You perceive an insult to your family. Don't talk to the people closely involved, let your tawdry cousins make up your mind for you. Don't go after the person you think is the perpetrator, go after his loved ones, especially female, since it's harder for them to defend themselves, and rape is just so satisfying. And yes, I'll call it rape, no matter how his charismatic charmingness insisted it wasn't. Blackmailing someone into sex (and pregnancy???) is no different from rape in my opinion. Good thing there weren't any children in the FL's family, he could have raped the girls and sold them to brothels and emasculated the boys. That would certainly clear the stain on the family name. I guess my definition of honour and the ML's definition are diametrically opposed. And what was he going to do when he got her pregnant? Sell her and the baby to a brothel? The very flower of Homo Sapiens Sapiens. Makes me want to go live with a colony of wolverines or some other civilized form of animal.
I really believe in the rule of law, but I see how money and bigotry can skew justice ("affluenza" keeping a rich scumbag white man who showed zero remorse out of trouble, while unarmed men of color are gunned down by overarmed police because they "felt threatened"). Here, we have Harlequin stories, written about white folks and mainly for white folks, which keep telling us that a poor mother who is discovered by the insanely rich and sociopathic scumbag who fathered her child has to succumb to this filthy dirtbag's blackmail because his wealth can ensure that he will be given custody to a child born between them in a court of law, no matter what the circumstances are.
The fact that a fictional story can be written with this premise, and be published, really makes me bothered. The fact that it is believable is even worse. From the case of Loeb and Leopold to O.J. Simpson, it has been made obvious that the rich and famous can get away with murder, while the poor and "ethnic" are guilty until execution is pretty much the actuality of the rule of law.
My point: I'm pretty much a regular type retired military dude who really wants to believe in the government to provide liberty and justice for all. I'm also pretty much of an unreconstructed savage, a'la Major Joseph Makatozi from Louis Lamour's story, "Last of the Breed." Meaning, that if someone pulls total crap on those I love, and cannot be touched by the law, I WILL find a way to feed them into a large commercial sausage making machine. And you know what? There are so many real victims in the world that I can't make myself shed a single tear for an unrepentant scumbag who preyed on others. If that makes me filth beyond redemption, I'll look forward to the kind of filth I'll have to associate with in the afterlife!
But then instead of catching the violent criminals, they'd go after people like you who's trying to bring justice where justice was denied (I don't support violence but at least someone's trying to do something to salvage the victim's pain which the law system failed to do).
If they have the strength and time to catch someone killing heinous criminals, why not catch the heinous criminals first and spare him the trouble to kill them?
After seducing her and having a liaison with her, he stomps out of a restaurant and stops talking to her because other men looked at her? With brains and emotions like that, he should be sold in an adult novelty shop on the shelf containing items beginning with "D."
to be fair, women and men, especially men, tend to not think when jealous and protective
Sorry, but he's supposed to be an adult and a professional. He's the confident man in charge when he's dealing one on one with her, but as soon as another man looks at "his" girl, he turns into a mentally pre-pubescent bundle of jealousy and basically takes it out on her. If I acted like that, I would expect my crush to change her phone number, e-mail address, and take out a restraining order if I spoke to her again.
I'm sorry. Obviously someone tried make a romantic story. Perhaps their talent lies in basket weaving or cheese making. I'm afraid it isn't writing.
HAHAHAHAHAHA! I nearly peed myself laughing at that! It's so true!
You have to remember that the harlequin mangas are adaptations from novels, so not everything is necessary going to crossover well... that being said, while I agree that the story wasn’t great, compared to other desert prince romances I’ve read; it’s not the worst. The guy wasn’t a complete jackass and he did offer to off the other male asshole lol
Love the way he gaslights her by making innuendos and setting up impressions for her and then blaming her and coming back with "When did I say that? I never said that." Then he keeps a tally and "revenges" himself on her, when he's the one who set up the whole misunderstanding. It's as though everything he does is designed to keep her defensive and off balance, so it's pretty much of a power play. How any sentient being could be in love with such an a**hole is beyond me. He doesn't even have the charm of Charles Boyer! All three of the Male Leads in this series are irredeemable jerks without any saving grace whatever.
This is the second historical manga I've seen the wrong type of firearm in. This is supposedly Regency England, just after the Battle of Waterloo (1815). The gun depicted is a revolver, which didn't come into use until the late 19th century. In the time this is supposed to take place, the weapon would have been a single shot flintlock or percussion cap pistol. One might as well show up at the Battle of Bunker Hill with an M16.
Haha. I love that I'm not the only one nit picking the details.
And I was still trying to figure out just how said questionable revolver ended the story the way it did. 1) In regards to plot, if the gun is broken, why is it being kept around? What was it? Someone's heirloom? [Wonder if the novel explained it better?] 2) If its a broken trigger, I wouldn't expect THAT sort of result from a revolver. A bent barrel might, but not a broken trigger. But now that you bring up what it SHOULD have been [likely what the author intended], it makes more sense. A flintlock or percussion cap has a loose powder pack right down by the trigger, unlike a bullet with the powder contained in a casing. That makes the fatal misfire from a broken trigger seem more plausible. So the artist's lack of research was unfortunate in that it affected both the aesthetics and logic of the story for those who know better.
If it's by Marion Lennox, it's bound to be a really decent read. Her novels are the same, and the mandaka who turn them into graphic novels have done a more than decent job. It's so Nice to read about decent people for a change! (Barring the old scumbag in the wheelchair, of course.)
Sorry to go against everyone's opinion so far, but I didn't care much for the ML. He was pretty pushy about getting her into bed. I'll give him his due as a Harlequin ML, he wasn't all that bad, but I really don't like people who push other people into being part of their deceptions. It's just not a very nice thing to do, and makes an innocent party complicit in a lie that doesn't benefit them at all.
The father rocked. The brother was an annoying non-entity. The ML showed up with a pre-pubescent angry angst attitude (and absolutely NO manners whatsoever) and then left after touching her inappropriately. The boss at the gallery and the director of her play were assholes. Perfect world: father gets well, play fails, gallery goes broke, brother becomes a gay porn star, ML meets Truck-run and father protects his grandchild and daughter-in-law for several more years.