Book review: How to Tame a Wild Rogue

Things I know I can count on from a Julie Anne Long story:
1- Humor that sneaks up on you through quirky characters in increasingly silly situations;
2- Writing that puts you right there on the pink settee, or in the scullery (or bedchamber!), or on top of the pile of crates in the dark alley on a pitch-black night with a storm bearing down on you;
3- Exquisite details that lay bare the emotions of the characters (think Mr. Darcy's involuntary hand clench in the 2005 film adaptation of Pride and Prejudice).

"How to Tame a Wild Rogue" delivers all of this and more. My absolute FAVORITE part of this story is the connection that forms almost immediately between two characters who could not be much more different on the surface but who share a common need for shelter from the storm. As with many of Julie Anne Long's novels, the main woman character's needs and problems are more obvious and more urgent--because of the realities of life for women in the time period in which the stories are set--than those of the main man character, whose needs we only gradually learn are every bit as deep. Daphne at first seems to be the semi-unwilling damsel in distress whom Lorcan rescues...but soon the situation shifts and she is able to provide something in return in the form of loyalty, support, and the kind, fair attention he has been missing since early childhood.

This is what Julia Anne Long's masterful stories do: They turn our ideas about who possesses strength and courage and nobility upside down. They show us relationships in which both partners need. Both partners think and feel and give. Both partners rescue.
And we lucky readers get to experience their love stories unfolding, their fraught conversations, their shared private jokes, their sexual tension, their nearly unbearable longing and extremely satisfying happy ending, right along with them.

"How to Tame a Wild Rogue" is lovely and heart-warming, touching and laugh-out-loud funny. As always, I closed the book already looking forward to the next book in the Palace of Rogues series.

5 enthusiastic stars!

[Image: "Clinch" cover of Julie Anne Long's novel "How to Tame a Wild Rogue," against a background of line drawings of astrolabes and oranges. Attribution: for Arabic astrolabe image: Sue Clark (perpetualplum) via Creative Commons, license 2.0]