Review: Scandal, by Carolyn Jewel

Scandal, published in 2009, is Carolyn Jewel’s second third fifth third full length historical. It is up for a RITA for Best Regency Romance later this month, and its nomination is well deserved, in my opinion.

Here’s the blurb:

The earl of Banallt is no stranger to scandal. But when he meets Sophie Evans, the young wife of a fellow libertine, even he is shocked by his reaction. This unconventional and intelligent woman proves to be far more than an amusing distraction– she threatens to drive him to distraction. Unlike the women who usually fall at Banallt’s feet, and into his bed, Sophie refuses to be seduced. And soon Banallt desires her more than ever– and for more than an illicit affair.

Years later, the widowed Sophie is free, and Banallt is determined to win the woman he still loves. Unfortunately, she doesn’t believe his declaration of love and chivalrous offer of marriage– her heart has already been broken by her scoundrel of a husband. And yet, Sophie is tempted to indulge in the torrid affair she’s always fantasized about. Caught between her logical mind and her long-denied desire, Sophie must thwart Banallt’s seduction– or risk being consumed by the one man she should avoid at all costs…

You can read Chapter One here.

According to my personal tastes, this book had two huge things going for it out of the gate: (1) it’s a reformed rake story, and (2) it begins in medias res, with Banallt having already seemingly destroyed his chances with Sophie, not only by mentoring her libertine husband in licentiousness, but by doing something else that the reader doesn’t discover until the second half of the book. I happen to love romances that deal centrally with trust issues raised by the hero’s past bad behavior, and internal conflict generated in a heroine whose sound judgment that this guy is very bad news conflicts with her deep attraction to him is one of my favorites.

I loved the first chapter of Scandal. Banallt is riding onto the Surrey estate of Havenwood with its owner, John Mercer, who is Sophie’s brother. Banallt spies Sophie sitting outside, and his physical reaction — not a sexual one so much as a romantic one — cues the reader in to how gone he is for this woman. The ensuing conversation among the three is mulitlayered: John has no idea that his sister and Banallt have a history; Sophie has little conception of how deeply she affects Banallt; and Banallt is not quite clear, as usual, on the guarded Sophie’s real feelings for him.

But rather than rely too long on this kind of ambiguity and misunderstanding to generate interest, Jewel, in short order, has Banallt explain the nature of his past relationship with Sophie to John, and declare his intention to propose. And in the beginning of Chapter Two, he does. When Sophie replies with “I would rather die that marry the man my husband wished he could be”, the game is officially on.

The feel of this book is dramatic and melancholy. Both Banallt and Sophie have lost loved ones, have suffered, and have hurt each other in ways unintentional and otherwise. It is very much a story of recovery for both of them. But it is also a story of growth: Sophie’s impulsive marriage at age 19 to a fortune hunting jerk was a poor choice, and she needs to see it as no more and no less, rather than letting it dictate her life and her attitude towards love for ever more. Banallt, for his part, needs to stop seeing the world only through his own eyes. Yes, he’s reformed — mainly, it appears, by falling in love with the morally upright Sophie, something that might not work for all readers — and good for him. But he needs to appreciate where Sophie is coming from, in order to understand her very legitimate fears of marriage in general, and marriage to him in particular.

Most of the present day action takes place in London, where Banallt is working closely with John and others on political matters (Napolean is at it again). Sophie gets a bit of the social life her early scandalous marriage denied her, and attracts several excellent men as suitors along the way (this was slightly puzzling to me, as she is connected to scandal, older, no longer rich, and not a beauty). Of course, Banallt is there, doing his best to compete. The sexual tension between Sophie and Banallt is wonderfully done.

I loved the conversations between Sophie and Banallt. They talked in a kind of elliptical way, always skirting and darting the painful things in their past, every word having the potential to dredge up bad memories. They changed subjects abruptly, let sentences hang half finished, and, paradoxically, used vagueness and silences to say things clearly and directly. The emotion between them was just so powerful, it was almost as if the words had trouble getting through. I can see this driving some readers crazy, but I loved it.

While I enjoyed what felt almost like a paranormal element in Jewel’s description of Banallt’s eyes (“black rimmed irises, the color bleeding slowly into a solid and unrelenting gray eerily flat of expression” — Jewel also writes paranormals) I did feel that a few phrases to describe Banallt and Sophie were overused. For example, references to Banallt’s inky black hair were a bit too rife. On the other hand, sometimes the repetition worked well, as in a running theme in which Sophie straightens Banallt’s always crooked cravat — an innocent gesture that says a lot in a book about a moral woman and a rake.

I love flashbacks, and they were used effectively to let the reader in on the past events which so strongly shadow the present for these two. When we finally discover the the specific hurt Banallt caused to Sophie, the scene Jewel waited as long as possible to bring us back to, the buildup has been worth it.

In the last third of the novel, something pretty tragic occurs, which has bad effects on Sophie. While the tragedy was earned, and affected me as a reader, I felt at this point that the obstacles to true love were not as compelling, and that Sophie was sort of throwing in lame excuses to avoid saying yes to Banallt. So the final third felt less compelling in general. This did not take away from the delight I took, however, in their HEA.

I really enjoyed Scandal, and will absolutely be reading more historicals by this author.