The Unwanted Wife

I have to confess that I'm new to the concept of ‘angsty romance', that I came across here. But I think it conveys the message for Theresa and Alessandro. Also, I'm a sucker for stories of arranged marriages that turn into real love, (sue me) and this is a good example of why.

I would give this a 5 for groveling, 5 for addictiveness and plot line but a 1 or 2 for subtlety, consistency and Alessandro's depth as a character.

This last point might be my fault because I'm now very spoilt by dual, first person pov books or even excellent male only pov books like Surviving Raine In my eyes the more egregious (or even just obnoxious really) the male character's actions the more I want to hear their side of the story.
Or else it ends up feeling like I'm just being battered along side the heroine with little reprieve (which this one kinda suffered from for me).

I think that the writing was very engaging and the heroine was very easy to empathize with. But, to be frank, I'm of the opinion that a male pov is more fun and interesting to read in a romance novel. I like being told from the inside how much the hero cares, not watching it from the outside, and then having his actions possibly be misconstrued so that I'm left untrusting of the hero and his motivations alongside the heroine I have little patience for this kinda thing, emotionally. If you can't trust the man, I say jump ship and be done with it.

I read this book because I saw multiple reviews mention that it had some great grovelling. However, it felt a little flat for me. Even at the end, Alessandro was still a little too alpha for my tastes (probably a reflection of the time this book was written). Additionally, I felt like too much of the book was spent on their sexual chemistry and the rest of the relationship-building was glossed over. For example, after Alessandro wrangles 2 hours from her, I would have loved it if the author had spent a lot more page-space giving us examples of the quality time the two of them spent during that time. It was cute but ultimately a little disappointing.

****** 3.5 Stars ****“
Excellent first 120 pages.
The excuse for the marriage it is hardly believable.
And most of all, the low self-esteem of the heroine verges on the pathological.
the last 50 pages detract from the rest of the novel.

2.5 stars

4-Stars

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It was a quick read & if I would've had more time, I definitely could've read it in a day.

I didn't expect this book to be so...clean. & that's my fault cause I read books that leave very little to the imagination. I mean, there weren't even any curse words for fucks sake!! That didn't sway me though, I have read a lot of books which do the same thing, it just caught me by surprise.

Basically this book is about Theresa & Alessandro whom were thrown together in an arranged marriage. Theresa absolutely adored Alessandro & quickly fell in love with him, but he didn't feel the same way. Finally, Theresa gets a back bone after almost 2 years & tells Alessandro that she wants a divorce. Theresa didn't know that there were terms & conditions to her arranged marriage, but she quickly finds out what those are & a divorce won't be so easy. Alessandro finally finds his heart & realizes that he's falling in love with Theresa, but it seems like it's too late.

When Alessandro finally got his head outta his ass, he was filled with remorse about the way that he had treated Theresa, & she made him pay for it. The whole book was basically him trying to prove his love and newfound commitment to her & I LOVED it!!

Some things I didn't like:

-I felt as though exclamation points were used wrongly in this book. IDK, maybe I'm just weird about them, but to me they either mean angry or excited & at times the author put these exclamation points in and it just seemed too “chipper” & I really don't think that's what she was going for.

-USE CONTRACTIONS DAMNIT!! I can't stand when authors write too proper, to me it takes me out of the story because people don't f-ing talk like that. Now if I'm reading a historical novel, sure! But this book is based in present day, we're very lazy with our language & if we can shorten it we will.

But, I'm just being nit-picky. This really was a good book & I'm already on to the 2nd in the series!