Sin and Scandal in England

By Melody Thomas
Read: June/July 2008
Rating: Meh

This book was guest reviewed by Sreya, here.

Sometimes I have to buy a book for the title alone. Like The Barbarian. How could I NOT try that? Sin and Scandal is the look of a typical historical, half-naked men and woman standing in the snow. Though it does LOOK like her dress has a zip he’s undoing… Anyway. It’s an Avon, we won’t quibble.

There really isn’t much in the way of “sin” and the “scandal” doesn’t enjoy being scandalous, making for a rather lukewarm book. I hate Romance titles, they can be so damn misleading. Our hero works as a spy for the Crown, so there’s plenty of intrigue and conspiracy… but it’s all rather vague. It’s not milked nearly as hard as it could, and probably should, be. I was hoping for something a bit campy and instead I got boring. Clearly I need a book with more windswept characters.

Bethany Munro and Ian Rockwell both have Tragic Pasts and A Previous Meeting That Ended In a Broken Heart. Bethany’s, of course. Our story takes place at some undefined point (probably definable if you’re more familiar with the history and sciences) between the latter 1800s and early-early 1900s. Bethany gets to play Unconventional Heroine: she attends a university for women in a time when most schools won’t admit or give degrees to women. The school’s not really accredited but they learn the same things. She’s recently become the teaching assistant to her mentor, Mrs. Langley… who mysteriously disappeared a few months ago. Bethany being Bethany, but not in a particularly angry or vengeful way, is on the hunt for Mrs. Langley’s murderer.

Sir Ian got himself involved with the darker side of law enforcement about 10 years ago, and has done almost everything asked of him (also in a sort of passionless way except for some vague later regrets). His last job was something of a failure, as he was assigned to protect some guy who was blown up by anarchists. Rockwell is now chasing down said anarchists… to the home of Bethany’s uni friend Charlene. They are both surprised and apprehensive to see each other–last time didn’t go so well. Three years ago Ian was assigned to protect members of Bethany’s family, but she didn’t know that was why he was there. She was 17 and he was 27 and she declared her undying love for him in the barn. He walked away, then…

What follows is sort of muddled, not your straightforward plot. Lots of little twists and turns, just enough to keep one’s attention. The mystery side of things has succeeded because I couldn’t figure everything out in the first 50 pages. (YAY!) In fact, my one firm assumption turned out to be wrong. (WHOO!) And, everything is pretty plausible. So, it works.

I’m sure these characters must have volatile emotions in them SOMEWHERE but I’m just not seeing them. The author keeps telling me they have them, so they must. They’re sort of… wet. Uninspired. We’re told that Bethany has always had a passion for life, but I’ve yet to see an example.

I didn’t connect to them. They were just characters in the book, no one special. This is most apparent during the sex scenes. Not hot, too brief, and just… well… not hot. I think their attitudes were also a bit lax and not as upright as they should have been for the time in question. I love people who aren’t shy around each other, but fer the love of Clod, she still wears multiple petticoats.

[Ed: 7/6] Here’s something I forgot to mention on the first go-round. Bethany did some snooping on her own before the book picks up, and has accumulated some not-quite-incriminating papers. This, in the eyes of Rockwell and his superior, makes her some kind of natural. Her skillz0rs are, like, so awesum. But even Bethany herself says, “I just saw them lying on the desk and watched someone else open the safe.” She never exhibits these mad skills anywhere in the book. FAIL, secret spy agency! FAIL!

It didn’t help that the typo and “wtf phrase” count got higher as the book progressed. Just as the story began to pick up, we started getting randomly dropped words and spell checker errors. The very end mentions the “moats of dust” floating in the barnyard are. I would very much like to see what “moats of dust” look like. “wtf phrases” are what I call those phrases that make you look at the page sideways and go, “Would they REALLY have talked like that?” There weren’t many, but it was definitely a bit loose. Again, right as things were starting to become sort of interesting.

I’m just not impressed. I read it for the mystery. The puzzle pieces were kind of cool. But I’m glad I got through it and can pass it on and pick up something guaranteed to be good. Temeraire!