Seven years ago, Leona Montgomery’s sensuality was awoken by a mysterious young adventurer full of dark chaos and sinful inclinations.When she meets him again, their attraction reignites immediately, but he is much changed. Arrogant, masterful, and determined to seduce her, he now appears to have leashed the chaos and tamed the darkness.
Or has he?
Title: The Sins of Lord Easterbrook
Author: Madeline Hunter
Copyright: 2009
Genre: Regency Historical
Series: Last of the Rothwell Brothers Series. After The Rules of Seduction, Lessons of Desire, and Secrets of Surrender
Pages: 368
Sensuality: NC-17
Content warning: There is a paranormal element that is not treated as paranormal since this is a historical. I usually hate paranormal elements in historicals (e.g. Mine Till Midnight) but the way Hunter does it here worked for me.
Grade: B+
Ramblings: Usually, you can take any Madeline Hunter book from a series and read it out of order. However, I dont recommend that a reader new to Hunter do so with The Sins of Lord Easterbrook. This is a pretty good culmination to the series that started with Rules of Seduction, the first book (which still remains my favorite book of MH). All the loose ends are tied up neatly. Hunter conscientiously hasnt forgotten a thing, including to remember to match off the young minor female cousins from the series. There is even an epilogue, a literary first for Hunter.
This is the story of Christian, Marquess of Easterbrook. Since the beginning, readers have been clamouring for his book. He is such a strong character that he steals every scene that he is in and you could almost see Hunter having to rein him in previous books. Now unleashed, he is quite magnificent. Indelible . . . the way Lisa Kleypas’s Derek Craven is indelible. Indelible like JoBev’s Rothgar. Christian is also machiavellian, eccentric, ruthless, implacable, arrogant, reclusive, sardonic, controlling, and quite lusty. Emphasis on ruthless and lusty.
Frankly, as a loudly avowed lover of beta heroes, Christian was a little too much for this reader. At times, I fully expected Christian to start dragging his knuckles and shouldering Leona back to his cave. I also think he was too much for Leona which made the romance uneven. Altho she had a few good comebacks to Christian’s he-man routine, she was too easily distracted and seduced from her so-called missions by Christian, time and time again. Another way the romance is lacking was that there was not enough of those type of scenes which showed Christian and Leona falling in love, a common occurrence which I find more prevalent these days in novels where the H/H have met before the story opens.
So, for tying up all the back stories that have threaded the novels of the series, specifically about the Rothwell parents which was used as such a haunting backdrop in ROS and more as a MacGuffin in LOD, I would give this an A. The actual romance between Christian and Leona is more like a B-/C+. That averages to a B+ rating from me.
Note: Readers of Hunter’s Seducer series will recognize a cameo by one of the main heroes.
I’m just relieved that the final of the series (and for a much anticipated character) didn’t tank totally. A lot of times, I find the last book to be a huh instead of awesome.
I’m a fan of the Alpha heroes, so I think this one will work quite nicely for me. It seems from your review that she seems to remain true to his character. Hopefully I won’t want to club him over the head though because Alphaness goes so far with me. Was the heroine just not as strong as he was, character-wise?
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Elyssa, I went back and forth on whether the character of Leona was rounded enough. Of course, Christian is so overwhelming that its hard to notice anything else but after I have stewed about it for 2 days now, I would say ‘no, she wasnt’.
Christian’s outsize alphaness had me fuming a couple times but I know a lot of people will love him. He is hard not to love. The one thing Hunter has consistently said about this book is that she thinks she “did well by Christian.” And she did.
- seton
seton,
Cool blog! I have only ever tried one Madeline Hunter book and I didn’t like it, so I didn’t finish it. But after reading your review, it’s made me want to try the book out again. It was called The Sinner.
-Georgie
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Hi Georgie,
Thanks for stopping by. THE SINNER was my first Madeline Hunter too. I loved it b/c I thought it was a good example of two pretty-pretty people who are not exactly the sharpest tools in the shed falling for each other. Stupid people need love too! And I loved how Dante was such a horndog that he couldnt keep his hands off Fleur. It also one of her best examples of repetition of the same image thruout the book to illuminate the various stages of the relationship. (You cant miss which one it is since its the one that the book ends on.)
HOWEVER, MH isnt for everyone. If you like medievals, you might want to go for one of her earlier books. Or try THE ROMANTIC or RULES OF SEDUCTION which is more universally popular.
-seton
Loved this one and I struggled with it at first.
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Hunter disclosed in a recent chat that her next series will be four books, Regency setting. At Berkley, of course. It will be four women, not all of them necessarily respectable, living in the same place matched up with four men who know each other but are not necessarily friends.
- seton