Review: Not Wicked Enough by Carolyn Jewel

Thoughts like hers were not appropriate for a lady. Her father had once told her she’d been born wicked, and she suspected he was right. What proper lady, never married, took a lover, regretted nothing, and dreamed of taking another?

If you enjoy Historical Romances featuring heroines who are not shy, virginal misses, then this book will be right up your alley. The heroine, Lily, is a delightfully self aware heroine. She looks delicate and innocent, like someone you need to protect, but her mind is quite sharp. She flirts and tosses around innuendos without ever losing that innocent mien. I quite enjoyed the hero’s initial uncertainty about her awareness of the undertones to their interactions. She is also cheerful and fun to be around. She easily pulls the hero’s sister (her friend) out of the gloom she had fallen into with the death of her husband, and charms the reluctant Mountjoy.

This is a very character driven romance. There is a bit of a subplot involving the heroine’s fear that a distant relative has arrived to wrest her inheritance away, but it was quite obvious where that was going, and it wasn’t headed toward an actual conflict. The author did manage to surprise me with the development between Lily and the relative toward the end, but I was pleased to see that the situation didn’t become too sticky and that my initial assumption about his interest in their little group was still correct. I know that such an intense focus on the main romance, to the exclusion of all else, is not for everyone, but I quite enjoy it. I am an unrepentant emotional voyeur, and I love the intense focus on a burgeoning romance.

The story setup is very simple, and in the hands of another author it could have easily strayed into boring territory. Lily comes to visit her friend, Eugenia, to pull her out of the gloom she’s been in since her husband died. She meets the hero, Mountjoy, and sparks fly between them both. Mountjoy was a farmer who became a duke through a convoluted line of succession. He is a hard working man who has come to love the lands that he is responsible for. Although he has been the duke for quite a while, he hasn’t bothered to assume some of the more frivolous trappings of the nobility, like new clothes. He doesn’t care about entertaining or impressing anyone, so why would he need new clothes? But I think he also refused to change because he secretly didn’t want anyone to forget who he was or to think that he was putting on airs.

Mountjoy is probably going to marry a girl named Jane. He hasn’t proposed or courted her, but everyone assumes he will, and he doesn’t see a reason why he shouldn’t eventually propose. Eventually being the key word. Lily and Mountjoy are very attracted to each other and neither has a problem with it. The only real concern for Mountjoy is what will happen with his sister’s friendship with Lily when they eventually end their affair. This initially holds him back, but every nighttime encounter between them—Lily has always had insomnia, so she’s always up and about at night, giving her an easy way to spend time with him alone—pulls them tighter and tighter together.

For her part, Lily has no problem starting an affair with Mountjoy, other than a few worries about being disloyal to her feelings for her first love, Greer. We didn’t get a lot of information on Greer, so it was easy for me to brush off this concern. At one point Mountjoy said something to Lily that perfectly summed up my thoughts. I liked this indication that the author was fully aware of how Lily’s concerns were coming off to the reader. It made me have more patience with Lily. He said:

“Don’t settle for marriage without at least respect between you. You can’t live like that. Not you, Lily. I know you loved Greer, and I believe you’ll never love another man the way you loved him. But does it follow that you can never love? Does a parent love only one child? A child only one parent? May we love only one friend? You, Lily, you of all people must have love in her life. Genuine love from a man who understands the wonderful eccentricities of your mind. Accept nothing less.”

So if I enjoyed this book so much, why is it only a B instead of an A? It’s because of something I can’t put my finger on. I may have had a few irritants here and there in the book, like never knowing the hero’s name or the way Mountjoy’s connection with Jane became a non issue (it seemed like too easy of a shortcut for such a skilled author), but they were easy to ignore when compared to the charm of Lily and Mountjoy together. But what I can’t get over is the distance I feel toward this book. Just like with the last book I read by this author, Scandal, I enjoyed the story, enjoyed the characters, and can see the author’s skill, but I just don’t feel it the way I should. I don’t click with the story and it drives me batty that I can’t figure out why. So I, unfortunately, can only enjoy the story, not love it.

Favorite Quote:

“What are you thinking?” Mountjoy asked.

She could not remember a time when any man had made her so relentlessly aware that she was a woman. The man made the back of her knees positively weak. “Nothing.”

He laughed, and her belly tightened. “Wellstone. The day you are thinking of nothing is the day the world ends.”

Rating: B
Not Wicked Enough by Carolyn Jewel
February 7th 2012 by Berkley
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