Mini Reviews - XXV (Joan smith)

Talk of the Town

  -  Joan Smith
My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

The first half of the book is wonderful - one of the best repartee and a thoroughly entertaining battle of wits between the MC. I enjoyed that the hero kept ending up meeting the heroine and bested by her, despite his determination not to do so.

The heroine's character is a bit inconsistent - a young, inexperienced, country lady, moving with so much poise and confidence in the London society does not make sense. It would have been better of the author could had defined her personality in a manner that made her interactions with the top elite more believable (fun as they were!).

The second half lets the book down. The characterization of the aunt, Effie - she is supposed to be smart, but her actions contradict this - she lets people take advantage of her so much that she falls from affluence into abject poverty, she refuses to see that her "friends" are self-serving parasites, and also gets back with her unfaithful ex who continues to be a jerk. In the latter part of the book, the heroine starts behaving in an increasingly annoying manner, and the hero makes stupid mistakes, leading to a totally unnecessary misunderstanding (my least-liked trope).

In all, the premise was entertaining, but the characterization was lacking.

Lady Hathaway's House Party

  - Joan Smith
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was not as amusing as I expected it to be - I was looking for more banter between the MC, even if it was to be a trading of insults. But it rather turned out to be domestic fights, more or less one-sided (justified as it was - I sympathized with the heroine). It was redeemed by the efforts of the hero, who made genuine attempts to understand and rectify his mistakes. There was humor in the writing though, which I enjoyed.

However, a lot of entertainment was derived from the antics of two completely inappropriate characters, which didn't work for me. I especially wonder at the characters like Lady Dempster - whose inclination to gossip goes so far as to almost manufacture it, regardless of the cost to the people involved, and who don't even shy away from barging into personal and private conversations. I suppose its a caricature, but still wonder whether the etiquette in that society went so far as to not even insult such people.