Firstly I should say that I love Mary Balogh's earlier novels, the ones that were linked but not series. She could get an emotional grip on me that made it impossible to put those books down. Some examples: A Precious Jewel, Dark Angel, Red Rose, The Secret Pearl, Secrets of the Heart, A Promise of Spring. I kept and have reread all of these numerous times.
Remember Love was, to me, pretty pallid next to her best work. It also suffers from many pages of setup information at the very beginning. It took me longer than usual to get a sense of the central characters, let alone care what became of them.
That said, mediocre Mary Balogh is still better than so many of the authors publishing today. Her language is polished, precise and effective. She knows her tools.
So I would still say that anything she ever wrote is worth reading, if only for the language alone, and though this is one of her less engrossing works, it's still worthwhile.
Remember Love was, to me, pretty pallid next to her best work. It also suffers from many pages of setup information at the very beginning. It took me longer than usual to get a sense of the central characters, let alone care what became of them.
That said, mediocre Mary Balogh is still better than so many of the authors publishing today. Her language is polished, precise and effective. She knows her tools.
So I would still say that anything she ever wrote is worth reading, if only for the language alone, and though this is one of her less engrossing works, it's still worthwhile.
Love Mary Balogh but this book just wasn't up to her usual great stories in my opinion. I usually read her books in a day or two but this one has been hanging around for a couple of weeks! Disappointed. Almost seems like she really didn't care about this story.
