I had an impulse to hold the hem of this story and to let it walk me around. That is the child in me talking, needing comfort, something/somebody to look upon. In the world of reading, in the genre of HR, you won’t find a better book to admire, to get fascinated with, to mold your opinions around its moods and pace. It’s a very grown-up, exceptionally adult and mature masterpiece. It made me dry my tears with my fingertips, trying to swallow without the burn in my throat. The understanding of the other human being as a home was my undoing, the understanding of a deep hurt and self-infliction that every and each one of us carries was the other. The poetry of The Rake. No bricks, no paper called money that can burn when you put a lighter under it, no soil – that’s irrelevant to some extent of happiness, but the feeling of family that two people find when they truly absorb is what actually stands as a fortitude. And then bricks, papers and soil come. So in this genre to find two adult people, completed and layered is close to a wonder. All historical romances have a happy ending, it’s the ultimate bewilderment of the journey and ecstasy as to why so many people read it. The crack of the possibility that you can comprehend the universe, to believe that human knowledge and emotions can have true certainty. But this book had the north face, the part that sun never touches.Alcoholism, blackouts and serious auto-destructive behaviour kept this book away from the nursery cribs. How to gain sobriety when roaring addiction wants you angry, ashamed, on your knees and dead. It’s a romance novel with the tall, heterochromic eyes, Amazonian woman called Alys and Reggie, the worst kind of man. His 'worst' deep down really was awful. He was physically dangerous and his rake status wasn’t just part of 'ruined simply by being seen with' propriety. The rakes in historical romances are very usual. Those scoundrels with titles are the most appreciative ones. If the main lady is a virgin, you'll find your public. Just M.J.Putney did a huge twist, a spin-off of the word 'rake'. The rake was initially never in the shadow, because he is the one who tantalises female readers. To have a brute and to end up being with a reformed one, ah, the stardust. To describe him, you have to give him skills. He doesn't care what others think of him, has enough of money, he is a gambler, womaniser – ranks, titles, classes in his whoring don't matter. He is great in sports, a heavy drinker, has a sense of fashion and he has killed in duels. He is always tall, the one who can close the angry mouth of a dialogue speaker just by shoulder intimidation. Ladies and gentleman fear them. Former because they want him in bed, between their thighs, moaning and owning, the latter because somewhere between the deep frown and depreciation they want to be him. Just, what does an older rake do when twenty years of debauchery and bacchanalia pass. When it's difficult to get out of the bed because nausea and sickness and depression want to cut your flesh meat and chew it. When your dreary and bleak thoughts tell you that you're alone and on the secure path of death. And this is the twist where Putney's brilliance takes place. She writes around his saturnalian lifestyle, she goes into his intimacy beyond sheets and orgies, she gives us a breed of a man who is a disgrace and why he became that, in comparison with the tolerance of the same society who made him like this. Reggie Davenport became embodiment of the word rake and the incarnation of full circle, full study, full grievous coverage of a person who was potent and radiant enough to acknowledge second and last chance to change.So to read about him and Alys Weston, who are separately equally intelligent, have unfathomable wry humour, who are equally hard-working and equally intense, complexed and seclusive and to read about their friendship, their chemistry, their estate work and visible accomplishments was an experience. To read how they massacrated themselves and ascended was truly worth my tears. People change for themselves, they don’t change for others. Responsibilities and consequences make you do that. But, hope in others makes you do that as well.
Alys Weston is running from her past, and Reggie Davenport is fleeing his future. Fate brings them together on Reggie's Dorset estate, Strickland.It's uncommon, to say the least, for a woman to be an estate steward, yet Alys has been able to pull off that job for four years, communicating with the absentee owner in writing. When Reggie's cousin, the new owner, gives the estate over to Reggie, Alys sees her idyll coming to an end. Yet, when Reggie arrives at Strickland, he proves to be surprisingly open-minded and impressed Alys's success; he keeps her on as steward.Reggie is a rake of the first order, but more than that, he's a drunkard who, at age thirty-seven, has begun to suffer blackouts. Even he has become convinced that his life is on a dangerous trajectory; a voice in his head keeps telling him, "This way of life is killing you." He believes that Strickland may be his salvation.Alys and Reggie gradually become friends, and though they are attracted to one another, nothing more than a few kisses are exchanged. When fire destroys the steward's house, Alys and her three young wards move into the estate house, and Reggie begins to know the joys of a family for the first time in his life. But Reggie's real problem is his drinking, and a great deal of this story revolves around his efforts to first get it under control and later to stop altogether. It's heartbreaking to watch him try and fail and try again. Mary Jo Putney does an excellent job portraying the inner demons that plague Reggie. At the same time, she doesn't succumb to the temptation that some writers might feel to make Reggie's recovery all about his love for Alys. Reggie is getting sober for himself, not for someone else. And while Putney does lapse into a bit of AA one-day-at-a-time-speak occasionally, she is able to keep the story from sounding too modern.There's an engaging cast of secondary characters and a couple of other romances. And I particularly enjoyed the epilogue:(view spoiler)[ after Reggie and Alys marry, the other characters are shown reacting to the news, wrapping the whole story up quite nicely. (hide spoiler)]
What do You think about The Rake (1998)?
Another example of how romantic fiction is not fluff. This book was deep as the ocean. I loved how this book brought together two people who had been hurt or damaged by life, and helped them to find peace and love. The Rake is an excellent portrayal of a person suffering from alcoholism. And coming from a family where both side has members who were alcoholics, I can testify to this. Reggie reminded me of a few of my uncles. They could have been better men had they not been under the influence of the drug that started as something they indulged in for fun, but became their lives and helped to destroy their lives.The great thing about this book is that it was so well written that I couldn't turn away because I had seen too much of that behavior. Instead, I wanted to read more about Reggie's journey to sobriety.Alyx also has issues. She is odd-eyed, meaning her eyes are different colors. She is also tall and buxom. In her mind, she is unattractive. And she heard a man that she adored dismiss her, so she ran off and gave herself to the first man who asked. Of course, he didn't want her for more than one night. Lesson learned, she retires to the country and gets a job as the steward to an absentee landlord. This turns out to be the recently inherited property of Reginald, who is running away from London to try to get his life under control. This is how these two souls meet and find a love that helps them both to heal and gives them a hopeful future.It's been a while since I read this one, but it is destined to always have a space on my keeper shelf. For the beauty of the storytelling, the compelling and realistic hero and heroine, and for the excellent handling of the tough subject of alcoholism.
— Danielle The Book Huntress (Self-Proclaimed Book Ninja)
Do you ever read a book where you're like "...I don't get it"? This was that kind of book for me. I can see that this is one of those books where my opinion is way out in left field, so these are just my own notes on why I didn't get it: Heroine works as an estate steward and also takes care of a couple of kids/young adults, one of whom is a young lady involved in her own romance. Heroine has some kind of secret, terrifying past. Heroine frequently dresses like a man to do her steward job. --- BEGIN NITPICKING --- (I am one of those annoying people who require a baseline level of accuracy in historical romances. I get it, they're romances first, but... I have ??? feelings when women in historical romance dress like men or do jobs that were done primarily by men. I'm actually totally pro-women-doing-dude-jobs, but I at least need more information to make me believe that this could indeed happen in this era. Like here I suppose I would need to know if some ladies did in fact ever work as stewards, and if some women who did physical work did dress like this, and if people gave them a modesty pass in certain circumstances. Otherwise I just spend the whole book being like WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT. One of the reasons I read primarily historical romance is that I'm interested in the ways in which a very different set of mores change how people interact. For instance, I always like it when an author indicates an understanding of the modesty standards of the time they are writing in - you know, if the era thinks of men's shirts as underwear, I appreciate it if the Heroine is a little startled and blushing when she sees the Hero sans waistcoat and jacket. I don't want to read historical romances that take modern sensibilities and set them in a picturesque manor, in other words. I originally wanted to read this book because I was quite interested in the idea of an independent woman secretly doing a man's job. But the execution, to me, felt really glossy and shallow, instead of actually grappling with the themes that it sets up. Contrast with, oh, I was just reading Lord Perfect (heart!) and there's a bit where the Heroine, a widow and mother of one child, worries out loud to the Hero that her husband's family could take the child from her and she would have no recourse, because a child belongs to her father, ergo to her father's family. Now that's an element you couldn't have in a modern story, you know? The Regency period wasn't just 2014 by candlelight. If your Heroine wears pants and does a man's job on the sly, I want to know all about the ways in which that is hard and challenging. I don't want everyone to just be anachronistically cool about it.) --- END NITPICKING ---The Hero is a semi-dissolute dude who does not really seem that rake-y to me. He has a drinking problem and is trying to figure out that in the early 19th century when maybe the whole idea of being addicted to alcohol, at least for gentlemen, didn't really exist yet. This theme was okay - I didn't like it as much as everyone else, though. I thought it was going to have incredible insights about addiction (based on glowing reviews), and I didn't really feel that way. It did give a pretty compassionate, whole portrait of someone struggling with addiction, and I appreciated that. But overall, I do not find either the Hero or his relationship with the Heroine that gripping, and don't really remember much about their interactions. I've tried to read this twice and failed to finish both times. I just don't get it. I don't find the romance compelling, and what seem to me like anachronisms really make it not my jam.
—Corduroy
Excerpt:Fate has given a disgraced Rake one final chance to redeem himself--by taking his place as the rightful master of an ancestral estate. But nothing prepares him for his shocking encounter with a beautiful lady who has fled a world filled with betrayal. Now he will awaken in her a passion more powerful than anything she has ever known--a passion that can doom or save them both if they dare to believe.I was very pleasantly surprised by this book. I got it after an recommendation and i'm ver
—Melissa
