Title: Lover Be Mine
Author: Nicole Jordan
Series: Legenary Lovers
Genre: Historical romance
Published: 2013
Rating: 3.5 stars
Lover Be Mine is the second book in the Legendary Lovers series by Nicole Jordan. I haven’t read the first one yet, Princess Charming, though I do have it–if memory serves, I bought it back when Eloisa James featured it on one of her Barnes & Noble columns, maybe? I’m not sure. All I know is it looked good, I bought it, but I just haven’t gotten around to reading it yet. I received this one through the Early Reviewers program at LibraryThing, though, so I wanted to read it and post my review as soon as I had the chance.
The idea behind this series is that one of the Wilde cousins, Kate, has decided that the members of her generation of the family must all emulate “legendary lovers” in order to find their perfect mates. In Princess Charming, Ashton Wilde woos his future bride Maura as inspired by the story of Cinderella. In Lover Be Mine, Romeo and Juliet are the “legendary lovers” of choice for Lord Jack Wilde and Sophie Fortin.
Jack is the illegitimate son of royalty. His mother was killed in Paris during the early years of the French Revolution just after Jack’s father, the prince of the tiny principality of Navartania, was called back to his country by Jack’s grandfather. By the time Prince Raoul returned, Jack had already been rescued from dire straits in France by his mother’s brothers and was safe in England with the Wilde clan. Jack had blamed his father for his mother’s situation and death for most of his life, and also feared love since he felt it too had a large part in his mother’s difficulties.
Sophie is the only remaining child of a family that had lost their claim to their title years ago due in some part to the result of a duel between one of their ancestors and a long-dead Wilde. Her father is determined to do two things: to keep the family grudge against the Wildes going, and to wed his daughter to a wealthy man with a title. He has his sights set on the Duke of Dunsmore, a much-older widow who saw Sophie at a musical evening and was taken with her beauty. Sophie feels it is her duty to do as her parents wish, because she knows that her brother’s death years before had dealt them both such a disappointment that she would like to do what she can to make their lives easier in the future.
Though I really like the idea of this series, and the parallels to Romeo and Juliet here weren’t too bad, I didn’t love this book. I just didn’t feel really connected to the hero and heroine of the book–they didn’t inspire any great emotion in me at all. They were just…okay. I felt more like I was watching their story unfold at a distance than that I was taking part in it with them. There wasn’t anything I really didn’t like about it–the writing was decent, the dialogue was fine, their actions believable–I just didn’t feel that “spark” that makes a good book into an outstanding read for me. It’s the first time I have read this author, though, so it’s definitely a possibility that it was just this book and these characters. The excerpt that was included for book three, Skye’s story (Secrets of Seduction, a Beauty and the Beast-inspired story), looks great–I’ll keep my eye out for that one. I’m still planning on reading Princess Charming when I get the chance as well.
In a nutshell: An okay read, but nothing special. I liked the idea behind it–and the entire series–so I’m hoping a different story works better for me. 3.5 stars.
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