Wedded Bliss

By: Barbara Metzger / Narrated By: Pippa Rathborne

Length: 11 hrs and 4 mins

Thoughtful and deliberate character-building to go with gross misdemeanors and hiLARious side-plots? FUN!

First, I had to chuckle when reading a 1-star review that said Wedded Bliss was The Worst Book Ever—that it was sexist, etc. etc. Seriously? Of COURSE it was sexist! What on earth did you think when going into a Regency Romance, portraying a time in history when young girls had their Seasons, with matchmaking mamas, and papas willing to sell their daughters to the highest bidder: Usually older, way older! gentlemen who were most decidedly NOT gentlemen?! Dude, in a Regency, it’s common to have a Hero who starts out as a cad, a man with huuuuge gaming debts, a shameless dandy, a confirmed bachelor, or a Corinthian of note. THEN they meet the AWEsome heroine, she works her magic through a shining and winning and witty personality, and what starts as a marriage of convenience or a business deal slooooowly morphs into a wonderful Love Match.

What’s not to love? and yessss! it’s exceeeedingly sexist!

Here, in Wedded Bliss, Barabara Metzger turns in her consistently wonderful writing of a romance which clocks in at a whopping 11 hours (And 4 minutes…), thereby giving her ample opportunity to craft a methodical warming of our Hero, with bumps of various sizes along the way, with vile and lecherous villains to boo against, with bruised egos (And shattered curios of extreeeeeme value!) to boot. Top all this off with the Queen of Tongue-in-Cheek herself, Pippa Rathborne! doing the narration honors, and I was charmed even tho’ those bumps of various sizes started off by making me wonder the direction of the story at times.

Robert Rothmore, Earl of Rockford, couldn’t care less about being a father, even to the point of questioning whether he actually IS father to his two sons (His first two marriages were pretty much business deals, and the wives—now deceased—were somewhat open about their flings). Still, when he finds his youngest living with the widow Mrs. Alissa Hennings in a rundown cottage, he’s furious. Still (Again!), it beats having to raise the boy himself. Soon, he’s taken his oldest boy from his ex-in-laws, and naturally that goes awry as well. And so he proposes a marriage of convenience to Alissa.

Alissa is pinching her pennies and living unprotected when the Earl enters the picture. Indeed, her oldest boy has had to grow up fast, trying to be Man of the House and keeping his Mum safe. And so Alissa agrees to this setup cuz she’s reeeeally scared about the future, and what the heck are two more boys when she has two of her own and a young sister who needs to make a respectable marriage (Whazzat? you ask. Sexist? Yup)?

However, upon waiting for her new husband on the first night of their marriage, she’s sooo disappointed to discover that he has no intention of even consummating the marriage (Which she was kinda sorta dreading, her nerves shot to hell), and is further surprised to find him dashing from the country estate and heading back to his life as a newly-married-bachelor.

She finds herself unprotected still, and so she gathers up all the kids, takes her nervous sister in hand, and the pack of them descend upon the Earl’s townhouse in London. Things are NOT safe for her and the children, her sister, with a lech out for vengeance.

There is chaos and disorder, and Rockford is sorely peeved. He still carries on with his diplomacy-inspired affair with a brooding, hulking Princess… until… he realizes he’s left the good and kind Alissa open to gossip of the worst sort, open to depraved advances, and what kinda jerk is he anyway? He triiiiiies to do what is good and honest, is pleased that he’s managed to remain faithful for all of a week, but this book is a truly slow unwinding and reshaping of characters. Metzger is sooo good that way, eschewing the usual 6-8 hour storytelling in favor of many side-plots and believable character arcs. And those questionable avenues I THOUGHT the story would be going down? Nope, Metzger morphs them and twists them with clever choices and witty escapades.

Pippa Rathborne is wonderful, as always. Also as always? I DEFinitely start one of her narrations wondering why I like her so much. After all, she has kinda a strange voice, kinda sounds older than the heroines in the stories she’s narrating. But boy! can she soon inhabit a story and deliver comedy, or what?! As this is a sliiiiightly more steamy book than I’m used to, Rathborne does NOT make the various scenes of growing desire tawdry and toe-curling. Rather, she infuses wry humor into the wording (“He rose to the occasion… TWICE…”). I sooo appreciate that as I have actually run into a couple of fairly graphic Metzger romances which I oh so quickly returned whilst Audible had its Romance Package. I full-well admit that, for me, levity does MUCH to uncurl the toes!

Sooo happy I added this audiobook to my week’s Listening as it was an often-hiLARious way to spend 11 hours (And AGAIN: Pippa Rathborne’s pacing is so excellent that I could not for the life of me listen at anything but x1 speed! Every single audiobook this week? x1 speed!!!).

I had to practice self-control this week with the whole x1 speed deal, dying to know What was going to Happen Next, but oh how satisfied I do feel right now.

Were I cat? Dude, how I’d purr!!!

(P.S. No cats in this. Nope, just a pack of crazy and incontinent puppies driving our Hero CRAZY. Ha!)

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