The Summer Bride by Anne Gracie

the-summer-brideNarrated by Alison Larkin

This is the fourth book in Anne Gracie’s quartet about the Chance sisters, four young women who banded together through adversity and regard themselves as “sisters of the heart” even though only two of them are actually related by blood. In the first book in the series, The Autumn Bride, the ladies were taken in by Lady Beatrice Davenham, an elderly lady who had been neglected by her staff and family and whom the ladies nursed back to health.

The other books in the series have seen each of the ‘sisters’ fall in love and in The Summer Bride, it is now the turn of Daisy, the only one of them not to have been born a lady. By her own admission, she was born in the gutter and was brought up in a brothel; she doesn’t want to learn posh manners or deportment or how to dance because her ambitions lie in another direction. A talented seamstress, Daisy dreams of becoming the best modiste in London, with – eventually – her own shop that will be patronised by all the great ladies of the ton. With her married sisters already going about town in Daisy’s creations, work is starting to come in in a steady stream, but Daisy is finding it difficult to keep up. She works all the hours God sends, and then some, but even with the occasional help from Lady Bea’s maids, she is forever worried about falling behind and never takes any time for herself. She forgets to eat, she hardly sleeps and is working herself into the ground, but Daisy is determined to earn success by dint of her own hard work and looking after herself is a long way down her list of priorities.

She is also determined that marriage and children aren’t for her. For one thing, she hasn’t got time, and for another, her business would automatically belong to any man she marries, and that just isn’t going to happen, ergo, no husband.

The fact that she fancies the pants off Patrick Flynn, a wealthy, self-made businessman and partner to two of her brothers-in-law in their shipping firm, is perhaps a little inconvenient, but Flynn is a good friend and engaging in a few bouts of “rumpy-pumpy” with him would only ruin a friendship that Daisy holds dear. Besides, Dublin-born Flynn has his sights set higher than a cockney seamstress; having worked hard at anything and everything in order to make something of himself, Flynn is intent on getting himself an aristocratic bride and has settled upon the daughter of Lord Compton, an impoverished earl desperately in need of the funds Flynn can provide.

One of the things that drives Flynn is his desire for a home and family. While he was raised in poverty, his family was a close-knit, loving one, and he was devastated when he lost them all to illness. Now he is secure and well-heeled he wants only a wife and children to complete his happiness – but he quickly realises that the lady he is chosen is reluctant, and when he discovers that her father has given her a choice between an elderly roué and him, Flynn instead helps her to abscond to safety, away from her father’s influence.

So the field is clear and Flynn is free to pay court to the woman he has suddenly realised he really wants instead. But in spite of the strong attraction between them, Daisy doesn’t want him. Or, rather, she wants him in her bed, but doesn’t want to marry him; and the rest of the story revolves around Flynn’s daily proposals of marriage while Daisy, having found an investor, sets up her business.

Flynn and Daisy are attractive characters who work well together, but the story itself is somewhat dull and contrived. I never quite understood exactly why Flynn wanted an aristocratic wife, other than that he had enough money to net one; it’s really just a device to keep him and Daisy apart for half a book, and then he abandons that plan at the drop of a hat. I did understand Daisy’s reluctance to marry given the fact that as a married woman, she would have no rights to her business, but her stubbornness and her refusal to take good advice were just plain annoying. And then comes the biggest cliché in the book to remove Daisy’s objections to marriage; and her (erroneous) belief that Flynn would take over her business if she married him just disappears.

I haven’t listened to Alison Larkin narrate an historical romance for a while, but she’s someone I know I can usually rely on to provide an accomplished performance. That is certainly the case here; her pacing and acting choices are all good, and while in the past, I’ve criticised her ‘hero’ voices for sounding pompous or un-masculine, I noted a definite improvement here in her portrayal of Flynn. I don’t know if it’s because he doesn’t need to sound aristocratic like many of the other heroes she voices, but with a drop in pitch and the addition of a slight Irish lilt (which is, I have to admit, a little inconsistent) she makes him sound like the attractive Irish rogue he is. Her characterisation of Daisy is similarly good; the cockney accent she gives her is just about right, not so broad as to be unintelligible, but with suitably rough edges and enough dropped ‘h’s and ‘g’s to be convincing. I am a fan of her interpretation of Lady Bea, one of those formidable aristocratic ladies whose crusty exterior masks a heart of gold; although she continues to mispronounce “Bea” as “beer” (or “bee-ah”) for some strange reason.

Apart from that, however, this is a very enjoyable performance, and definitely one of Ms. Larkins’ best. It’s just a shame that it comes in a somewhat lacklustre novel. The Summer Bride isn’t a bad book, by any means, and listeners who have been following the series will no doubt want to pick it up to find out what happens to Daisy. But it’s not an especially memorable story and there’s certainly nothing new to be found in it. It passed the time I took to listen to it pleasantly enough, but it’s not something I think I’ll be listening to again.

Caz


Narration: B+

Book Content: C+

Steam Factor: Glad I had my earbuds in

Violence Rating: None

Genre: Historical Romance

Publisher: Tantor Audio

The Summer Bride was provided to AudioGals by Tantor Audio for a review.

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