Night of Sin [Paperback]

While Wild Lord Jack waited for the passengers disembarking from the ship walked uphill from the docks, his thoughts of a henna tattooed woman were pushed back from his mind as he watched the typical English whale bone corseted young woman fighting her way downhill through the stormy gale. Jack grinned and thought nothing more of the plain looking non-descript young woman although he noted the tough looking sailor roughly bump into her in his haste uphill. It wouldn't be until later that Jack, too late to save the sailor from being killed in the crowd, discovered that the expected parcel he should have been carrying was not there and he then remembered the young woman with the basket that the sailor had roughly jostled.

Miss Anne Marsh, traveling in from the country arrived at her Aunt's home soaking wet, minus the umbrella that had been blown away by the wind. After pleasantries and sending her basket of foodstuffs from her family to her Aunt's kitchen to be unpacked, was astounded when the maid came back to show her the strange item she had found in the basket. It would be as a result of the strange artifact that much later that evening, Anne would be awakened from her sleep, by an intruder, who would then be attacked by a second intruder - Lord Jack.

Anne, the daughter of a Dissenter minister, was engaged to be married to fine man, yet this strange beautiful man, who clearly was a gentleman of the nobility with his fine manners, was a total enigma to Anne. She was in love with her fiancé, and looking forward to a quiet and companionable marriage. It then came as a surprise to her that she would allow this man, the younger son of a duke as it turned out, who'd burst into her bedroom in the middle of the night, willingly go along and let him lead her on an adventure the like of which she could never, ever have conjured up in her wildest dreams.

*** I have been a fan of Julia Ross' since I first picked up one of her earlier novel, MY DARK PRINCE. Since then, I have purchased each and every one she's written and she has consistently taken my breath away with her exquisite and mesmerizing passionate prose. In this latest novel, NIGHT OF SIN, there is at the center the mystery surrounding the fossil that several have died in trying to obtain, but more importantly are the two main characters of Lord Jonathan "Wild Lord Jack" Devoran St. George and the plain minister's daughter Anne Marsh. While Jack is complex with a very mysterious past, hinted at but never fully revealed until the end, Anne is what she appears but with an intelligent mind and an honest and forthright courage that quite disarms Jack. As they make their way to his home, Anne discovers a passion that he unleashes in her with a sensuality that totally disarms him. Ms. Ross has again delivered another of her most sensually exquisite romances featuring a divinely complex and fascinating hero and wonderful heroine that the readers are sure to find absolutely riveting!! --- Marilyn, for www.historicalromancewriters.com ---

I will admit that I am predisposed to dislike plots like this one, where an adventurous man (in the geographical and sexual sense) falls in love with a plain parson's daughter who doesn't know what sex is. I really resent the notion that after spending years sloughing off the conventions of his homeland, testing himself physically and mentally, and getting to know a lot of women who are openly and skillfully sexual, Jack finds himself losing his heart to an innocent girl who may be capable of making a similar journey, but who is - compared to Jack - a baby.

And Anne's ignorance is a little inconsistent - at one point she appears to be shocked that boys have different bodies than girls *down there* and at another she's making jokes about closing your eyes and thinking of England.

Plus, the whole family drama has it's odd moments. The Blackdowns are really great characters, every last one of them, but a big factor of the plot is Jack coming home after many years and his family is angry at him because he's compromised this girl and they've heard all sorts of rumors about his crazy foreign debauches. So there are long conversations where his mother and brother are questioning him about his sexual practices and I frankly just found that creepy. And then his brother walks in on him having sex with Anne and then they have to talk about it, and then the mother finds out and they have to talk about it too....At some point, the whole thing made me a little uncomfortable.

And then the end is rather wooden. This is the most shocking thing at all because Julia Ross is an incredibly evocative writer; she sets atmosphere like nobody else, and her dialogue is always original and uniquely styled. Yet the last twenty pages or so are really flat and rushed, with lots of declarative statements that push the plot along as quickly as possible.

OK, and now I feel bad about trashing this book because actually I adore Julia Ross and she writes beautifully and it was a great read. With all its flaws, it's still in a class of its own.

I would read a cocktail napkin limerick if it were written by Julia Ross, so it comes as no surprise that I enjoyed her latest book thoroughly. Night of Sin, with its intricate plotting and finely drawn characters, draws from various historical sources, including the story of Sir Richard Burton, who discovered the source of the Nile and wrote the first English translation of the Kama Sutra. By switching from the Georgian period of The Seduction, and The Wicked Lover, to the more socially (and sexually) restrictive Victorian Era, Ross brings a fresh approach to the familiar Puritan versus Rake story. Perhaps most refreshing about Ross's rendition of this familiar plot, is the way in which her characters behave not as cardboard cutouts from a set of Victorian paper dolls, but as individual personalities. This is especially true when it comes to the novel's treatment of Anne's "sprained ankle." Rather than rehash the angry-religious-father-demanding-that-his- daughter's-honor-be-avenged routine, or the angry-religious-father-shuns-his-slutty-daughter bit, Ross has Rev. Marsh react to his daughter's plight with kindness and love. While this would not work with every book, it was a nice break from the expected and did not detract from the historical accuracy of the story. Though I gave it only four stars, because I simply didn't love it as much as The Seduction or The Wicked Lover, Night of Sin is far better than 98% of the historical fiction being written today and deserves a closer look.