Untouched must be some kind of Romance Rorschach test. It’s by far my least favorite Campbell book, although I liked the premise (captivity, go figure). But it just felt so awkwardly written and clumsily overwrought. CtC remains my favorite Campbell book, even though I did not like the second half as much as the first.

I haven’t read Untouched but I felt the writing in Claiming the Courtesan was overwrought, and I had a hard time buying that heroine as ever having been a successful courtesan. So the problems you’re having with Campbell’s two most recent books are ones I had with Claiming the Courtesan.

Incidentally, I’m still hoping you get around to Putney’s Uncommon Vows someday, Robin. It’s my favorite captivity romance ever — and probably the only one I love.

That said, you’ll have gotten from my review that I derived a degree of enjoyment from TTD. It wasn’t a wallbanger or a DNF, and given some of the books I’ve given up on in the past (technically far superior) I find myself wondering why…

Robin – on the whole I agree with you re the writing. As for the empowered whore who enjoys sex, I think I would find that difficult to buy and I thought the frigidity made more sense here. When I think of books with whore heroines (The Secret Pearl and No Man’s Mistress by Balogh spring to mind) their career has not been enjoyable although I think Balogh in those books did a very good job of showing women being empowered in the sense of choosing to use what they had to to survive. The books that I’ve read that maybe show heroines more actively empowered by their sold sexuality don’t feature whores so much as choosy courtesans/ selective mistresses. Women who have had actual relationships with the men they’ve slept with rather than a large number of punters. I’m thinking here of Sleeping Beauty by Ivory for example. This latter scenario is more morally ambiguous (for want of a better term) and easier to carry off than the former. I did a post on this some time ago – link below. Any thoughts on any particular books with these types of heroines that you’ve read?

http://tumperkin.blogspot.com/2008/01/classification-5-lady-is-tramp-i-mean.html

I have been halfway through this book for months now … The frigid thing REALLY turned me off, in part because it seemed like a much stronger undermining of Olivia’s character than had been done to what’s-her-face in CtC. It’s one thing to control one’s sexuality consciously (i.e. Claiming the Courtesan) but quite another to be in a sexually-defined profession and be unable to experience any sexual enjoyment. Although one could argue that neither Olivia nor Verity is as powerful as she claims, I find the heroine who can at least experience sexual fulfillment to be *more* empowered than the woman who cannot and must be cured by her True Love and his great and magical penis.
One day I’ll have to finish TTD to see if my view changes.

I agree with you. Olivia really is quite unformed, and it was as difficult for me to imagine how this person could have become London’s most notorious courtesan as it was to imagine the hero as London’s most notorious rake.

MoJo wrote:

that this author has already used this premise and I don’t trust her to do it right a second time and…why should I?

Until I read T.’s review and these comments, I had no idea how similar CtC is to TtD. But that’s interesting that you liked the middle book.

Kaetrin wrote:

But, thank you for your description of the hero’s response to her ultimatum – I’d never thought of that particular act as hygiene before!

Well, things were different in Regency London.

But I agree with you on the “will I try this author again” question. I feel so incredibly behind. I started reading late and I read maybe a book a week, that I am reluctant to try an author again unless I really liked her. I may do it for an author everyone raves about, especially if it’s a different subgenre (Victoria Dahl and Gena Showalter are two I plan to read more of, but in a different subgenre than I have preciously tried), but otherwise, life’s too short.

Kyra wrote:

God, those two. Up and down, up and down. I like my romances emotional and I like them edgy but this was just exhausting.

This is very true.

Victoria Janssen wrote:

For me, the wild emotional surges of the story were what I wanted, and what I got. In media fandom, sometimes that’s called “emotional pr0n.”

And then you have this other way of looking at it.

My own reactions were all over the map as I read, and I can see readers very split on this book and CtC. This author clearly has something going on.

carolyn crane (CJ) wrote:

I enjoyed your review, particularly the discussion of the high concept forcing a framework onto the characters that may not have felt natural.

I loved that too. Tumperkin always teaches me something.

carolyn crane (CJ) wrote:

Okay, what does it say about me that I actually sort of liked the galactic orgasm passage? I did, I did!

Is this a rhetorical question?

A lot of times they say that if you give a hero or heroine a desire that’s strong enough and put in obstacles, you have a story, it sounds like she did that well, but let it be disconnected to character and world.

Okay, what does it say about me that I actually sort of liked the galactic orgasm passage? I did, I did!

For me, the wild emotional surges of the story were what I wanted, and what I got. In media fandom, sometimes that’s called “emotional pr0n.”

UNTOUCHED is my favorite of hers, too. It’s so cracktastic!

Also I think my passionate hatred for the cover might have prejudiced me unduly. Why is that man glaring at me like that? Why does he want to hurt and violate me?

Loved your joint review though. And you’re dead right – Erith has weird priorities. I felt something bothering me when I was reading that’s exactly it. The disjunction between his care for Olivia and his care for his family is genuinely jarring.