start over. In addition to being humorous, it's a sensuous love story. It's a good romance novel.

Rating:
Summary: A Proper Affair
Review: Cassandra Abbot and Lord Byrce Keene are a study in opposites. Cassandra has always been the obedient daughter, and the very epitome of all that's proper and correct; while Byrce has always done as he pleased and is a bit of a rake. And when thet first meet, both are very young and supremely confident that their take on life and conduct is the correct one. Years later, bitter experience has taught both Cassandra and Bryce a thing or two about life. For Cassandra, the very proper young lady that she was, obediently married the aging duke of her parents choice, and led a life of quiet hell at his hands; while Bryce defied his parents and married the very wild and exciting Lady Francesca Milford, who made Bryce a laughingstock in the ton's eyes with her numerous affairs.

The welcome death of both their respective spouses however has not meant that life's difficulties are over for either Byrce or Cassandra. In Cassandra's case poverty and her father's enormous gambling debts are ugly realities that loom over her head constantly; while Byrce is literally at his wit's end trying to curb his rambunctious and hostile niece's behaviour. On hearing that the widowed Cassandra is back in town, and knowing of her reputation for proper behaviour, Byrce hits upon the notion of marrying Cassandra in order to provide his niece, Elaina, with the right kind of role model. And so Byrce makes a contract with Cassandra: he will rescue her family if she will marry him and take care of Elaina. Experience however has been a hard teacher, and Cassandra agrees to marry Byrce on condition that he agrees to 56 provisions from her, which deals with everything from Cassandra being allowed to buy at least 3 new dresses per month, to Byrce's acceptance of her cat, Poco, and to their marriage not being consummated for at least 6 months while they get to know each other. Of course Bryce doesn't read all the 56 provisions, and of course he is outraged when Cassandra refuses to allow him his marital rights. What unfolds then is a rather amusing battle of wits on both Cassandra and Byrce's part, as Byrce tries to seduce Cassandra and she tries to stay one step ahead of him. Who will win this batle of wits?

"A Proper Affair" was a rather amusing read in parts. Both Cassandra and Bryce are obviously well matched in both character and temperament. But what I liked most about this novel was that Victoria Malvey didn't paint Byrce as overwhelmingly arrogant or Cassandra as incredibly rigid. We see things mostly through Cassandra's point of view -- what she suffered at her first husband's hands, and her fears of ever giving any man too much power over her -- and we empathise; but Malvey also lets us in on Bryce's fears as well -- his fear of not being able to trust anyone esp after what he went through with Francesca. Of course he does behave arrogantly, but he also climbs down from his arrogant stance esp when he realises that he is wrong. I cannot remember the last time I read a regency romance hero admit that he was wrong! However I thought that the subplots that dealt with Elaina's headstrong behaviour, and Bryce's enemies that try to destroy the marriage were a bit weak, and could have done with a bit more exposition. Other than that "A Proper Affair" is quite an enjoyable read.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging battle of wits in aristocratic England.
Review: Cassandra Abbott is the very image of propriety. In fact, she wrote an etiquette book and lives the words she wrote. Bryce Keene is her polar opposite. He craves excitement, and his choice of a bride reflects this. Cassandra, on the other hand, accepts her parents' choice of husband. Flash forward seven years later. Both are widowed. Cassandra was married to a controlling old man who left her destitute. Bryce's wild bride slept with servants and half the ton before her death. Both Cassandra and Bryce are scarred and lacking in trust... and Bryce is also left with a niece who is showing signs of becoming as wild as his wife. She needs a calming influence, and someone who can tutor her on the proprieties... and who better than Cassandra? She agrees to wed him but is far different from Bryce's expectations, from her provisions to her ugly cat. Bryce and Cassandra spend their days trying to outwit each other... and trying to keep Bryce's niece from spinning utterly out of control, for there are forces at work that want nothing more than to ruin all that Bryce values.... Settle in for an exhilarating battle of wits between a man who is becoming more proper and a woman who is learning the value of breaking some of society's harsh rules. This is a truly sparkling work with an alluring extra feature: excerpts of Cassandra's etiquette book are featured at the beginning of each chapter. It was great fun to see how each rule applied to the chapter, and how it was broken!

Rating:
Summary: Ms Malvey needs a history lesson
Review: I started this book with great expectations, since I like Ms Malvey's A Merry Chase. What a waste of time! I can accept the standard storyline of marriage of conveneince between a rich duke and poor desperate widowed duchess who has fallen on hard time, BUT what I cannot and will not stand is to have the basics wrong - (1) Form of Addressing: Never ever a Dowager Duchess could be addressed as a "Lady" and a Duke as a "Lord", they should always be Her and His Graces; (2) the English upper class would never married in a "room" in their own home regardless how urgent their need to tie the knot; (3) the 2001 mode of speech is extremely off putting. I suggests Ms Malvey should put in some hours on English history or give up writing English historical romance all together.

Rating:
Summary: An enjoying Victorian romance
Review: Over the last few years most of the Ton recognizes Lady Cassandra Abbott as the expert on proper etiquette with published works to support her position. Married to an older person, Cassandra is a paragon that debutantes and other aristocrats can copy. However, in 1843, Cassandra's spouse dies, leaving behind financial ruin.

Bryce Keene needs a female guardian to help him raise his teenage niece. No one is better suited for the job than the nonpareil Cassandra. He offers to pay off her father's gambling debts and provide her an allowance if she would agree to a marriage of convenience in which she teaches his niece proper behavior. Desperate Cassandra accepts, but she has changed her thoughts on propriety so he does not obtain what he expected. Instead, he attains love.

PROPER AFFAIR is an enjoyable, often amusing, and early Victorian romance. The lead characters are a strong couple whose sparks light up the story line. When together, the plot is just what sub-genre fans want from their novels. However, the key secondary cast behaves more like spoiled little children detracting from Cassandra and Bryce. Still, Victoria Malvey provides her fans with a fun to read tale due to her stars shining with a strong historical background.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: No history in a so-called historical romance
Review: This historical romance is supposedly set in England in the 1830s. Hmmmm, trying to find some authentic historical details in it is like trying to find a needle in a haystack. In addition, the author has got titles of the English nobility embarrassingly wrong. The characters do not behave in a historically accurate way either. I can enjoy a good Christina Dodd, Julia Quinn, or Cathy Maxwell where history is of the wallpaper variety but at least the wallpaper is there! No wallpaper here...Plus no entertainment. Immature characters and little plot.

Rating:
Summary: A delicious Victorian romance
Review: This is a delicious romance about two people who have made contrary experiences. Cassandra has followed the rules which has made her totally unhappy whereas Bryce has defied them, only to be utterly unhappy as well. After they have married for convience, both find out that there is a middle way! What I especially liked about the book was that it was not all about sex. They truly developped a relationship outside the marriage bed. Besides both were the most credible heroes in a romance novel I have met so far. It's so realistic when Bryce after a passionate night with Cassandra can't be the sultry lover the next morning because of his really bad quarrel with his niece. In another romance novel he would have cast all that aside to make wild love to Cassie.
And I also loved the way each chapter starts with a rule of Lady Cassandra's etiquette book which will be thoroughly broken in this chapter. There's also a second love story in the novel with Bryce's niece involved. I often laughed out loud while I read the book for it was really funny!

Rating:
Summary: Pretty Good
Review: This was good. Not the best thing I've ever read, but it was worth the money I paid. I thought the characters were very well developed and I liked them very much. The niece was pretty obnoxious, but she acted like a typical teenager ("Everyone hates me! I never get to do what I want to do!). The only thing that bugged me was (SPOILER) when she decided to move out of the house into her own place because they were fighting. If she hated him that much, there's no way she would've let him move in with her. And if she didn't hate him that much, why did she move out?

Rating:
Summary: Pretty Good
Review: This was good. Not the best thing I've ever read, but it was worth the money I paid. I thought the characters were very well developed and I liked them very much. The niece was pretty obnoxious, but she acted like a typical teenager ("Everyone hates me! I never get to do what I want to do!). The only thing that bugged me was (SPOILER) when she decided to move out of the house into her own place because they were fighting. If she hated him that much, there's no way she would've let him move in with her. And if she didn't hate him that much, why did she move out?