Short version: Rhianna sleeps with billionaire Alexis, who curses her existence for daring to discuss business after coitus. Alexis discovers their secret baby when Rhianna almost dies!Long version: In a last ditch effort to win her father’s love, Rhianna buys a fancy dress and goes to London to persuade Greek billionaire Alexis not to block the sale of her father’s yacht building company to a company he’s buying. She’s capable enough to wrangle an invite to a fancy dinner, and alter the seating plan so she’s next to Alexis, but one look at him and her brain liquefies. She cannot speak. She can only stare and blush.This is a huge turn on for Alexis, who, when Rhianna finally discovers she still has a working tongue and asks for a private meeting, knows he is IN. Their night of passion commences with a rather ambiguous conversation about contraception. Alexis asks ‘is this ok?’ meaning ‘may I leave my hat off when I enter your body?’ but what Rhianna hears is ‘do you consent to my being inside you?’ and yes, indeedy, she does. The next morning Rhianna remembering she arrived with a mission, starts in on her business case, and Alexis rears back in disgust. With her business talk, Rhianna has perverted the whole coitus experience into something transactional, just like every woman before her! Alexis, naturally, has copious issues with women stemming from his childhood. He is not rational when he gets that hint of feels, and he will now ensure that the complete opposite of what she wants will happen! Five years later Rhianna is hit by a car, and a horribly nosy social worker contacts Alexis to come get his son. Yes, Rhianna had a secret baby, but pinned a note naming Alexis as the daddy on some important papers, just in case something bad happened to her. Rhianna has been having a terrible time of it. She’s been on government benefits, caring for her ingrate of a father and her baby. Her father has died, she’s been sick for ages, and somewhere in the middle of all that her nosy social worker decided that Rhianna was dangerous, because Rhianna yelled at her while brandishing the kitchen knife she was using to chop carrots, and a drug addict, because Rhianna was taking flu powder, and some of it spilled. I spent ages trying to work out what flu powder was. I couldn’t think of any way to take a powder that didn’t involve snorting it, or melting it in a teaspoon and shooting it into a vein. I couldn’t think of any flu medicine that would be snorted. I wondered if the powder was something Julia James had made up, so it could be more conveniently mistaken for hard drugs. I finally worked out that Rhianna must have been taking something like Lemsip, which made me feel much better, and gave me a deeper empathy for judgemental and stupid characters in romance novels. I bet that social worker identified the teaspoon Rhianna had used to stir the Lemsip as ‘drug paraphernalia’ in her report.Alexis first sees Rhianna again in her hospital bed and she looks like a zombie. He takes the nosy social worker’s story at face value, and he decides that he will have to tolerate druggie Rhianna the bad mother so that he can possess His Son. This is a departure from the usual hero trick of threats with lawyers – this is an alternate universe to standard Romancelandia UK, where even a mother who appears to be quite capable of supporting herself and her child is persuaded that there is no way she can win a custody battle against a billionaire. Alexis, now very into the concept of His Son, decides that he will whisk them both off to his Greek island, along with a nanny for the boy and a nurse for Rhianna.Rhianna’s pretty reluctant about going to Greece, and she thrilled me by vaguely thinking she needed an exit strategy. She didn’t actually come up with a plan, but she was clearly planning to have a plan, which is quite a significant thing for a romance heroine to do. She thinks Alexis is up to some horribleness, because in her experience all daddies are bastards. See, mostly heroines are the better adjusted ones in the couple and are prepared to accept that just because they’ve been mistreated by men, it doesn’t mean that all men are terrible. Rhianna, bless her, isn’t having any of that. She and Alexis have so much in common. I liked that she was suspicious and angry, even though it meant she spent a lot of the story as a screechy zombie, whereas I think she should have been a gaspy whispery zombie, given she was recovering from ugly lung complaint.I have a thing for lung diseases. It goes back to Jane Eyre, when Helen had consumption. Then I read all sorts of other novels where women had consumption and for some reason, I got it into my head that girls and women with consumption, or indeed any lung complaint, are rendered luminously beautiful by fatal and near fatal diseases. Apparently though, serious illness makes you look terrible and Alexis spends some time dwelling on how Rhianna’s degradation and descent into drug addiction has rendered her completely unsexy, and he is now not into her at all. Rhianna catches some of this in his expression, and accepts it as further evidence of what a vile, disgusting monster Alexis is. Even though she STILL wants to sleep with him, which she takes as proof that there is something wrong with her. Alexis is really, really awful. He tries to buy His Son for a huge sum of money. Rhianna tears up the contract and starts calling him names. Alexis is all ‘congratulations, you have passed my test!’ Rhianna tells him where he can shove his test. In fact, she keeps getting to tell Alexis where to shove it, because he keeps accusing her of stuff, and then consulting others to check that she’s told him the truth, and then telling her about it later and wondering why she gets all furious again. They are both so adorably self-righteous. Initially, telling Alexis to shove it has a somewhat detrimental effect on Rhianna’s health, but sunshine and sea air and good food has her returning to her pre-curse beauty, and telling Alexis to shove it starts to add an attractive glow to her skin. Alexis notices, and starts plotting to keep Rhianna as well as His Son. Rhianna’s continuing rage at Alexis’s appalling behaviour is intensely emotional and so satisfying. The only obvious problem is that it makes the romance between them a difficult concept. They’re both attracted to each other, and both impressed by each other’s commitment to The Son. It’s not a bad start, but I’m left to rely on the hope that after they’ve resolved their issues about their horrible parents they start competing to be the most sunshine and lollipops to the other, and live happily ever after.
Kitabın başı kesinlikle özgün bir şekilde başladı. Hah işte seveceğim bir kitap derken yazar tempoyu tutturamadı ya sinir oldum açıkçası. Rhianna çocuğu koruyan bir anne Alexis desen çocuğunun dört yılını kaybetmiş bir baba. Açıkçası Alexis'i çokta haklı bulmadım. Ön yargılarının kurbanı oldu ve o günlere sonuçlarını katlanarak geldi. Kadını baştan çıkaran sen, manipülüze etmek için beraber olduğunu kanısına ışık hızıyla varan sen, kıza servisleri için para fırlatan sen, kalkıp kadının ben hamileyip çocuğumuza bak mı demesini bekliyorsun be adam? Ve beni en çok sinirlendiren o ön yargılara kitabın %75'inde devam etmesi. Kızımızda zavallı yeni kaza geçirmiş. Habire Alexis'in iğneli laflarına uslu durmazsa çocuğunu ondan alacağı tehditlerine dayan. Sonunda adamı affetmekle iyi mi yaptı bilemem ama mutlu denilebilecek bir pozla bitişi gördük. Konumuza gelirsek hikaye Alexis'i arayan bir kadının çocuğu olduğu iddiası üzerine başlıyor. Sonra kadın karakterimizin hastanede geçmişi hatırlamasıyla maziilerine vakıf oluyoruz. Rhianna'nın babası bir yat dizaynırı ve batmak üzere. Alexis'ten babasının şirketini satın alması için katıldığı bir geceye gidiyor. Ama işler hiçte umduğu gelişmiyor ve kendini bir gecelik bu adama kaptırıyor. Ertesi sabah ise uyandığında adam işe gitmek için hazır bulununca hayakırıklığı hat safhada. Hemen konuyu açmaya çalışır ve o anda hata yaptığını geç anlar. Alexis yanlış anlamız kıza hizmeti karşılığında para teklif ederek onu utandırmıştır. Bunun üzerinden dört yıl geçtikten sonra Rhienna'nın hastane odasında karşılaşırlar. Rhienna bu sefer bu adamdan kurtuluş olmadığını içten içe biliyordur. Ama oğlunuda kaptırmaya niyeti kesinlikle yoktur!
What do You think about Baby Of Shame (2006)?
I can totally understand the criticism that heroine wasn't very logical and was a big martyr but so what? I'm looking for angst, drama, passion, and there was plenty of each...very few HPs are realistic. The implausible plot points of social worker entering her home and her raising her request the morning after allowed H to think ill of her and be harsh, so he would later have to apologize. He thought she was a gold digger and drug addict. His misinterpreting of their night together was even a little understandable. I loved the injustice of h's suffering and H's harsh words as much as the fiery fights and ultimate grovel. Very fulfilling read for me. One unexplained point...why she didn't get a caretaker and seek a job as an accountant!
—Becky
Burned-out heroine has been taking care of her illegitimate young son & emotionally-unavailable father who recently died after a long illness the past 5 years. She gets hospitalized after a car accident & is further traumatized with her son being taken away from her by a suspicious social worker who thinks she's a drug addict. She feels even worse when her son's wealthy father tries to take full-custody of their son after he finds out about his existence from the social worker. Both Hero & heroine have major trust issues stemming from their own upbringing as well as miscommunication from their 1 passionate night together 5 years ago. I loved this James' book. It had a wonderful romance & sizzling chemistry & love scenes. It pulled my emotions dramatically. I found myself in tears a few times. The misunderstanding & miscommunication between Hero & heroine was so great that I wondered how they could ever come to even like or trust each other again. James weaved the story well. It was interesting to see the character development throughout this short book. I sympathized with both as their childhood experiences explained how they interpreted events that happened & why they responded the way they did to each other. I really liked how Hero groveled for heroine's forgiveness. It was believable & touching.Highly recommended.
—RomReader
O GECENIN SIRRI-Julia Julie JamesBU hikayede gecmiste yaşanan acılarin bireylerin ikili ilişkilerini etki boyutlarini açık şekilde gösteren bir hikaye idi Bu hikayede ise cok aci ceken bir kadın karakteri vardi ki okurken içim parcalandı. Rhianna Davies onu kücüklügünde terkedip giden maddi durumu bozulan babasi icin milyarder Alexis Petrakis ile konuşmak için gittigi yemekte isler bir anda cigrindan cikmis kendini bu adamın yataginda bulduktan sonra bir de aşagilanmisti. Babasina yardimci da olamamis ve sirketi iflas etmisti. O günden sonra onu daha da zor günler bekliyordu ki bir de hamile kalmışti. Hikayemiz bu olaydan beş sene gectikten sonra basliyordu ki. Rhianne'nin yeni babasi ölmüs kendisine araba çarpmısti. Düstügü maddi krizden devletten aldıgi yoksul maaşi ile geçinebiliyordu. Üstelik hasta,sosyal devlet görevlisi ona takmışti bu kotü sartlardada cocugunun babasi Alexis ile karsılasmak tam anlamı ile kabustu.Claire ve Alexis'in korkulari degişikde olsa anne ve babalarindan kaynaklaniyordu. Özellikle Alexis'in korku nedeni annesi idi. Rhianne'nin annesi gibi davranacagini sanıyordu ki,bu daha cok hata ve sert davranmasina sebep oluyordu.Duygu yüklü bir romandi.Bu ayki Harlequin Clasiccleri çok beğendim tavsiye ederim...
—HÜLYA
