Kidnapped (2009)Nicola Cornick
Grade: C+
Genre: historical romance / ship
Sex scenes: doesn't hit mild
Source: library
The death of eighteen-year-old Catriona Balfour’s father just short months after it took away her mother has left Catriona numb. Her parents never resented the fact that she was a girl and their only child, and her father never thought that her lack of a ‘Y’ chromosome meant that she couldn’t be educated to the highest level in astronomy, mathematics and philosophy. She loves the small Scottish village that is her home but her newly orphaned status and almost-penniless state means that she can stay no longer. Fortunately, her Balfour relatives have taken her in, but as Catriona later discovers, this is a mixed blessing.
Along to escort Catriona to Glen
Clair is the dashing Neil Sinclair, heir to the Earl of Strathconan and
unrepentant rake. He claims to be distantly related to the Balfours but is
elusive when it comes to discussion about her newly discovered family. One
thing that Catriona does know is that Neil is as sinful as Satan himself and
that there is no mistaking his desire for her. When he bluntly asks that she be
his mistress and live a life of luxury, Catriona is initially shocked and
disgusted, but there really could be no more generous, attentive or attractive
man to have to serve. Regardless, Catriona sticks by her morals, turning him
down but highly aware of the lifestyle and privileges that she is giving up in
doing so. However much she wants to hate Neil and get him out of her mind, the
memory of his proposal and the attraction she feels for him makes it
impossible.
Life with the Balfours is bleak.
Her aunt’s nerves prevent her from ever leaving her bed; the estate is in ruins
as a result of her uncle’s incessant drinking; and only Catriona’s sweet cousin
Ellen’s cheerful demeanour makes life tolerable during the boring days that she
now leads. When Catriona discovers that she’s the true heiress to Glen Clair, her
life is put in danger. When she next wakes up, she’s tied up on the bottom of a
ship with a similarly captured Neil Sinclair for company. In an extraordinary
turn of events, they become shipwrecked on a tiny, uninhabited island in the
middle of the Atlantic Ocean, forced to fend for their lives. Catriona’s
reputation is beyond ruined, yet still Neil doesn’t touch her. Will they ever
be rescued, and what will be their fate if that ever happens?
Forbidden gave me my first taste of Nicola Cornick and although the
two books I’ve read since haven’t nearly matched up to the same standards, I’m
not giving up. This was by no means a fantastic story, but the writing style
demonstrates Nicola Cornick’s breadth and I need to read more of her work!
It’s been a long time since I’ve
read a romance written in first-person, especially such detailed narrative as
this. At times, it’s almost like reading a diary and all that’s missing is
dates and a ‘Dear Diary’ at the start of each entry. I find it easiest to write
in first person, but I’m not the biggest fan of reading it, which makes me the
biggest hypocrite ever. It can work well but since it’s not something you come
across often in romance, it’s difficult to pin down my feelings for it. I
enjoyed the first-hand insight it gave into Catriona’s thoughts and feelings
and it certainly made for a change in pace and a break from the norm in the
genre.
One of the drawbacks of first
person in romance is that you don’t get any direct access to the hero’s brain
and what he’s thinking and feeling. I like witnessing how characters evolve
over the course of a book and none more so that the hero. In Kidnapped, the first-person narrative
meant that all events were filtered through Catriona’s perspective and while
this made for entertaining reading at times, it also meant that we were
watching what happened with Neil through her biased eyes. That’s not to say
that you don’t get bias in third-person written novels, but it’s of a different
kind and so you’re better able to form your own opinion on events.
The turn of events in the last
phase of the book was entertaining but unnecessary. Its purpose seems simply be
to drag the book on another few chapters and while I did enjoy reading it, it’s
hard to shrug off the knowledge that the book would have done fine without it.
I’m glad that this wasn’t my
introduction into Nicola Cornick; if it had been, I don’t think I would come
back. Ms Cornick is guilty of trying to cram too many ‘big’ events into too
limited a space with the result that the book seems over-crammed and the reader
isn’t quite sure which events are supposed to be most significant in the development
of the story. I would have liked some more depth into the Balfour family as
well as getting to know Neil a little more, but opportunity for the latter was
limited as a result of the first-person. This could have very easily been
circumvented through a simple conversation, so unless we happened to skip over
these parts of Catriona’s thoughts, we seem to have missed out on what could
have been a fantastic character-bonding opportunity.
Not the most encouraging review, but like I said, I've liked enough of Ms Cornick's other works to want more.
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