wolfie0516 reviewed on
I think this book deserves a higher rating than the PBS readers have given it. It was a very good story about a man who suffered horribly, along with his family, because of another man's selfishness and greed. Understandably he wants revenge. One of the ways he seeks revenge is to take the man's daughter as his mistress for a year. The dilemma is that he knew her as a child and they were friends, and he has good memories of her and some remaining affection. I loved the way he ended up treating her (although I wasn't thrilled he expected her to give up her reputation so easily and go with her passion and go to bed with him). He ended up treating her with respect and the story involves them growing close to one another and regaining some of their childhood infatuation with one another. I got somewhat irritated with her insistance at not considering her dad's guilt when it was so evident and obvious, even to her, that he was a selfish, greedy, horrible man. I didn't like how she was supposed to be so smart, but kept falling for her dad's manipulations. I also got annoyed with her insisting on Blake not carrying out his revenge on her dad to prove he had feelings for her. After what her dad did to Blake and his family, the revenge Blake had planned for her dad was not harsh enough, by far. But it was a great book and the main characters had very admirable qualities that left you really rooting for them to end up together. I liked the secondary love story between Blake's friend, Justin, and Blake's neighbor, Samantha, also. It left me wanting a novel to be written about them. I recommend this book to readers who like reading about more than just a surface kind of relationship. They were complex characters that I liked reading about.
