A History Nut's Romantic State of Mind

I was very surprised that Lorraine Heath wrote this. I even bothered to check in which year this book was originally published. 2001, 14 years ago. Her regency novels came a few years later so I can only assume that the Heath I knew before this book has matured as a writer.

(The review may contain spoilers.)

In this book you could already see that Heath has good ideas for plots and characters. Angela (24) was blind. She was abducted by Lee (20) during one of his bank "heists" because Lee thought Angela had seen his face. Lee was on the run. He killed a man to avenge his family and his sister and had been waiting for his eventual capture by the authority, though he did attempt to postpone the "unsavory" event. Instant attraction, lots of horse-riding, I cannot be with you beacuse I am an outlow (Lee), I love you anyways (Angela), boom lots of sex and the a-ha moment when Lee's family mystery came to light.

I do find it interesting how Heath built the plots. It became gradually clear to me who really mothered the little boy and who Lee truly was.

But, these rather interesting elements don't really fit together. I feel that I am just muddling through the story and keep making very odd turns. I had a lot of "huh?", "what?" and "eh?" moments in this book. If I were an expert writer myself, I would probably say that the book was an amateurish attempt. But as a reader I can only say that I was often confused and had the feeling that I had to "catch up" because the story just jumped from one place to another.

I don't mind a younger man in a relationship nor do I mind it in a romance. But Lee and Angela kind of grossed me out because Angela was kind of Lee's "babysitter" when he was abducted at 5. She was only 4 years older but I could not shake the feeling that she was his babysitter. She talked about little Damon, who is in fact Lee, as if little Damon was her lost child. Then all of a sudden the adult Damon/Lee was having crazy sex with her? The problem is not the age. She thought of him as a baby who she should have proteced as an older sister. I found it distasteful to pair them with each other. It would so gross me out to even imagine having a physical relationship with a younger neighbor kid who I was supposed to take care of as an older sister. How sick is that?! (Am I alone in this??)

I have heard that Heath's Texas trilogy are great reads. Seeing that the Texas trilogy was probably written around the same time as this book, I am reluctant to try.