Sins of a Wicked Princess by Anna Randol

Sins of a Wicked PrincessNarrated by Veronica Paulion

I’ve been waiting to read or listen to this story since I read Sins of a Ruthless Rogue (Book 2 in the Sinners Trio) last Spring. Ian Maddox, aka The Wraith, appeared as a secondary character in that story and immediately caught my attention with his snarky mouth and cocky attitude. I’m a sucker for a smart guy with an equally smart mouth and have been eagerly awaiting his story which is the final book in Anna Randol’s trilogy of stories of espionage and romance.

Ian Maddox is one of a group of crack British spies known as “the Trio”, all of whom had been rescued from the gallows in exchange for putting their exceptional skills to use for the Crown during the Napoleonic wars. Ian’s particular talents have to do with retrieval – if there’s something he wants, he gets it, no matter what he has to do. He’s quick and light on his feet and can find ways in and out of all manner of places without people even knowing he’s there. Blink – and you’ll miss him.

When I started listening to Sins of a Wicked Princess, I was delighted to meet Ian again. He’s just as I remembered him – super confident, irreverent, witty, sexy, and flirtatious, and new-to-me narrator Veronica Paulton’s performance definitely brought out those characteristics very well indeed.

At the beginning of the series, the war is over and the Trio is released from their service and disbanded. Ian is certainly not averse to getting his life back, but before he “retires” he wants to do one last thing – discover the identity of the traitor who ordered their deaths. His investigations lead him to suspect the betrayal came from someone in the London home of the exiled Princess Juliana of Lenoria, a small European kingdom which is the object of dispute by the Spanish and the French.

Not being one to beat about the bush, Ian sneaks into Juliana’s chamber one night and confronts her with his suspicions. She has no idea who he is or what he is talking about, and Ian, who can recognise the truth when he hears it, has to reluctantly accept her protestations of innocence.

Shortly after this, Juliana is apprised of a plot to depose her in favour of her younger brother, Gregory, who has allowed himself to be dazzled by the promises of an extremely powerful British peer. In finding out about this plan, Juliana also discovers that Gregory was the one who ordered the deaths of the Trio. She recognises that her brother does not wish her harm, but that he has been duped by the Duke of Sommet, who is now blackmailing him to ensure his continued cooperation.

Juliana can think of only one person who can help her retrieve these sensitive documents and asks Ian to teach her the skills she will need to steal them from Sommet. In return, she will tell him what she knows about the Duke’s involvement in the treason against her country and the order to kill him and his friends.

From here on in, the story twists and turns as the plot well and truly thickens at the same time as Ian and Juliana become more deeply attracted to one another. Their dialogues are laced with humour and Ian’s quintessential brand of innuendo and snark, and Juliana is more than up to his weight when it comes to matching him in their verbal sparring matches. Writing witty banter that consistently feels naturalistic is not an easy thing to do, but Ms. Randol makes it seem effortless and carries it off with aplomb.

While I did enjoy listening to Sins of a Wicked Princess, and will say that the multiple plot threads and twists were clearly well planned and executed, I did come away feeling a little disappointed when it came to the romance. Ian’s arrogance, insouciance and wit make him a very sexy hero, and Juliana’s innocence in her initial responses to him – which he can read like a book – made her rather endearing. There was plenty of sexual tension between them and the love scenes, while not explicit, were sensual and romantic; yet it seemed to me their feelings for each other at the end of the story were the same as at the beginning. That’s not to say I didn’t believe they felt deeply for one another – just that I didn’t get any real sense of their relationship maturing and developing.

I also had a couple of issues with the characterisation of both protagonists. Juliana is presented to us as being essential to the future of her country and to the continued survival of those Lenorians who had fled to England with her, yet she often comes across as ineffectual and rather in awe of her trio of aunts. And Ian is supposed to be a super-intelligent crack spy, yet his thoughts are almost entirely taken up with Juliana’s physical perfections and attributes, and how he can never have her because he’s a gutter rat and she’s a princess.

On the whole, however, those are minor niggles, because the story moves – for the most part – at a cracking pace and there’s little time to dwell on such issues if one is to keep up with the developments and complications which abound in the plot!

As far as I can determine, Veronica Paulion is new to the world of audiobook narration, and if that’s the case, she has acquitted herself here very well. Her voice is pleasantly mellow-toned, her pacing is good, her enunciation clear, and I was generally impressed by her acting choices. She made good use of pauses and I thought her acting choices gave both the dialogue and her narration a naturalistic feel. Ms. Paulion doesn’t utilise a much of a lower pitch to portray the male characters, but they were all suitably delineated and differentiated – from Juliana’s younger brother to Ian’s old retainer, Canterbury. She was especially successful in her interpretation of Ian – she had a very deft touch with the humour in the book and had his tongue-in-cheek arrogance down to a T, which made it the stand-out characterisation in this audio.

She was equally successful when performing the various female characters. Juliana’s three aunts all sounded perfectly distinct and her characterisation of Apple, the street urchin who becomes her maid, was very well done indeed.

All in all, Sins of a Wicked Princess was an enjoyable – though not outstanding – listen. Ian Maddox is far and away the star of the show and, while I may have been disappointed in some aspects of the story overall, he’s one of those characters who is so utterly compelling that one is able to forgive much simply because he’s such a charming rascal!

Caz


Narration:  B+

Book Content:  B

Steam Factor:  Glad I had my earbuds in (but fairly tame)

Violence:  Minimal

Genre:  Historical Romance

Publisher:  Harper Audio

 

Sins of a Wicked Princess was provided to AudioGals for review by Harper Audio.

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