"an excellent pirate romance"

Summer Ashton has been sold into marriage to Gowan McConnel, a Scottish Earl that she has never met. Leaving her beloved plantation in the Caribbean, she sets sail for the colder climate of Scotland and is beset upon and kidnapped by pirates.

Brent Douglas didn't really need to plunder another ship, as his own is full to the side rails. After finding out that the ship carried the wife of the Earl of Heatherstone, the man he blames for his own ruined life in Scotland, he couldn't resist adding her as a plundered prize.

Leigh Greenwood has written a fascinating story involving pirates, the Caribbean, as well as mixing in the Scottish element -- all the elements for my favorite type of historical. THE CAPTAIN'S CARESS has a few twists that caught me by surprise, and is full of action.

However, there are a few issues that I felt were unresolved or were never clarified, which I found confusing. From the very beginning, we know that the Earl somehow stole Brent's heritage, but Brent tells the Earls agent he is going to treat Summer exactly as he (Gowan) would himself. Besides (I feel) raping her via seduction, all they did was quarrel; and somehow fall in love. I found myself wondering on several occasions what he meant by that statement.

Actually, I liked the arguments between Summer and Brent. They were very refreshing and realistic. I however don't know how she could fall in love with him, because he really struck me as an overgrown child that overcompensated for one wrong by committing another. He had a good heart, and the best of intentions (most of the time) but he really did treat Summer as a captive bedmate. I will however concede that I also think he was forced to "grow up" and go rescue Summer from the Earl and therefore deal with his past at the same time, or lose the woman he has come to love.

I liked Summer as a heroine. She seemed very genuine and just as confused about falling in love with Brent as I was with her falling in love. Maybe it's because he was a good person underneath the appearance of being a pirate. Regardless she was very intuitive despite living a sheltered life on a Caribbean Island. I also liked the way she stood up to him, even if the end result was she did get seduced again (Brent's solution for everything).

While I think Brent came across as an overbearing child most of the story, I would recommend THE CAPTAIN'S CARESS simply because the story was very well thought out and written and over all was an excellent pirate novel.

Reviewed by Cynthia Eckert
Courtesy eBOOKISLE.net
Posted March 8, 2006