Judith James "Broken Wing"

This book has gotten all sorts of accolades from other reviewers, for good reason. It's lovely, well written and definitely not run of the mill (without resorting to any superhuman sexual appendages). Most of us know the premise, Sarah finds her lost brother in a brothel, but unharmed because of the direct protection of a male prostitute. She offers to take him to her home in recompense for what he did for her younger brother.

The two of them eventually fall in love, but Gabriel decides he must leave to make his fortune as a pirate. She assures him this is unnecessary but he goes anyway. Bad things happen. I'm trying to not spoil the book here, but my main beef is with this section of the book. Those of you who have still not read this book, just skip ahead to the next paragraph. After he claws his way back to civilization, couldn't he have just written her a letter? If he really thought she was better off thinking he was dead, it's pretty shitty of him to go anywhere near England in my humble opinion.

It's a sign of a very good book when I have a major beef, not with how the author characterized the main character, but with the actions of that main character, showing how real this character became for me. Liked it a lot. And to those of you following the recent posts, I did finish this a while ago, before school started this fall. :)

Historical Romance 2008: 4.5 of 5 kisses right on the lips.