Masquerade of Love
Elizabeth Batten-CarewContemporary romance
Available from New Concepts Publishing
ISBN: 1-58608-448-8
May 2004
| Vanessa's friend, Rachel, gives her a Cinderella costume and an invitation to a masquerade ball. She's had so little in her life, due to her rather demanding stepmother, and the hand-me-downs she received from her two stepsisters. Rachel has to work hard to convince Vanessa to go to Nick Power's ball, attended by some of the local society's wealthy elite. Add that Vanessa's aunt once swore she'd meet her prince charming, and the antique glass slipper earrings, and it's almost like Vanessa is being urged to go by the past. She attends in the place of Amy, and ends up being fought over by two men, one of which is gorgeously handsome and in the costume of Prince Charming. He kisses her, and sparks flame, but when he realizes that she is not Amy, she runs from him...and loses a glass slipper in the process.
The next day, she's called into Power Systems as a temporary secretary to Nick Powers, as Rachel, his normal secretary, had to go on maternity leave early. When she walks into his office, the man she meets is the man she kissed the night before, only he isn't dressed as Prince Charming anymore. He's also looking for her, and found her glass slipper earring. She can't afford to have him know she was Cinderella, regardless of how much she wants her earring back, and of how much she wishes he would love her. Masquerade of Love played out like the Cinderella fable it was modeled after, but without any interaction with the step-relatives. I'd have liked to see Vanessa get a tiny bit of revenge on her stepmother, but she seemed too nice to do something like that. In fact, Vanessa seemed too nice and timid to really do much of anything empowered, and often reminded me of what a woman was supposed to be like in Regency books; demure, sweet, and perfectly willing to find and marry The Right Man. Of course, Vanessa wasn't looking for that during the story, but her fantasy about Prince Charming was too close to that for comfort. She also seemed too naive for a girl brought up in our times, and that same niceness also seemed odd considering how she had to struggle financially through life. Nick redeemed the story some, alternating between believing he should marry one of his own, and marrying someone he was comfortable with, like Vanessa. Though it could have seemed shallow and irritating, it was instead portrayed as something natural for someone in his position. He wasn't prejudicial about it, he'd just always assumed he'd need someone like himself in order to get along comfortably. But once he got used to the idea of Vanessa being perfect for him, he acted accordingly, and was very romantic about it. The romance between Nick and Vanessa was very much on the sweet side and fairly genuine. The story would be great for those looking for something mellow and sweet.
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Reviewer: Tara Black |
