Silver Lady

[cornerofmadness]

Silver Lady by Mary Jo Putney

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I got this from the publisher as part of a summer reading packet win last year and put it off as I'm not a romance reader. this is a 3.5 read for me but I rounded up since some of my issues are romance tropes that I know others like. I will give it this, Bran is as far from the toxic alpha male you often see as you can get. He's so sweet (as his brother Cade) that he borders on Larry Stu flawlessness.

Bran and Cade were both thrown out because they are 'gifted' and escape a baby farm (and since there are reviewers saying how unbelievable they are and they can't exist. Believe it. They were real though usually took younger kids than Bran or Cade. Margaret Waters a baby farmer was convicted of killing nearly 2 dozen kids) They are taken in by Lord and Lady Tremayne who were also gifted.

And for me here is problem number one and the largest of them. The plot is Merryn, the amnesiac gifted love interest was kidnapped and mind blocked by two people so they can exploit her gifts. Of course they would. Who wouldn't? In this world everyone knows about gifts and a lot of people despise/are afraid of them. I'm like who wouldn't want to use these gifts to their advantage. It made little sense other than Bran and Cade needed to be orphaned but not really.

Because that's the other main plot line. Bran's obnoxious father, Lord Penhalion, has lost all his heirs except Bran and he wants him back now. Maybe. Bran doesn't want to be Lord but his gift tells him to go to Cornwall anyhow.

Naturally he meets Merryn and I liked how that was handled. What I was less enthused with was how Merryn's amnesia was handled. She was infantilized, talking in one or two words. Amnesia doesn't work that way but later we learn gifts were involved. Gifts that kept involving to make the storyline work.

There was a bit of deus ex machina in this as well at the end that I found annoying. It definitely sets up the series which since there is like a dozen Tremayne kids they're all going to get the romance treatment (or at least Cade is, you can see it coming) The other romance trope that made me groan is that all of this takes place in less than two weeks and they're already racing to marry. Ugh. Yes I know love at first sight exists. In my world it always ends in a whirlwind too (I know one person where it didn't) so when that's your real life experience this trope just falls flat. You don't even know her yet. She barely knows herself. But you're SO in love. I found it a bit cringy.

I did like Bran, Cade and their sister Tamsyn. Merryn was all right. I'd have been much more interested if this was the siblings action adventure novel.



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