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A Late Loving
She was his wife, not his mistress
Amber knew Alex would find her. You just didn't hide forever from one of the most powerful men in the world.
Nine years ago, as a naive young bride, Amber had fled from what she felt was an unbearable marriage. She'd always expected a reckoning for the public insult to a proud and formidable husband.
But nothing had prepared her for Alex's unique revenge--her willing seduction! It would take all of Amber's willpower to resist the memories of how he was capable of making her feel.
Amber knew Alex would find her. You just didn't hide forever from one of the most powerful men in the world.
Nine years ago, as a naive young bride, Amber had fled from what she felt was an unbearable marriage. She'd always expected a reckoning for the public insult to a proud and formidable husband.
But nothing had prepared her for Alex's unique revenge--her willing seduction! It would take all of Amber's willpower to resist the memories of how he was capable of making her feel.
187 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
About the author
Robyn Donald
450 books150 followersRobyn Elaine Donald was born on 14 August 1940 in Northland, New Zealand. She was the oldest child in her family, and as a child, she thrilled her four sisters and one brother with bloodcurdling adventure tales, usually very like the latest book she'd borrowed from the library.
Robyn owes her writing career to two illnesses. The first was a younger sister's flu. She was living with her husband and Robyn and spent most of that winter acquiring, suffering, and recovering from various infections. One day she croaked that she had read everything on Robyn's bookshelves, so would Robyn please buy her something cheerful and sustaining. Robyn found three paperbacks- one Mills and Boon Modern Romance novel and a couple of other romances. Robyn read them, too, of course, and so enjoyed them she spent the next couple of years hunting down more Mills and Boon books. This was much more difficult then than it is today, so she decided to write her own, and for the following busy 10 years she wrote and hoped that one day she would finish a manuscript good enough that was good enough to send to a publisher.
The second illness was her husband's, and it was bad a heart attack. He was so young it terrified them all. While he was recovering, he suggested that Robyn finish the manuscript she was writing and send it off. It wasn't a perfect manuscript, but the doctor had said to humour her husband, so she finished the manuscript, edited it as best she could, and sent it off. Three months later, she was astounded to read a letter from the editor saying that if She made a few revisions they would buy her novel Bride at Whangatapu.
Published since 1977, Robyn sees her readers as intelligent women who insist on accurate backgrounds, so she spends time researching as well as writing.Robyn Donald sometimes thinks that writing is much like gardening. It's a similar process creating landscapes for the mind and emotions from the seeds of ideas and dreams and images. Both activities can also lead to moments of extreme delight, moments of total despair, and backache.Now Robyn lives in the Bay Islands. She continues writing, and also finds time for a very supportive husband, two adult children and their partners, a granddaughter and her mother, not to mention the member of the family that keeps her fit - a loud, cheerful, and ruthlessly determined "almost" Labradordog.
Robyn owes her writing career to two illnesses. The first was a younger sister's flu. She was living with her husband and Robyn and spent most of that winter acquiring, suffering, and recovering from various infections. One day she croaked that she had read everything on Robyn's bookshelves, so would Robyn please buy her something cheerful and sustaining. Robyn found three paperbacks- one Mills and Boon Modern Romance novel and a couple of other romances. Robyn read them, too, of course, and so enjoyed them she spent the next couple of years hunting down more Mills and Boon books. This was much more difficult then than it is today, so she decided to write her own, and for the following busy 10 years she wrote and hoped that one day she would finish a manuscript good enough that was good enough to send to a publisher.
The second illness was her husband's, and it was bad a heart attack. He was so young it terrified them all. While he was recovering, he suggested that Robyn finish the manuscript she was writing and send it off. It wasn't a perfect manuscript, but the doctor had said to humour her husband, so she finished the manuscript, edited it as best she could, and sent it off. Three months later, she was astounded to read a letter from the editor saying that if She made a few revisions they would buy her novel Bride at Whangatapu.
Published since 1977, Robyn sees her readers as intelligent women who insist on accurate backgrounds, so she spends time researching as well as writing.Robyn Donald sometimes thinks that writing is much like gardening. It's a similar process creating landscapes for the mind and emotions from the seeds of ideas and dreams and images. Both activities can also lead to moments of extreme delight, moments of total despair, and backache.Now Robyn lives in the Bay Islands. She continues writing, and also finds time for a very supportive husband, two adult children and their partners, a granddaughter and her mother, not to mention the member of the family that keeps her fit - a loud, cheerful, and ruthlessly determined "almost" Labradordog.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 58 reviews
September 2, 2018
Re A Late Loving - there are just some books in HPlandia that are totally, epically whacked, these books go way beyond a trainwreck with an avalanche on top.
I give these books a special category all their own -- the So Bad It Is Cultic category. For a book to get this classification, it has to be the most outrageous scenario, complete with the most egregious characters ever who are coupled with such appalling acts of wanton mayhem that the book will become notorious in discussions and posts where readers can rant for days about them. This will always be the type of book that is either loved or hated and often the book is very well written, (poorly written works usually don't make the epic cultic grade,) it takes major skill to produce this amount of wall banging, house collapsing frustration. Robyn Donald has several that come into this category and A Late Loving is definitely one of them.
The ratings for a book of this type will always be all over the place, no matter how well it is written, there are going to be bad, bad marks for the book being so shockingly, outrageously horrible in the bad behavior - usually the VERY badly behaving H.
Then there are those like me, who rate the book pretty highly - not because the characters are so great or the HEA was so believable-- but because the book is such a PERFECT example of the HPlandia crazytrain whackiness that we just can't help but in be in flabbergasted awe that such a work even got published.
Now that I have whetted your curiosity, stock up on your adult beverages and our favorite Australian Tim Tams and lets all board the HPlandia Train of Utter Bad Romance.
The most horrifying thing about this one is that the H and h are married and have been for nine years. The h was 17 when she was sold off in marriage to the 21 yr old H as part of a big business merger between their families. The h has to move to Greece to live in the H's father's house that is ruled over by the H's stepmother, who is an utter conniving, miserable cow. You sorta feel a bit bad for her upon her introduction. The woman is clearly abused and belittled by the H's father and she just can't help but share the torment and agony around. Oh yes, this stepmother truly believes in sharing the misery wealth and the h is about to get a triple word score bonus helping of it.
The h and H are actually kinda cute together at first, the H is nice to her and the h is infatuated. That ends when the H's stepmommie dearest takes the h on a neighborhood tour and shows the h where the H's pregnant mistress lives. Stepmommie dearest makes sure the h knows just how regularly the H visits his pregnant lady friend, and granted for the state she is in, the pregnancy happened before the h married him - but his behavior is very much a man who is making regular lurve club insertions.
The h is horrified. The H doesn't care, he pillages her anyway and when she protests, he goes back to his mistress and tells her she can just live with it, if she isn't willing to put out, oh well others will - then he takes off on a business trip and cheats on both the h and the mistress. Then the H's mistress seeks the h out and makes a point of rubbing in the fact that she, not the h will be the mother of the H's first child and that gives her special privileges.
The h absolutely will not live like this. She hates Greece, she hates misogynistic men and she HATES being lied to and deceived. She will be boiled in oil before she will bring a child into this poisonous, toxic environment where he will grow up to be just like his excrement slurping scum sewage parasite grandfather. Nor will she be bearing any acknowledged children to the piece of excrement she married who so closely follows in his father's footsteps. The h has no expectations that her father will help her, he sold her off for a lucrative business proposition and her mother is dead. The h needs a sanctuary badly tho and it needs to be far enough away that the H can't find her and drag her back.
Fortunately the h remembers a distant cousin of her father's who runs a big cattle station and various enterprises in New Zealand, She manages to escape while on a visit to her father's house and she flees to her cousin in NZ. When she gets there, she settles in to helping him with his various farms and business and she makes friends with the neighboring H and h of A Durable Fire.
She also finds she is pregnant, but when the baby is born it looks enough like her that people assume that her cousin is the father and she figures the H won't catch on if he does catch up to her because they hadn't been intimate for over a month when he sleeps lurves her up the night before she left and she knows by his behavior in the morning that he doesn't remember. To the H, her child was born 10 and half months after they stopped having marital relations.
The book opens with the h now 26, talking to one of the farm manager wives on the estate. The h's son and her cousin are off sailing around on the H from A Durable Fire's yacht. She and the h from ADF were supposed to go on the sailing trip too, but the h from ADF is preggers and not feeling well, so the ladies sent the guys off for male bonding time.
Then the H shows up and forces the shocked h into leaving with him by telling her that he will bankrupt her cousin if she doesn't comply. Later the h realizes that she should have made a big fuss and threatened the H with the press, but she was too shocked and plus the h was on a horse with the farm manager's child when the H showed up and startled the horse into rearing with his helicopter. The near miss accident discombobulated the h so much, and the H's threats were so rapid that the h just left with him.
The H takes the h to a private island he bought in NZ's Bay of Islands. He calls her all kinds of nasty names, forces her into degrading clothes and generally tells her that she will willingly sleep with him and then he will dump her after she is ensorcelled by the power of his mighty tower. The H wants revenge for her dumping him and leaving nine years earlier - as we can all see, this H has no ego problems here, but is really sorta lacking the brains department for all that he runs a big international conglomeration.
The h is attracted to him, it is the usual RD massive physical passion trope, but the H forgets that he is just as susceptible as she is. They spend several days on the island and the H finds his attempts to cheapen the h by forcing her to wear tacky clothing comes back to bite him when day visitors arrive on the island and the men can't stop drooling over the h.
The h and H have several bitter discussions about about their marriage and the past and the H gradually comes to understand that she was 17, isolated by the language barrier (the H's father demanded that people only speak to her in Greek) and the stepmommie dearest's intense loathing for her. The H's words are as mean and nasty as ever, but RD shows through his little actions that he is starting to tumble tho the h holds him off from exercising the lurve club. We also find out the mistress's baby was stillborn and the H was sad about it. The h is sad for him too, and she makes it clear she pities the mistress. The H is a bit taken aback by that.
Then the h's son falls off a cliff and seriously injures his head. The h's cousin managed to save him when the cliff gave way but he broke his leg and got badly bruised, so they are both in hospital with the son in a coma. The H rushes the h to the hospital where it is assumed the H is the boy's father. This makes the h incredibly nervous, because she knows the H will try and take her son if he figures out who the father is.
The cousin is wiling to back the h in her story, he is half in love with her himself, but she never looks at him that way. ( Not to worry tho, Matt the cousin gets his own story in A Matter of Will where this h is inadvertently the OW for that h). Eventually the h's son wakes from his coma and the h is so relieved and the H is so supportive that she winds up doing the boudoir bounce and they go at it a few times while the son is hospitalized. Then the son is ready to leave the hospital and the cousin has recovered too. The h manages to get the upper hand in the boudoir stakes and the leashed lurve club slave H takes off, telling the h she will be hearing from his lawyers. (He lost the bedroom board struggle so he has to get all legal now to win.)
A few months later the h is despondently moping around because she has fallen in love and she has found out she is preggers again, when the H returns. He got blood tests and a new DNA test (the first introduction of DNA to HPlandia) and can prove that the h's son is his and he plans to take him. Then he and the h's cousin (who is no slouch whatever the H thinks,) almost get into a fight so the h pretends to pass out.
The H is all over helping her up and then he confronts her with her son's real parentage and he is really, really hurt that the h would hide the child. The h explains that his attitude towards women was not an acceptable one for her child to grow up with. The H turns white and pale, cause while they were in the hospital he told the h that he wouldn't corrupt the boy and the h made up some excuse for her keeping him away from her son, but now the H realizes that the h is really serious when she believes that he would be a negative influence on his own son. He finally gets that the h thinks he is a worthless person in a lot of ways, so much so that she would keep a father from his son because she felt his values would harm his own child.
The H has some serious explaining to do and while he sorta threatens he is going to take her son and the new baby, he is also knowing that A) these kids are NZ citizens, B) his many mistresses and hedonistic lifestyle has been headline news for years. C) the h can make a HUGE stink in the press about his behavior, especially as she has been living like a nun for nine years and was not her cousin's lover as he thought and negative press is really bad for his business and D) the h has wealthy, powerful NZ friends (the H from A Durable Fire who has all the other RD wealthy Alpha males NZ friends) so that no matter how much Greek money and big corporation power he has, there is a REALLY good chance he will lose badly in court and E) he is really in love with the h and while she has been a bit attention deprived in the physical department, she basically hates him.
So he grovels as much as his tiny brain will allow him too - tho honestly his grovel is more like the h was never supposed to know about the mistress and really he only lived that way cause his daddy told him to. His more recent actions are put down to intense rage and pain that the h dumped him when he was starting to love her nine years earlier and then moved in with her cousin and he tried every woman he could get but he still woke up lonely for the h - so he had a lot of suffering going on inside, the poor little nematode parasite. But I believed he did love her in the end and since the h loves him back and he swears fidelity and I pretty much bought it for the HEA. I could be happy the h was happy in this one.
We do see this couple again in A Matter Of Will and of course the H is a blissed out love fool following the h around like a puppy dog, so it works out in the end. Tho the H does ask at one point if the h would love a child of his, and it isn't clear if that question is motivated by his grand plan o'vengeance to impregnate the h and then steal her child, or if he has other children from his frequent flyer lady miles. Whatever, the H probably shouldn't have been allowed to breed, but the h has proven herself more than capable of winning on penalties in the end so we can now throw this one at the wall again in sheer relief and then go find a drywall repair kit.
Like I said, this is a love or hate book, the writing and the scenes are very intense and the amount of Captain Morgan consumption with this one is probably going to be very high for first timers. I would recommend reading this one on a day when you don't have to do anything else, cause the hangover and the overstuffed feeling of eating too many confectionery concoctions will take a bit of time to recover from.
If you do make it through this story on your first attempt at reading, either give yourself a big gold star and an extra cookie or go seek out a trainwrecker support group-- I am really not sure which it is with this book. But I do know that a successful read through of A Late Loving will put right there at the top of the diehard HP Veterans who boldly go without flinching into places where most romance readers would fear to tread. You should be very proud you made it, cause adding this to your books-that-have-been-read list makes you a Navy Seal/SAS forces commander of the really, really wildest shores of HPlandia.
I give these books a special category all their own -- the So Bad It Is Cultic category. For a book to get this classification, it has to be the most outrageous scenario, complete with the most egregious characters ever who are coupled with such appalling acts of wanton mayhem that the book will become notorious in discussions and posts where readers can rant for days about them. This will always be the type of book that is either loved or hated and often the book is very well written, (poorly written works usually don't make the epic cultic grade,) it takes major skill to produce this amount of wall banging, house collapsing frustration. Robyn Donald has several that come into this category and A Late Loving is definitely one of them.
The ratings for a book of this type will always be all over the place, no matter how well it is written, there are going to be bad, bad marks for the book being so shockingly, outrageously horrible in the bad behavior - usually the VERY badly behaving H.
Then there are those like me, who rate the book pretty highly - not because the characters are so great or the HEA was so believable-- but because the book is such a PERFECT example of the HPlandia crazytrain whackiness that we just can't help but in be in flabbergasted awe that such a work even got published.
Now that I have whetted your curiosity, stock up on your adult beverages and our favorite Australian Tim Tams and lets all board the HPlandia Train of Utter Bad Romance.
The most horrifying thing about this one is that the H and h are married and have been for nine years. The h was 17 when she was sold off in marriage to the 21 yr old H as part of a big business merger between their families. The h has to move to Greece to live in the H's father's house that is ruled over by the H's stepmother, who is an utter conniving, miserable cow. You sorta feel a bit bad for her upon her introduction. The woman is clearly abused and belittled by the H's father and she just can't help but share the torment and agony around. Oh yes, this stepmother truly believes in sharing the misery wealth and the h is about to get a triple word score bonus helping of it.
The h and H are actually kinda cute together at first, the H is nice to her and the h is infatuated. That ends when the H's stepmommie dearest takes the h on a neighborhood tour and shows the h where the H's pregnant mistress lives. Stepmommie dearest makes sure the h knows just how regularly the H visits his pregnant lady friend, and granted for the state she is in, the pregnancy happened before the h married him - but his behavior is very much a man who is making regular lurve club insertions.
The h is horrified. The H doesn't care, he pillages her anyway and when she protests, he goes back to his mistress and tells her she can just live with it, if she isn't willing to put out, oh well others will - then he takes off on a business trip and cheats on both the h and the mistress. Then the H's mistress seeks the h out and makes a point of rubbing in the fact that she, not the h will be the mother of the H's first child and that gives her special privileges.
The h absolutely will not live like this. She hates Greece, she hates misogynistic men and she HATES being lied to and deceived. She will be boiled in oil before she will bring a child into this poisonous, toxic environment where he will grow up to be just like his excrement slurping scum sewage parasite grandfather. Nor will she be bearing any acknowledged children to the piece of excrement she married who so closely follows in his father's footsteps. The h has no expectations that her father will help her, he sold her off for a lucrative business proposition and her mother is dead. The h needs a sanctuary badly tho and it needs to be far enough away that the H can't find her and drag her back.
Fortunately the h remembers a distant cousin of her father's who runs a big cattle station and various enterprises in New Zealand, She manages to escape while on a visit to her father's house and she flees to her cousin in NZ. When she gets there, she settles in to helping him with his various farms and business and she makes friends with the neighboring H and h of A Durable Fire.
She also finds she is pregnant, but when the baby is born it looks enough like her that people assume that her cousin is the father and she figures the H won't catch on if he does catch up to her because they hadn't been intimate for over a month when he sleeps lurves her up the night before she left and she knows by his behavior in the morning that he doesn't remember. To the H, her child was born 10 and half months after they stopped having marital relations.
The book opens with the h now 26, talking to one of the farm manager wives on the estate. The h's son and her cousin are off sailing around on the H from A Durable Fire's yacht. She and the h from ADF were supposed to go on the sailing trip too, but the h from ADF is preggers and not feeling well, so the ladies sent the guys off for male bonding time.
Then the H shows up and forces the shocked h into leaving with him by telling her that he will bankrupt her cousin if she doesn't comply. Later the h realizes that she should have made a big fuss and threatened the H with the press, but she was too shocked and plus the h was on a horse with the farm manager's child when the H showed up and startled the horse into rearing with his helicopter. The near miss accident discombobulated the h so much, and the H's threats were so rapid that the h just left with him.
The H takes the h to a private island he bought in NZ's Bay of Islands. He calls her all kinds of nasty names, forces her into degrading clothes and generally tells her that she will willingly sleep with him and then he will dump her after she is ensorcelled by the power of his mighty tower. The H wants revenge for her dumping him and leaving nine years earlier - as we can all see, this H has no ego problems here, but is really sorta lacking the brains department for all that he runs a big international conglomeration.
The h is attracted to him, it is the usual RD massive physical passion trope, but the H forgets that he is just as susceptible as she is. They spend several days on the island and the H finds his attempts to cheapen the h by forcing her to wear tacky clothing comes back to bite him when day visitors arrive on the island and the men can't stop drooling over the h.
The h and H have several bitter discussions about about their marriage and the past and the H gradually comes to understand that she was 17, isolated by the language barrier (the H's father demanded that people only speak to her in Greek) and the stepmommie dearest's intense loathing for her. The H's words are as mean and nasty as ever, but RD shows through his little actions that he is starting to tumble tho the h holds him off from exercising the lurve club. We also find out the mistress's baby was stillborn and the H was sad about it. The h is sad for him too, and she makes it clear she pities the mistress. The H is a bit taken aback by that.
Then the h's son falls off a cliff and seriously injures his head. The h's cousin managed to save him when the cliff gave way but he broke his leg and got badly bruised, so they are both in hospital with the son in a coma. The H rushes the h to the hospital where it is assumed the H is the boy's father. This makes the h incredibly nervous, because she knows the H will try and take her son if he figures out who the father is.
The cousin is wiling to back the h in her story, he is half in love with her himself, but she never looks at him that way. ( Not to worry tho, Matt the cousin gets his own story in A Matter of Will where this h is inadvertently the OW for that h). Eventually the h's son wakes from his coma and the h is so relieved and the H is so supportive that she winds up doing the boudoir bounce and they go at it a few times while the son is hospitalized. Then the son is ready to leave the hospital and the cousin has recovered too. The h manages to get the upper hand in the boudoir stakes and the leashed lurve club slave H takes off, telling the h she will be hearing from his lawyers. (He lost the bedroom board struggle so he has to get all legal now to win.)
A few months later the h is despondently moping around because she has fallen in love and she has found out she is preggers again, when the H returns. He got blood tests and a new DNA test (the first introduction of DNA to HPlandia) and can prove that the h's son is his and he plans to take him. Then he and the h's cousin (who is no slouch whatever the H thinks,) almost get into a fight so the h pretends to pass out.
The H is all over helping her up and then he confronts her with her son's real parentage and he is really, really hurt that the h would hide the child. The h explains that his attitude towards women was not an acceptable one for her child to grow up with. The H turns white and pale, cause while they were in the hospital he told the h that he wouldn't corrupt the boy and the h made up some excuse for her keeping him away from her son, but now the H realizes that the h is really serious when she believes that he would be a negative influence on his own son. He finally gets that the h thinks he is a worthless person in a lot of ways, so much so that she would keep a father from his son because she felt his values would harm his own child.
The H has some serious explaining to do and while he sorta threatens he is going to take her son and the new baby, he is also knowing that A) these kids are NZ citizens, B) his many mistresses and hedonistic lifestyle has been headline news for years. C) the h can make a HUGE stink in the press about his behavior, especially as she has been living like a nun for nine years and was not her cousin's lover as he thought and negative press is really bad for his business and D) the h has wealthy, powerful NZ friends (the H from A Durable Fire who has all the other RD wealthy Alpha males NZ friends) so that no matter how much Greek money and big corporation power he has, there is a REALLY good chance he will lose badly in court and E) he is really in love with the h and while she has been a bit attention deprived in the physical department, she basically hates him.
So he grovels as much as his tiny brain will allow him too - tho honestly his grovel is more like the h was never supposed to know about the mistress and really he only lived that way cause his daddy told him to. His more recent actions are put down to intense rage and pain that the h dumped him when he was starting to love her nine years earlier and then moved in with her cousin and he tried every woman he could get but he still woke up lonely for the h - so he had a lot of suffering going on inside, the poor little nematode parasite. But I believed he did love her in the end and since the h loves him back and he swears fidelity and I pretty much bought it for the HEA. I could be happy the h was happy in this one.
We do see this couple again in A Matter Of Will and of course the H is a blissed out love fool following the h around like a puppy dog, so it works out in the end. Tho the H does ask at one point if the h would love a child of his, and it isn't clear if that question is motivated by his grand plan o'vengeance to impregnate the h and then steal her child, or if he has other children from his frequent flyer lady miles. Whatever, the H probably shouldn't have been allowed to breed, but the h has proven herself more than capable of winning on penalties in the end so we can now throw this one at the wall again in sheer relief and then go find a drywall repair kit.
Like I said, this is a love or hate book, the writing and the scenes are very intense and the amount of Captain Morgan consumption with this one is probably going to be very high for first timers. I would recommend reading this one on a day when you don't have to do anything else, cause the hangover and the overstuffed feeling of eating too many confectionery concoctions will take a bit of time to recover from.
If you do make it through this story on your first attempt at reading, either give yourself a big gold star and an extra cookie or go seek out a trainwrecker support group-- I am really not sure which it is with this book. But I do know that a successful read through of A Late Loving will put right there at the top of the diehard HP Veterans who boldly go without flinching into places where most romance readers would fear to tread. You should be very proud you made it, cause adding this to your books-that-have-been-read list makes you a Navy Seal/SAS forces commander of the really, really wildest shores of HPlandia.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 25, 2021
Okay - this one was hard to rate. I didn't "really like it," but I couldn't look away and for that, I have to give it four stars.
Other reviewers have spoiled the plot, so I'll just talk about the kitchen sink aspect of this story. Honestly - this had everything. Heroine is married at 17 and totally in love - check. Evil stepmother - check. Isolated in a foreign country without speaking the language - check. Screwed up backstory - check. 21 year-old hero is too proud to give up his pregnant mistress for a wife he married for business- check. Heroine in hiding with a secret baby for 9 years - check.
And that's before the events of the story take place.
Add in blackmail, kidnapping, revenge seduction, humiliation.
A kid in a coma.
Confrontation of 2 alphas.
"Life force sex" after the kid comes out of the coma.
DNA tests.
Another pregnancy.
And . . . let's just declare a HEA even though the hero hasn't really changed his arrogant ways.
I wasn't really buying the HEA. Who is to say he won't stray again? And why wait 9 years for revenge? And I just never liked the H - no charm whatsoever. Heroine was okay - she was right to leave him in the first place. I guess if you've got two children with the guy you have to give it another chance.
Other reviewers have spoiled the plot, so I'll just talk about the kitchen sink aspect of this story. Honestly - this had everything. Heroine is married at 17 and totally in love - check. Evil stepmother - check. Isolated in a foreign country without speaking the language - check. Screwed up backstory - check. 21 year-old hero is too proud to give up his pregnant mistress for a wife he married for business- check. Heroine in hiding with a secret baby for 9 years - check.
And that's before the events of the story take place.
Add in blackmail, kidnapping, revenge seduction, humiliation.
A kid in a coma.
Confrontation of 2 alphas.
"Life force sex" after the kid comes out of the coma.
DNA tests.
Another pregnancy.
And . . . let's just declare a HEA even though the hero hasn't really changed his arrogant ways.
I wasn't really buying the HEA. Who is to say he won't stray again? And why wait 9 years for revenge? And I just never liked the H - no charm whatsoever. Heroine was okay - she was right to leave him in the first place. I guess if you've got two children with the guy you have to give it another chance.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 5, 2021
A revenge-humiliation story with the H in full vendetta mode, wanting/needing to teach his runaway wife that no one messes with a Greek husband. As he says, I could have strangled you for what you did, a century ago and nobody would have turned a hair. He traces her after 9 years across the globe in NZ where she is living with her hunky cattleman cousin (a H in a later book) and a son. He believes the boy to be the om’s and by outrageous double standards, indulges in some name calling.
Great for all around angst!
Great for all around angst!
July 11, 2016
I was warned.
Cheating, arrogant and vengelful SOB Greek alpha hero cons stupid, doormat with a blackmail plan and a magic penis.
The kind of angst and abuse that gives romances a bad name.
Cheating, arrogant and vengelful SOB Greek alpha hero cons stupid, doormat with a blackmail plan and a magic penis.
The kind of angst and abuse that gives romances a bad name.
February 6, 2023
A new cheating shelf: hero cheats on the heroine AND the mistress with another ow🤡
Only Ms Donald….🤡
Only Ms Donald….🤡
June 12, 2016
Really hated the guy but I strangely liked the story apart from when the female lead becomes all understanding and compassionate about the mistress at the end.....erm hello she tried to break up your marriage and was pregnant with your husbands child! Sorry but I don't think I could be so soft.
October 20, 2022
Last night after making dinner (it was 3pm I fed them leftover Chinese food) I put on my new Cuddle Duds pajamas (with the matching headband) and settled in with a bottle of wine (it was a box- I’ve got a thing for Franzia) to spend the evening with some old school HP’s. I started with A Late Loving because everyone hates it, but want to add the disclaimer that alcohol was involved in this rating. Before we get started let me clarify that this is about a cheating husband, and probably not great for safety readers. Let’s go…
The book starts with Amber living in NZ, she fled her husband Alex nine years earlier after he refused to cut off his pregnant mistress, and his family were assholes… especially his step-mommy. My friends are split whether this was an active cheating situation or not, and the text is vague, so it’s easy to be swayed either way. This is all mentioned through memories, there’s nothing on page of the dalliances, and other than her telling him what a bitch the mistress was to her, there’s no OW drama…which was a disappointment for me.
There’re several spoiler reviews out there if you want all the deets, but the rest is them working through their shit. Amber doesn’t forgive him at once, she holds him off (which is VERY difficult because Alex is a walking aphrodisiac), and keeps her secret with no plans of reconnecting. I especially liked how confident she was with her body and self; she’s not an insecure ninny. Alex for his part rides the line of saying/doing nasty things (like making her wear hussy clothes) while being somewhat caring, and calling her pet names.
Bottom Line- I felt this fell more in the HP whacky lane than a serious marriage in trouble. I was entertained by their antics, but never had any feels. My only real complaints are that I thought the relationship should’ve either been more substantial or the separation shorter so their love declarations at the end felt a little more believable. It’s hard to not laugh at ...we had shared a love so rare and precious that it was written in the annals.. when they spent 6 months together a decade earlier. I also prefer more drama-llama in whacky HP’s, and there’s no comeuppance for the ex-mistress or nasty MIL. I like my soapy h’s to be cattier… at the very least I would’ve never let the MIL be a g-ma to my kids, but I hold a mean grudge. In the end, I did believe Alex loved her, and could get on board with the HEA… at least Amber is happy, and the epilogue helps. Also, I can’t remember the name, but I know this h pops up in her cousin Matt’s book, and Alex is besotted.
The book starts with Amber living in NZ, she fled her husband Alex nine years earlier after he refused to cut off his pregnant mistress, and his family were assholes… especially his step-mommy. My friends are split whether this was an active cheating situation or not, and the text is vague, so it’s easy to be swayed either way. This is all mentioned through memories, there’s nothing on page of the dalliances, and other than her telling him what a bitch the mistress was to her, there’s no OW drama…which was a disappointment for me.
There’re several spoiler reviews out there if you want all the deets, but the rest is them working through their shit. Amber doesn’t forgive him at once, she holds him off (which is VERY difficult because Alex is a walking aphrodisiac), and keeps her secret with no plans of reconnecting. I especially liked how confident she was with her body and self; she’s not an insecure ninny. Alex for his part rides the line of saying/doing nasty things (like making her wear hussy clothes) while being somewhat caring, and calling her pet names.
Bottom Line- I felt this fell more in the HP whacky lane than a serious marriage in trouble. I was entertained by their antics, but never had any feels. My only real complaints are that I thought the relationship should’ve either been more substantial or the separation shorter so their love declarations at the end felt a little more believable. It’s hard to not laugh at ...we had shared a love so rare and precious that it was written in the annals.. when they spent 6 months together a decade earlier. I also prefer more drama-llama in whacky HP’s, and there’s no comeuppance for the ex-mistress or nasty MIL. I like my soapy h’s to be cattier… at the very least I would’ve never let the MIL be a g-ma to my kids, but I hold a mean grudge. In the end, I did believe Alex loved her, and could get on board with the HEA… at least Amber is happy, and the epilogue helps. Also, I can’t remember the name, but I know this h pops up in her cousin Matt’s book, and Alex is besotted.
January 26, 2019
Well written story of a woman whose husband finally finds her after she's run away from him and stayed away for 9 years. She of course has been celibate all these years but as is typical for these older HPs you just assume he hasn't even though it is not really addressed. The story hung together well . I like that RD writes books in series. The cousin who the husband thinks is the OM has his story told in a later book. RD just has a writing style that keeps you riveted even though she is telling the same old boy meets girl story. Plus as a bonus these older HPs are longer than the newer ones, more story to enjoy.
July 2, 2011
OMGoodness! What a jerk!!!! The things he did and said...he called her a "whore" on more than one occasion, and HE IS THE ONE WHO CHEATED REPEATEDLY DURING THE MARRIAGE.
I am just so freaking angry after reading this book with its patheticly contrite, "I really loved you but wanted my dad's approval so I acted like him-a big old jerkwad!"
GIVE ME A FREAKING BREAK.
I am just so freaking angry after reading this book with its patheticly contrite, "I really loved you but wanted my dad's approval so I acted like him-a big old jerkwad!"
GIVE ME A FREAKING BREAK.
January 11, 2018
‘Whore!’ Shouts Alex, on first encountering the wife he hasn’t seen seen in 9 years. ‘Throw down that infant child of shame and enter my helicopter!’
This is a very promising beginning to a Robyn Donald angst-fest, and Amber does in fact gently relinquish (to his mother) the boy she’s been holding while riding about on her hot cousin’s farm, and gets into the chopper.
It’s at this point, I am certain of two things. One, that I read this book approximately a million years ago, but remember hardly anything about it (except that I’m fairly certain I named my cat after this character) and two, that Alex is a cartoon villain and I cannot take him seriously.
And by the way, if you are looking for an excellent and insightful review that will give you all the plot details you could ever need, I recommend Boogenhagen’s. It’s also very entertaining. I’m about to deliver not so much a review, but a bunch of random crap.
Back to Alex the cartoon villain. He’s a sexy tall rich Greek shipping man, and is all for getting Amber to the little New Zealand island he bought, so that he can yell at her some more. And then have sex with her. Sex, yell, repeat, until he’s bored. Amber left him after about 5 months of marriage. She was 17, he was 21. They were both hot and had massively great sex together. But then Amber found out Alex had a mistress, and she just would not shut up about it. And she also kept complaining that his stepmother was being mean to her. And then she found out that Alex’s mistress (who he wasn’t giving up, thanks, because no 17 year old is telling him what to do, even if she is awesome at sex) was pregnant, and she really wouldn’t shut up.
Then she left, and Alex has finally tracked her down to where she’s been staying with her hot cousin, and he knows that the hot cousin is the father of Amber’s son (see, that’s why he called her a whore), and now he’s going to get his revenge. And lots of sexy times.
Amber starts kicking herself almost immediately for getting in the chopper. While she’s pretty keen on Alex not learning that he’s the father of her son (and conveniently son and hot cousin are off on a holiday), she probably could have said/done just about anything sensible, and they’d have had a big argument, and then Alex would have left.
Which, sadly for me, meant that Alex wasn’t the cartoon villain I’d been so hoping he’d be. You see, I started thinking:
1. I can’t take him seriously, this is going to be hilarious
2. Although ...
3. Is there a cartoon villain who is actually sexy?
4. OMG. He’s Gaston!
Sadly Alex is not Gaston. His body isn’t covered in hair (Amber gets to stare at his smooth chest) he doesn’t use antlers in all of his decorating, and he isn’t especially good at expectorating (or at least, no evidence of this skill is provided in the narrative). If you are thinking, it’s creepy and wrong to like Gaston ... HEY! I mean, sure, he goes downhill pretty quickly when he starts organising an angry mob to attack the Beast’s chateau, and he’s not very bright, and he’s wrong for Belle, but he’s still kinda sexy.
The private island is really nice. Amber gets to wander around looking at Nature, as lovingly described by Donald who should have written arty culture-nature documentaries. Amber gets to go swimming in the sea, and Alex, once he’s calmed down and is (disappointingly) no longer Gaston-like, is a good listener.
‘I was such a young person when we married,’ Amber does not quite say, while sitting on a raft with Alex beside her. ‘Of course I couldn’t maturely navigate adult relationships as successfully as my self-aware adult self would now. It’s such a shame, but it’s only through making mistakes that we grow, right?’
‘Uh huh,’ Alex does not quite say, ‘indeed,’ and ‘quite so,’ when the pauses in her monologue seems to call for it. ‘But by the way,’ he almost says, as she’s starting to wind down ‘it’s really time for us to do something about you being naked.’
Because she is. And is for most of the private island time. Naked, or topless, or scantily dressed. Amber prefers naked to the clothes Alex provides for her, because they are either transparent, tight, short, or all three. She’s naked swimming because when she went searching for swimmers, she found a couple of bikini bottoms and something called a cache sex, and ... wow.
Amber, who wants to assure the reader that she’s not a skank, only knows what a cache sex is because her wicked stepmother-in-law once took her lingerie shopping in Paris, where, when she picked one up, it was explained to her that women only needed to use those around flabby old men who can’t get it up.
My many years on this planet have been similarly sheltered, and I wasn’t immediately certain I knew what this thing was. I thought that a cache sex was probably a g-string with suspenders, and thoroughly impractical for swimming unless Alex had also thought to supply waterproof double-sided tape. Which: doubtful.
I’m still not quite sure I’m right about what this thing is, because when I looked at the pictures on Wikipedia and skimmed the text, they seemed more the sort of thing men wear. I could have investigated further, but, you know: lazy.
Anyway, Amber prefers naked. She has this whole internal monologue over whether it is better to wear, or not to wear. Wearing, according to some of her reading, is more titillating than not wearing, and that is her final deciding factor. She’s going to prove to Alex that she’s not into his seduction games! (She totally is).
Not that she has any time to explain this to Alex, because he’s tired of the whole introspection thing, and he wants to do some touching and some licking. ‘Yacht,’ Amber says eventually, to get him to stop. Later, they go on a topless nature hike, because why not? It’s not like New Zealand doesn’t have bugs, and isn’t a damp climate where even if there aren’t bugs, there are leeches.
To be fair, possibly not on that island, but sensible people don’t risk their naked parts around leeches. Sensible people have NEVER gotten over a particularly harrowing scene in ‘Stand By Me.’
Amber is a wonderfully strong empowered heroine, and is all self-awareness and empathy. She is all about peeling back the layers of what makes people tick, and realising that people who weren’t ... great to her in the past had their own set of miseries to contend with. Robyn Donald writes the type of women I like, thoughtful and intelligent, and stoic in the face of the rampant foolishness of their men. Amber is also really into sex, and I’m prepared to accept that she knows what she likes in bed, and what she likes in bed is Alex, and I’m happy for her that she gets him where she wants him.
This is a significant change for me in my reading attitudes. Like Amber, I am super self-aware, and can remember what I was like at 17. I used to think these women were a bit nonsense for not being able to overcome overpowering sexual attraction in the face of such obvious grottiness of the men but now ... meh. Let ‘em live their lives and bloom where they’re planted etc. Theoretically, it’s really good sex, and they may as well have some of it now, and deal with exit strategies when they get bored.
Soon after the naked swimming and the topless hiking they do move on from the island, and from being naked. If you need to know about that: Boogenhagen.
Alex didn’t annoy me, probably because of that early Gaston thing. Yes, he’s stereotyped as a product of his environment, and makes some stupid comments early on about how if it was centuries ago he could do this alpha arrogant dominant thing and nobody would blink. Donald doesn’t spend much time digging beneath the superficial chauvinism of his upbringing,she highlights it as the influence on his character, but Amber also continually points out that he is thoughtful and intelligent, a good listener and an interesting companion. Amber starts getting a wee bit patronising in her people analysis, about the rampant but excusable sexism of the ‘older generation.’ I don’t quite see why she feels the need to forgive this.
I guess I could make a bigger fuss over Alex’s infidelity, but I’m prepared to accept that he wasn’t sleeping with the mistress after he married Amber, and that he was trying to do the right thing by a woman he’d been very involved with, and who was carrying his child.
It’s also worth remembering that Alex is only 4 years older than Amber. She sees him as a great deal more sophisticated and worldly than she was when they first met, but she’s not making a clear assessment. Again, Donald doesn’t really dig into what it was like from his perspective. Possibly that’s a smart move. It’s probably better, when they start the whole debrief and settling into the HEA, to gloss over what, in the hero’s character, is the infrastructure of a lengthy and elaborate plot to kidnap a woman and yell at her until she has sex with him.
Unfortunately, the mistress lost the baby. Alex sets her up with a boutique on the French Riviera, and Amber is all ‘oh that’s nice for her,’ because Amber is really working hard for her ‘most empathetic heroine ever in the face of her hero’s infidelity’ merit badge.
The thing is ... it probably isn’t nice for her. While the mistress has suffered, so fiction karma is more than satisfied if you’re keeping score, OWs don’t really think things through if they think they’ll like retail. Probably, they’re looking forward to sneering at a bunch of poor innocent heroines out for their Pretty Woman moment, but that can’t happen more than once or twice a year. The rest of the time, they’re dealing with spoiled, entitled women who aren’t known for their kindness to shopkeepers. It can’t be fun.
Really happy I found ‘A Late Loving’. Maybe in another million years I’ll get to read it again. By that stage, I’ll probably be back to my original ‘resist the sex when the heroes are grotty’ standpoint, and feeling sorry for women who lived in a time when they had to make do with grotty men because sex androids weren’t socially acceptable, or real. You should make sure yours is especially good at expectorating, fictional person who cannot hear me, because of being fictional and in the past and the future! It’s a very useful skill.
This is a very promising beginning to a Robyn Donald angst-fest, and Amber does in fact gently relinquish (to his mother) the boy she’s been holding while riding about on her hot cousin’s farm, and gets into the chopper.
It’s at this point, I am certain of two things. One, that I read this book approximately a million years ago, but remember hardly anything about it (except that I’m fairly certain I named my cat after this character) and two, that Alex is a cartoon villain and I cannot take him seriously.
And by the way, if you are looking for an excellent and insightful review that will give you all the plot details you could ever need, I recommend Boogenhagen’s. It’s also very entertaining. I’m about to deliver not so much a review, but a bunch of random crap.
Back to Alex the cartoon villain. He’s a sexy tall rich Greek shipping man, and is all for getting Amber to the little New Zealand island he bought, so that he can yell at her some more. And then have sex with her. Sex, yell, repeat, until he’s bored. Amber left him after about 5 months of marriage. She was 17, he was 21. They were both hot and had massively great sex together. But then Amber found out Alex had a mistress, and she just would not shut up about it. And she also kept complaining that his stepmother was being mean to her. And then she found out that Alex’s mistress (who he wasn’t giving up, thanks, because no 17 year old is telling him what to do, even if she is awesome at sex) was pregnant, and she really wouldn’t shut up.
Then she left, and Alex has finally tracked her down to where she’s been staying with her hot cousin, and he knows that the hot cousin is the father of Amber’s son (see, that’s why he called her a whore), and now he’s going to get his revenge. And lots of sexy times.
Amber starts kicking herself almost immediately for getting in the chopper. While she’s pretty keen on Alex not learning that he’s the father of her son (and conveniently son and hot cousin are off on a holiday), she probably could have said/done just about anything sensible, and they’d have had a big argument, and then Alex would have left.
Which, sadly for me, meant that Alex wasn’t the cartoon villain I’d been so hoping he’d be. You see, I started thinking:
1. I can’t take him seriously, this is going to be hilarious
2. Although ...
3. Is there a cartoon villain who is actually sexy?
4. OMG. He’s Gaston!
Sadly Alex is not Gaston. His body isn’t covered in hair (Amber gets to stare at his smooth chest) he doesn’t use antlers in all of his decorating, and he isn’t especially good at expectorating (or at least, no evidence of this skill is provided in the narrative). If you are thinking, it’s creepy and wrong to like Gaston ... HEY! I mean, sure, he goes downhill pretty quickly when he starts organising an angry mob to attack the Beast’s chateau, and he’s not very bright, and he’s wrong for Belle, but he’s still kinda sexy.
The private island is really nice. Amber gets to wander around looking at Nature, as lovingly described by Donald who should have written arty culture-nature documentaries. Amber gets to go swimming in the sea, and Alex, once he’s calmed down and is (disappointingly) no longer Gaston-like, is a good listener.
‘I was such a young person when we married,’ Amber does not quite say, while sitting on a raft with Alex beside her. ‘Of course I couldn’t maturely navigate adult relationships as successfully as my self-aware adult self would now. It’s such a shame, but it’s only through making mistakes that we grow, right?’
‘Uh huh,’ Alex does not quite say, ‘indeed,’ and ‘quite so,’ when the pauses in her monologue seems to call for it. ‘But by the way,’ he almost says, as she’s starting to wind down ‘it’s really time for us to do something about you being naked.’
Because she is. And is for most of the private island time. Naked, or topless, or scantily dressed. Amber prefers naked to the clothes Alex provides for her, because they are either transparent, tight, short, or all three. She’s naked swimming because when she went searching for swimmers, she found a couple of bikini bottoms and something called a cache sex, and ... wow.
Amber, who wants to assure the reader that she’s not a skank, only knows what a cache sex is because her wicked stepmother-in-law once took her lingerie shopping in Paris, where, when she picked one up, it was explained to her that women only needed to use those around flabby old men who can’t get it up.
My many years on this planet have been similarly sheltered, and I wasn’t immediately certain I knew what this thing was. I thought that a cache sex was probably a g-string with suspenders, and thoroughly impractical for swimming unless Alex had also thought to supply waterproof double-sided tape. Which: doubtful.
I’m still not quite sure I’m right about what this thing is, because when I looked at the pictures on Wikipedia and skimmed the text, they seemed more the sort of thing men wear. I could have investigated further, but, you know: lazy.
Anyway, Amber prefers naked. She has this whole internal monologue over whether it is better to wear, or not to wear. Wearing, according to some of her reading, is more titillating than not wearing, and that is her final deciding factor. She’s going to prove to Alex that she’s not into his seduction games! (She totally is).
Not that she has any time to explain this to Alex, because he’s tired of the whole introspection thing, and he wants to do some touching and some licking. ‘Yacht,’ Amber says eventually, to get him to stop. Later, they go on a topless nature hike, because why not? It’s not like New Zealand doesn’t have bugs, and isn’t a damp climate where even if there aren’t bugs, there are leeches.
To be fair, possibly not on that island, but sensible people don’t risk their naked parts around leeches. Sensible people have NEVER gotten over a particularly harrowing scene in ‘Stand By Me.’
Amber is a wonderfully strong empowered heroine, and is all self-awareness and empathy. She is all about peeling back the layers of what makes people tick, and realising that people who weren’t ... great to her in the past had their own set of miseries to contend with. Robyn Donald writes the type of women I like, thoughtful and intelligent, and stoic in the face of the rampant foolishness of their men. Amber is also really into sex, and I’m prepared to accept that she knows what she likes in bed, and what she likes in bed is Alex, and I’m happy for her that she gets him where she wants him.
This is a significant change for me in my reading attitudes. Like Amber, I am super self-aware, and can remember what I was like at 17. I used to think these women were a bit nonsense for not being able to overcome overpowering sexual attraction in the face of such obvious grottiness of the men but now ... meh. Let ‘em live their lives and bloom where they’re planted etc. Theoretically, it’s really good sex, and they may as well have some of it now, and deal with exit strategies when they get bored.
Soon after the naked swimming and the topless hiking they do move on from the island, and from being naked. If you need to know about that: Boogenhagen.
Alex didn’t annoy me, probably because of that early Gaston thing. Yes, he’s stereotyped as a product of his environment, and makes some stupid comments early on about how if it was centuries ago he could do this alpha arrogant dominant thing and nobody would blink. Donald doesn’t spend much time digging beneath the superficial chauvinism of his upbringing,she highlights it as the influence on his character, but Amber also continually points out that he is thoughtful and intelligent, a good listener and an interesting companion. Amber starts getting a wee bit patronising in her people analysis, about the rampant but excusable sexism of the ‘older generation.’ I don’t quite see why she feels the need to forgive this.
I guess I could make a bigger fuss over Alex’s infidelity, but I’m prepared to accept that he wasn’t sleeping with the mistress after he married Amber, and that he was trying to do the right thing by a woman he’d been very involved with, and who was carrying his child.
It’s also worth remembering that Alex is only 4 years older than Amber. She sees him as a great deal more sophisticated and worldly than she was when they first met, but she’s not making a clear assessment. Again, Donald doesn’t really dig into what it was like from his perspective. Possibly that’s a smart move. It’s probably better, when they start the whole debrief and settling into the HEA, to gloss over what, in the hero’s character, is the infrastructure of a lengthy and elaborate plot to kidnap a woman and yell at her until she has sex with him.
Unfortunately, the mistress lost the baby. Alex sets her up with a boutique on the French Riviera, and Amber is all ‘oh that’s nice for her,’ because Amber is really working hard for her ‘most empathetic heroine ever in the face of her hero’s infidelity’ merit badge.
The thing is ... it probably isn’t nice for her. While the mistress has suffered, so fiction karma is more than satisfied if you’re keeping score, OWs don’t really think things through if they think they’ll like retail. Probably, they’re looking forward to sneering at a bunch of poor innocent heroines out for their Pretty Woman moment, but that can’t happen more than once or twice a year. The rest of the time, they’re dealing with spoiled, entitled women who aren’t known for their kindness to shopkeepers. It can’t be fun.
Really happy I found ‘A Late Loving’. Maybe in another million years I’ll get to read it again. By that stage, I’ll probably be back to my original ‘resist the sex when the heroes are grotty’ standpoint, and feeling sorry for women who lived in a time when they had to make do with grotty men because sex androids weren’t socially acceptable, or real. You should make sure yours is especially good at expectorating, fictional person who cannot hear me, because of being fictional and in the past and the future! It’s a very useful skill.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 23, 2023
И тази луда бабка не е за слабосърдечни и устремени към розови пухкави облачета 🤭💗 Никаква милост 🤣
3,5⭐️
3,5⭐️
August 9, 2012
3.5 stars
This book was your typical HR with your long suffering heroine who could never bare the touch of another man despite the horrors she endured in her short marriage to the hero before taking a hike. Though, I liked that the heroine at least had a backbone and left the marriage rather than stay with someone who didn't treat her fairly in the relationship.
The hero totally turned me on in spite of myself. He was tall, dark, handsome, domineering, selfish, manwhore, etc. Usually this kind of character makes me want him to suffer tremendously, but this one excited me to no end. Must have been the salty musky smell of him. ;)
The thing that bothered me a great deal about this story was the cousin. He's a handsome bachelor who we're going to guess has been secretly pining for the heroine waiting for her to finally get a clue that he could be her man. The guy waited NINE YEARS while she stayed with him, hiding from her husband and playing the role of wife, other than between the sheets. So what's going to happen to him? Tossed to the side like dirty laundry? He helped her raise her son for the past nine years and has been the only father he's ever known. Are they going to just pick up and leave now and forget the relationships they formed? That bothered me. Have I said that? Good thing it's just a story ;D
Overall, this was a nice cheater book with a redeemable hero (though if this was real life, he'd be back to messing around in two years time), making for a fun read.
This book was your typical HR with your long suffering heroine who could never bare the touch of another man despite the horrors she endured in her short marriage to the hero before taking a hike. Though, I liked that the heroine at least had a backbone and left the marriage rather than stay with someone who didn't treat her fairly in the relationship.
The hero totally turned me on in spite of myself. He was tall, dark, handsome, domineering, selfish, manwhore, etc. Usually this kind of character makes me want him to suffer tremendously, but this one excited me to no end. Must have been the salty musky smell of him. ;)
The thing that bothered me a great deal about this story was the cousin. He's a handsome bachelor who we're going to guess has been secretly pining for the heroine waiting for her to finally get a clue that he could be her man. The guy waited NINE YEARS while she stayed with him, hiding from her husband and playing the role of wife, other than between the sheets. So what's going to happen to him? Tossed to the side like dirty laundry? He helped her raise her son for the past nine years and has been the only father he's ever known. Are they going to just pick up and leave now and forget the relationships they formed? That bothered me. Have I said that? Good thing it's just a story ;D
Overall, this was a nice cheater book with a redeemable hero (though if this was real life, he'd be back to messing around in two years time), making for a fun read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 8, 2018
Not a bad story, started off liking the heroine who fled her cheating husband who refused to give up his pregnant mistress! That soon changed when she lusted after him and took some of the blame for his ways, as well as feeling sorry for the nasty mistress who delighted in hurting the heroine! Why there was so much sympathy for the mistress, even from the hero I was confused! He didn't love the mistress but felt too guilty to stop seeing her cause she cried? Not believable when he he showed no compassion or remorse when the heroine broke down in a state about the hero, no when she cried she was a foolish, dramatic young girl! Heroine pretty much straight away is back with the hero and even fell back in love with him after he admitted he planned to get her pregnant and steal the child away from her! I am meant to believe he loved her? Seriously! He showed some remorse but not Enough grovelling for me. The wife disappeared after he mocked her and refused to stop seeing his mistress! She kept their son a secret as she did not want him to be an asshole like his father, and she also knew Alex would try and steal him and use the child as a weapon, and she was right! This was a disaster book where the hero was an ass all the way through! If this is love than what is hell?
November 25, 2023
Reread… probably not 4 stars, but I found it’s still entertaining.
I know I should be horrified by the cheating husband, yet not so much. Lots of tropes...cheating husband, secret baby, runaway wife, blackmail, revenge.
They married when she was 17 and he was 21–an arranged marriage to enhance their fathers’ business empires. Both were young and stupid. I liked that she had the backbone to leave a situation she found intolerable.
When he tracks her down 9 years later, he was a nasty bully. For the most part she doesn’t back down from him. But, obviously she eventually gives in, truths come out, a little groveling and they live HEA.
I know I should be horrified by the cheating husband, yet not so much. Lots of tropes...cheating husband, secret baby, runaway wife, blackmail, revenge.
They married when she was 17 and he was 21–an arranged marriage to enhance their fathers’ business empires. Both were young and stupid. I liked that she had the backbone to leave a situation she found intolerable.
When he tracks her down 9 years later, he was a nasty bully. For the most part she doesn’t back down from him. But, obviously she eventually gives in, truths come out, a little groveling and they live HEA.
March 1, 2012
I can almost swoon from how much this hero was a jerk.
And when I say, jerk, I mean GET THE FUCK OUT YOU FUCKING JERK-AZOID! OMFG!!!!!!
And when I say, jerk, I mean GET THE FUCK OUT YOU FUCKING JERK-AZOID! OMFG!!!!!!
February 7, 2022
I remember reading this book about 30 years ago. And I remember that this was one of my favourite books back then. The fact that I remember this book really well after such a long time, makes it 5 stars.
This book will not be liked by everyone because he is an obsessed, cruel, rude, ruthless alpha male jerk. So don’t read this if you like nice H’s.
There is so much passion in this book. He is mesmerised by her, by her body, and she actually has him wrapped around her little finger, even though he calls the shots. He can’t stay away from her.
Even after 30 years I remember that scene in which she walks topless next to him on a private beach and how the writer describes his admiration for her naked beauty.
This book will not be liked by everyone because he is an obsessed, cruel, rude, ruthless alpha male jerk. So don’t read this if you like nice H’s.
There is so much passion in this book. He is mesmerised by her, by her body, and she actually has him wrapped around her little finger, even though he calls the shots. He can’t stay away from her.
Even after 30 years I remember that scene in which she walks topless next to him on a private beach and how the writer describes his admiration for her naked beauty.
April 3, 2012
Oh, how I wish this book was done better. It could have been amazing. It had such an interesting premise, but wasn’t delivered well. If there were at least a back story of the conflict from when they were first married, it would have made a huge difference in the quality of the story. We are given unrealistic stupidity instead. Here we have a man that cheated on his young wife and got another woman pregnant which provokes her to run away from him into hiding, and what is the back drop that the author gives us? The hero supposedly kidnaps the heroine, ( even though she went with him of her own free will) so he could treat her like a mistress by dressing her up in sluty clothes and seducing her. What a waste of a good story! The TSTL story line killed any redeemable quality that would have made me want to finish this book. It was just a tease. It sounds so good but doesn’t deliver.
February 1, 2026
“A late Loving” is the story of Amber and Alex.
Well this was terrible.
Heroine and hero marry at 16/21 - only for him to get his mistress pregnant, repeatedly cheat on the heroine and for him and his family to dismiss her.
She runs away, realizes she’s pregnant, and then spends years carving up a life for herself with her son. He shows up one day and blackmails her into coming with him as his sex slave, and she gives in after a minute of resistance.
We get moments of the characters finally communicating and understanding each other, but most of the book is the hero slut shaming her, using her callously, heroine getting turned on by his barbarism and ridiculous displays of jealousy.
It’s somewhat of a happy ending for this cheater and I’m a bit upset that the heroine ended up with him- she should have married- and I can’t believe I’m saying this- her cousin.
Unsafe
1/5
Well this was terrible.
Heroine and hero marry at 16/21 - only for him to get his mistress pregnant, repeatedly cheat on the heroine and for him and his family to dismiss her.
She runs away, realizes she’s pregnant, and then spends years carving up a life for herself with her son. He shows up one day and blackmails her into coming with him as his sex slave, and she gives in after a minute of resistance.
We get moments of the characters finally communicating and understanding each other, but most of the book is the hero slut shaming her, using her callously, heroine getting turned on by his barbarism and ridiculous displays of jealousy.
It’s somewhat of a happy ending for this cheater and I’m a bit upset that the heroine ended up with him- she should have married- and I can’t believe I’m saying this- her cousin.
Unsafe
1/5
January 8, 2022
This review comes with a New Year warning: If you have made a resolution to stop drinking, smoking, eating and or indulging in activities to excess, then do not read this book until you have already fallen off the wagon. Seriously, this book is a straight ticket to Tito’s, oreos, and “smoke ‘em if you got em”. I don’t smoke, but in Michigan pot is legal and I was very tempted to go to my local Walmart to see if I could score a contact buzz off of someone. That being said, lets see if I can muddle through some sort of review, although quite honestly, Boogenhagen https://www.goodreads.com/review/show.... Stmargarets https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... and Dianna https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... did awesome reviews and overviews on this book. However, Vintage in her 1 star review may have summed it up best. “I was warned.” So my friends you are warned! Now go find those rose tinted glasses, you are going to need them!!!
SPOILERS HERE WE COME!
My friends I hope you read the book before you read any reviews. At one point, I really thought I was getting things wrong and decided to skim some reviews. Unfortunately, I got it right. The H was a dog. This is not a Disney fairy tale. This fairy tale is more in line with the dark ones from the brother’s Grimm.
SPOILERS HERE WE COME!
My friends I hope you read the book before you read any reviews. At one point, I really thought I was getting things wrong and decided to skim some reviews. Unfortunately, I got it right. The H was a dog. This is not a Disney fairy tale. This fairy tale is more in line with the dark ones from the brother’s Grimm.
December 28, 2023
Over here patting myself on the back for finishing this train wreck. Honestly, it wasn’t nearly as bad as it sounded. 🤷🏼♀️ Was this The Love of a Lifetime? Was I swooning? Umm… that would be a big fat NO. But was I entertained once I got through the worst of the anticipated angst? Yes. I liked all the drama and jealousy. I never really felt all that assured about the situation with his (ex)mistress. But it helped to know that while at the time of his “betrayal” he wasn’t in love with the h or her him really, he also didn’t really love the OW either. He was just in a sticky situation that wouldn’t have been all that understandable to a 17 year old girl, even if he’d lowered himself to explain. Is he still a raging jackass? Yes. Did I like how any of this was handled?? Not really.
But somehow RD managed to get me invested enough to shed a tear at this couple’s reconciliation. And honestly with all the sh*t in this book that I hate, I’d say that’s pretty miraculous. 🤷🏼♀️
I saw in a review that there’s a book for the OM where we get to see this couple in love and this asshat hero completely besotted, and now I must find it. 🤡
But somehow RD managed to get me invested enough to shed a tear at this couple’s reconciliation. And honestly with all the sh*t in this book that I hate, I’d say that’s pretty miraculous. 🤷🏼♀️
I saw in a review that there’s a book for the OM where we get to see this couple in love and this asshat hero completely besotted, and now I must find it. 🤡
avoid
January 9, 2023self note avoid
- H cheats on h with his preg mistress even after marriage.
- the h finds out about the mistress, H refuses to give up the mistress, then fly off to cheat on both the mistress and the h with a random ow during a business trip.
- h actually has a spine and leaves him.
- h has a secret baby.
- H continues to cheat with numerous ow for 9 years, the h is completely celibate. This point would piss me off but 30 years ago women were brain dead stupid to swallow shit like this, so whatever. Its history.
- finally finds her 9 years later, just to get revenge and divorce her, not to get her back.
- body betraying trope happens and hea.
preg mistress baby died. H was heartbroken about it (and h was too, yeah, right- eye roll).
- H cheats on h with his preg mistress even after marriage.
- the h finds out about the mistress, H refuses to give up the mistress, then fly off to cheat on both the mistress and the h with a random ow during a business trip.
- h actually has a spine and leaves him.
- h has a secret baby.
- H continues to cheat with numerous ow for 9 years, the h is completely celibate. This point would piss me off but 30 years ago women were brain dead stupid to swallow shit like this, so whatever. Its history.
- finally finds her 9 years later, just to get revenge and divorce her, not to get her back.
- body betraying trope happens and hea.
preg mistress baby died. H was heartbroken about it (and h was too, yeah, right- eye roll).
February 20, 2019
3.5
So, re read today, 2/19/19, and totally saw this through new eyes. You can't say R Donald doesn't know how to make her heroine hurt and she's such a good writer you feel her anguish. That's a good writer. But I can't give her more than 3.5 bc she never really put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
So, re read today, 2/19/19, and totally saw this through new eyes. You can't say R Donald doesn't know how to make her heroine hurt and she's such a good writer you feel her anguish. That's a good writer. But I can't give her more than 3.5 bc she never really put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
November 27, 2015
If you want a book that makes you hate the H who has no redeeming qualities then this is your book.
December 4, 2017
I debated on giving this one a 1 star rating or a big up 5. Robyn Donald could definitely pen a trainwreck of a storyline so OTT that you just can't help appreciating it and loving it a teeny tiny bit and while in real life our cheating swine of a H would deserve a swift kicking to the curb and divorce court in romance land he is of course redeemable.
While we are used to young (in this case 17 years old) h's we rarely see the H's married off young (unless its to evil OW) but this one is 21 when they take a trip into matrimony to seal a business deal and make him even more megalomaniac rich!
Now this is where it gets a "little" sketchy for me how many 21 year old men are in long term relationships with "experienced" mistresses who they then knock up? Surely at that age he would just be at the sowing wild oat stage and not quite cynical enough for the mistress stuff? Anyway... back to the review he is reluctantly dragged to the altar and can't help but have an undeniable attraction to our innocent and totally smitten h. He however is a spoilt arrogant toad and wants his cake and to eat it. Low and behold a h with a spine is shown the mistress (who is a cow) by evil step mom and gives ultimatum to the hubby that shes not the sharing type.
Mr Misogynist doesn't like to be told what to do by a woman and goes off in a huff. Our h is no doormat and goes to hide with her cousin in New Zealand for 9 years!!! good on her she also found out she was preggers but she wasn't about to spawn My Misogyny Jr so keeps it a secret too. I always find keeping it in the family romances a little icky so I was less enamoured by the "I could possibly shack up with my cousin for realz" vibes that were happening but we are saved from that by H turning up and finding our h holding a baby. You can tell he is gutted and jel as all hell esp since his detectives informed him she was holed up on the farm with the cousin and a 9 year old he reckons is not his.
While I don't applaud his tactics of separating mother and son and the whole kidnapping to an island thing i'm glad he didn't resort to "forced seductions"
Anyway son has an accident and is in a coma he steps up an helps her out she gets pregnant again which was apparently his plan all along to get her up the duff but when he finds out the son is in fact his too his vengeance steps up a gear and he wants all the kids with him. I'm glad he sees the error of his ways and I think he is genuinely hurt when he finds out why she kept his kids away from him because in his heart of hearts he knows he messed up BIG TIME and handled things badly all along. However, its not his fault its his upbringing!
So after all that angst we need to be happy that the h is happy because she has the man she wanted In real life son no 1 will probably not be too happy by both his parents antics but this is HP land and therefore we are to assume he welcomes new dad with open arms and is just messed up enough to make an interesting H in a future novel set in the 00's!
While we are used to young (in this case 17 years old) h's we rarely see the H's married off young (unless its to evil OW) but this one is 21 when they take a trip into matrimony to seal a business deal and make him even more megalomaniac rich!
Now this is where it gets a "little" sketchy for me how many 21 year old men are in long term relationships with "experienced" mistresses who they then knock up? Surely at that age he would just be at the sowing wild oat stage and not quite cynical enough for the mistress stuff? Anyway... back to the review he is reluctantly dragged to the altar and can't help but have an undeniable attraction to our innocent and totally smitten h. He however is a spoilt arrogant toad and wants his cake and to eat it. Low and behold a h with a spine is shown the mistress (who is a cow) by evil step mom and gives ultimatum to the hubby that shes not the sharing type.
Mr Misogynist doesn't like to be told what to do by a woman and goes off in a huff. Our h is no doormat and goes to hide with her cousin in New Zealand for 9 years!!! good on her she also found out she was preggers but she wasn't about to spawn My Misogyny Jr so keeps it a secret too. I always find keeping it in the family romances a little icky so I was less enamoured by the "I could possibly shack up with my cousin for realz" vibes that were happening but we are saved from that by H turning up and finding our h holding a baby. You can tell he is gutted and jel as all hell esp since his detectives informed him she was holed up on the farm with the cousin and a 9 year old he reckons is not his.
While I don't applaud his tactics of separating mother and son and the whole kidnapping to an island thing i'm glad he didn't resort to "forced seductions"
Anyway son has an accident and is in a coma he steps up an helps her out she gets pregnant again which was apparently his plan all along to get her up the duff but when he finds out the son is in fact his too his vengeance steps up a gear and he wants all the kids with him. I'm glad he sees the error of his ways and I think he is genuinely hurt when he finds out why she kept his kids away from him because in his heart of hearts he knows he messed up BIG TIME and handled things badly all along. However, its not his fault its his upbringing!
So after all that angst we need to be happy that the h is happy because she has the man she wanted In real life son no 1 will probably not be too happy by both his parents antics but this is HP land and therefore we are to assume he welcomes new dad with open arms and is just messed up enough to make an interesting H in a future novel set in the 00's!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 23, 2012
A compelling read, but this hero was pretty bad. It's unusual for the hero to have engaged in unjustifiable cheating, but that's what this hero did. Which I guess excused the heroine's failure to tell him about his son for 9 years? Also, the heroine was a 17-year-old wife, which wasn't really adequately explained (their fathers wanted them to get married, but who marries off a seventeen-year-old in any modern time?).
Regardless, I still enjoyed this angsty read. The ending wasn't quite satisfactory because all of the reveals occurred without much time for the characters to react to them, but still, a decent read.
Regardless, I still enjoyed this angsty read. The ending wasn't quite satisfactory because all of the reveals occurred without much time for the characters to react to them, but still, a decent read.
December 1, 2022
Amber knew Alex would find her. You just didn't hide forever from one of the most powerful men in the world.
Nine years ago, as a naive young bride, Amber had fled from what she felt was an unbearable marriage. She'd always expected a reckoning for the public insult to a proud and formidable husband.
But nothing had prepared her for Alex's unique revenge--her willing seduction! It would take all of Amber's willpower to resist the memories of how he was capable of making her feel. (less)
Nine years ago, as a naive young bride, Amber had fled from what she felt was an unbearable marriage. She'd always expected a reckoning for the public insult to a proud and formidable husband.
But nothing had prepared her for Alex's unique revenge--her willing seduction! It would take all of Amber's willpower to resist the memories of how he was capable of making her feel. (less)
May 6, 2019
I enjoyed this until near the end when it was rushed and that he forgave her so easily for keeping his son from him for 9 years and she forgave him for all that he did!
The story had it’s faults but was quite a good read.
The story had it’s faults but was quite a good read.
September 9, 2013
Holy shit! This novel has a lot more angst than I've ever seen. I was totally in lust with this novel. Yowzah!
Read
December 2, 2019I still don't understand why some women waste their time writing this kind of garbage. RIDICULOUS.
March 5, 2019
Hacia mucho que no leía una de estas novelas. Fue un poco nostálgico por eso, como sentirme la adolescente que amaba leer estos libros. Ahora que estoy un poco más vieja, ya no me resulta tan romántico...ni verosímil esto del millonario griego y la inocente jovencita.
Lo más interesante fue el registro de una época: las computadoras como novedad o una explicación muy somera del examen de ADN como un estudio de avanzada.
Lo más interesante fue el registro de una época: las computadoras como novedad o una explicación muy somera del examen de ADN como un estudio de avanzada.
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