Dark Earth, by Rebecca Stott (Random House)
I requested this book from Netgalley based on the
description. I loved the idea of an underworld of rebel women living secretly amid the ruins.
Alas, the opening was so sedate and the characters so bland and unrelatable, I
gave up in the middle of the second chapter. There simply wasn’t enough to keep
me reading. By contrast, the next book I picked up grabbed me right away, so I saw
no reason to take another look.
The Hundred Loves of Juliet, by Evelyn Skye (Del Rey)
What a great premise — Romeo and Juliet, reincarnated many
times over the centuries, always drawn together and always linked in tragedy. In
an added twist, Romeo is immortal and remembers all his previous loves. He
knows, for example, that whoever Juliet is in any given lifetime, she will die
within two years. Juliet, on the other hand, has no idea of their history
together. Now in the 21st Century, writer “Juliette” and sea captain
“Romeo” find themselves thrown together by fate and consuming attraction. Can
they break the cycle?
Well, maybe, if he would just sit down with her and have a
candid conversation. Clearly, he’s failed to do that before, only to watch his
beloved-of-this-century die, usually horribly. You would think he’d learn from
his disasters. Of all the failings of a typical romance novel, the stupidity of
keeping secrets ranks top of my list. Even if “Juliet” thinks he’s delusional
and doesn’t believe him, at least he would have given her a rationale for him
walking away from her. Which he tries to do, but because she has no idea why,
it doesn’t work.
I had other quibbles, including the passages supposedly
diaries and so forth from past centuries but laden with contemporary
sensibilities, that the heroine tries way too hard to be likeable, that the
hero is an example of “female-gaze” and not a real person. Although the prose
is for the most part pretty good, it slips into tone deafness all too often.
I suspect that this is a romance with fantastic elements,
rather than a reincarnation/time-travel fantasy with a love story, and that
science fiction/fantasy readers like myself will have a much harder time with
it than romance readers. Regardless, I gave up around the 24% mark. I simply
didn’t care what happened next as long as the characters were being so
dishonest with each other and themselves.
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