A Stormy Greek Marriage by Lynne Graham

A Stormy Greek Marriage by Lynne Graham (The Drakos Baby, Book 2)

Books like this are the reason I stopped reading category romance in my mid-20s. I hope I don’t come across too many more of them in the near future. DNF.

I have five more titles in my Lynne Graham glom pile, but I’m not sure I can bear to go on. On one hand, I knew getting into this book that Graham writes domineering heroes of the 80s alpha kind. I thought I could cope with it, but this book is such a trainwreck I gave up halfway through.

Surprisingly for a category romance, this is part two of a series. (Perhaps Graham should have just written a full length book, did anyone think of that?) The back story is explained well enough to get the gist—I’m fairly sure I wouldn’t be prepared to slog through an entire book to basically learn that Alexei finally slept with his personal assistant, Billie, taking her virginity. She’s pined for him in secret but felt she was no match for the dazzling beauties that naturally flock to her rich, handsome boss.

Unfortunately, Alexei tripped and hit his head and managed to conveniently forget the two nights they were together. More unfortunately for Billie, the oblivious Alexei tried to rekindle a childhood romance as Billie coped with the consequences of their nights together—yes, the old secret baby.

Anyway, back to this book. Billie and Alexei ended up together at the end of book one, but on their wedding night at the start of book two, Alexei magically divines that Billie is no virgin. He’s enraged and walks out on her. Or so she thinks. He doesn’t think it was walking out. More like having a tantrum because she lied. Except she tells him the truth about their child, Nicky, and he thinks it’s a lie. DNA is taken, Alexei realises she was telling the truth, but even then Graham refuses to bestow any sort of power on the heroine.

When Billie threatens to divorce Alexei, he whisks Nicky off to a different country, deliberately making Billie think he’d been kidnapped. Way to go to convince a woman to spend the rest of her life with you and her son. There’s nothing redeeming about a man who lets his wife think he’s kidnapping their son to convince her not to get a divorce.

At that point I put the book down. In many ways, I can see the appeal of Graham’s story to an older generation of women and in women today who are products of different cultures, who may have had to endure marriages rife with infidelity, lies and an enormous imbalance of power. I feel sorry for them, and a book like A Stormy Greek Marriage may be a way to express their frustrations while providing a glimmer of hope that love and dedication and faith might result in a happy ending.

But I’m not from that generation, and Alexei’s actions are abhorrent to me. A man who refuses to listen to someone he purports to love, who puts the principle of honesty before compassion by refusing to listen to her explanations, is not a hero in my mind. He’s an immature bully undeserving of the wealth and power and good looks with which fate—or the author—has gifted him.

Yay or nay?

Books like this are the reason I stopped reading category romance in my mid-20s. I hope I don’t come across too many more of them in the near future. DNF.

Who might enjoy it: Martyrs

Who might not enjoy it: Potential paperweight targets

This book is no longer in print.

Title: A Stormy Greek Marriage
Series: Drakos Baby (Book 2)
Author: Lynne Graham
Publisher: Harlequin Mills & Boon
Australia (Sexy): 9781742787879 (10/2010)
UK (Modern) 9780263878332 (20/4/2010)
US (Presents): 9780373129577 (16/11/2010)

AUSTRALIA: Fishpond | Mills & Boon | Other
WORLDWIDE: AbeBooks | Amazon UK | Amazon US | eHarlequin | Library