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Rating: 
Summary: The King of Spades
Review: Deverill (what a name!), the Duke of Prestwick, finds himself in a spot of trouble. He and his valet, Stump, are adrift at sea. He is about ready to accept his fate when he is rescued from watery death by our beautiful heroine... who happens to have a fiery tongue. Zara Greeley and the Duke of Prestwick are immediately at odds with each other. And she can't believe the nerve of that ingrate! The company of the pampered duke is the last thing she needs after what SHE'S been through. Zara and her young brothers have survived a difficult journey from Crete to England--without a feather to fly with! As they journey back to England together, Zara is constantly annoyed by the duke's spoiled attitude, and Prestwick can't stand the unpolished manners of Zara and her brothers. When they finally make it back to England, Prestwick thinks he has seen the last of her. ...But he couldn't be more mistaken. Nor could he be more mistaken about Zara herself. The spitfire girl could be just what he needs... I really enjoyed this book. As always, Andrea Pickens' writing style is impeccable. The beginning of the novel is laugh-out-loud funny, and the end is sweet & fulfilling. Unfortuanately, what keeps this book from earning its 5th star is the fact that toward the middle, I was struggling to keep my mind on it. Overall, it's a good story about opposites attracting... then finding out they had more in common than they thought. My favorite character was Stump, the humorous 1-handed valet. He was a riot. I would've liked to see more of him.
Rating:
Summary: The King of Spades
Review: Deverill (what a name!), the Duke of Prestwick, finds himself in a spot of trouble. He and his valet, Stump, are adrift at sea. He is about ready to accept his fate when he is rescued from watery death by our beautiful heroine... who happens to have a fiery tongue. Zara Greeley and the Duke of Prestwick are immediately at odds with each other. And she can't believe the nerve of that ingrate! The company of the pampered duke is the last thing she needs after what SHE'S been through. Zara and her young brothers have survived a difficult journey from Crete to England--without a feather to fly with! As they journey back to England together, Zara is constantly annoyed by the duke's spoiled attitude, and Prestwick can't stand the unpolished manners of Zara and her brothers. When they finally make it back to England, Prestwick thinks he has seen the last of her. ...But he couldn't be more mistaken. Nor could he be more mistaken about Zara herself. The spitfire girl could be just what he needs... I really enjoyed this book. As always, Andrea Pickens' writing style is impeccable. The beginning of the novel is laugh-out-loud funny, and the end is sweet & fulfilling. Unfortuanately, what keeps this book from earning its 5th star is the fact that toward the middle, I was struggling to keep my mind on it. Overall, it's a good story about opposites attracting... then finding out they had more in common than they thought. My favorite character was Stump, the humorous 1-handed valet. He was a riot. I would've liked to see more of him.
Rating: 
Summary: FORE! This stroke misses the fairway.
Review: Heed my warning and stay out of the rough. This latest effort from Mrs. Pickens should have taken a mulligan and swung again. The "romance" is pot-boiler, fill-in-the-blanks, auto-pilot romance writing at its worst. The author of this attempt at romance completely misses the mark with undeveloped, unremarkable characters and a storyline that leaves you out in the cold. Pickens should head back to the country club or take a few practice strokes out on the driving range before attempting another "romance" again. This "Stroke of Luck" cost me $5.00 and left me frigid.... I think I would have found more heat in a golf magazine and more luck at a blackjack table. Definitely not recommended: did I make my opinion clear enough? ( lol ) There are many better romance writers to read, don't waste your time with Pickens' "Stroke of Luck".
Rating:
Summary: FORE! This stroke misses the fairway.
Review: Heed my warning and stay out of the rough. This latest effort from Mrs. Pickens should have taken a mulligan and swung again. The "romance" is pot-boiler, fill-in-the-blanks, auto-pilot romance writing at its worst. The author of this attempt at romance completely misses the mark with undeveloped, unremarkable characters and a storyline that leaves you out in the cold. Pickens should head back to the country club or take a few practice strokes out on the driving range before attempting another "romance" again. This "Stroke of Luck" cost me $5.00 and left me frigid.... I think I would have found more heat in a golf magazine and more luck at a blackjack table. Definitely not recommended: did I make my opinion clear enough? ( lol ) There are many better romance writers to read, don't waste your time with Pickens' "Stroke of Luck".
Rating: 
Summary: an enjoyabel read
Review: Zara Greeley has a mission: to get her two younger brothers safely to England, and to see to it that the brother next to her in age inherits the title and estate that should (rightfully) be his. But things are not so easy: Zara and her brothers have been living overseas (in Crete), and when her father died, Zara had to struggle all by her herself to ensure their safety. Fellow Englishmen (and women) abroad proved no help, and in fact, quite frequently proved to be a detriment. As such, Zara has a rather poor opinion of aristocrats, deeming them all to be rich and useless parasites. Also factoring into her poor opinion of aristocrats is that she has an uphill battle on her hands trying to prove the validity of her brother's rights. Zara's father was estranged from his family because he chose to go his own way, and now an unscrupulous cousin who wants the title and estate for himself is claiming that her brother has no right to anything at all! The Duke of Prestwick is on his way to a remote estate in order to sort out the affairs of one of his cousins. The man claims that he is the rightful heir but fears that an adventuress bent to mischief will hold up things by making a counter claim. Now the duke is very much a London man -- with polished but reserved manners, a bit of an intellectual, and not at all outdoorsy in any way. So that one cannot but help but wonder why he readily falls in with his valet's (Stump) notion that they should sail to the estate in question.The novel itself opens with Stump falling into the sea, and the duke diving in to save him. The pair are saved by Zara and her brothers who fish them out of the sea. Zara, of course, immediate jumps to the conclusion that the duke was drunk and that the plucky Stump had jumped in to save him. The duke's and Zara's relationship steadily go downhill from there-- she thinks he's too arrogant and useless, while he thinks that she's too bossy and unrefined. After a couple of adventures in which both Zara and the duke learn to grudgingly admire each other, Zara and the duke make it to the estate where Zara learns to her dismay the duke will be mostly responsible for discovering who the rightful heir is. Can she trust the duke, an aristocrat after all, to do the right thing? Zara is torn, for she cannot help but distrust the man that she's become unfathomably attracted to... I rather enjoy the romance novels that Andrea Pickens pens because her primary characters are intelligent, strong and developed with care (even her minor stock characters, like the unscrupulous cousin and aunt, are well developed); and her stories are always interesting and have a lot more going for it than the usual 'a gentleman and lady meeting at a ball/house party and falling in love.' "A Stroke of Luck" fell into the usual Pickens's parameters, and was actually quite an interesting read. Both the duke and Zara have pasts that have coloured and shaped who they have become, and the authour lets us see and appreciate this fully. Unfortunately, I did think that the romance angle could have been developed better -- somehow I came away with the impression that the duke's feelings for Zara were part frustration, part desire, and that love figured into the equation (for at least three quarters of the book) not at all. Other than this one quibble though I'd still vote "A Stroke of Luck," as a good and worthwhile read.
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