Lost Love Found

Cover

Title Lost Love Found

Author Bertrice Small

ISBN 0-345-37419-3

Publisher Ballantine Books

Category Romance

Shira's Rating

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What It's About

Set in the early 17th century in late Elizabethan England, this is a romance novel which tells of Valentina St. Michael and her quest to find out the truth behind who her father might have been. In other words, she goes looking for trouble, and of course, she finds it! Along the way, she is courted by two eligible bachelors, taken prisoner by a cruel Tatar chieftain who is an outcast among his own people, and absorbed into the harem of the Grand Vizier of the Turkish government. The reason I've included a review of this book on my web site is that part of it is set in Turkey.

This book is a sequel to A Love For All Time, another book by Bertrice Small in a series of romance novels centered around a character named Skye O'Malley and her extended family. A Love For All Time told the story about how Valentina's parents had met and found love. It also is a follow-up to some of the events in Love Wild And Fair, another Bertrice Small book in a separate series of romance novels. Some of the characters from Love Wild And Fair make a return appearance in this book, and Lost Love Found makes references back to the events that occurred in it.

Like many romance novels, this book definitely contains some explicit sex scenes. Although they didn't bother me, readers who prefer books to be less, um, lusty probably wouldn't appreciate this one.

Its Good Points

People who have enjoyed Bertrice Small's earlier books in the Skye O'Malley series will find it interesting to continue exploring the adventures of her extended family, as portrayed in Lost Love Found.

Bertrice Small clearly did extensive research when preparing this book. Although I certainly would not encourage anyone to think of a romance novel as being a legitimate source of historical or cultural information, I nonetheless was impressed at the overall use of historical detail in this book. I'm not an expert on either Elizabethan England or 17th-century Turkey, but Valentina St. Michael's world was consistent with what I do know of those times and places.

I think a number of Western women fantasize about life in the Ottoman harem, imagining it to be a place of beauty, pampering, and sensual delights. This book portrayed the dark side of what it's like to be snatched away from everyone you love, be enslaved, and be subjected to the whims of someone who has ultimate power over you. In short, it debunks the fantasies and exposes some of the cold realities of that world. I applaud the author for her courage in addressing these issues head-on.

On The Negative Side....

I didn't find these characters as compelling as those in other books such as Skye O'Malley and A Love For All Time. Although likable as a lady in waiting to Queen Elizabeth, Valentina St. Michael came across in her dealings with her parents and suitors as a spoiled little rich girl.

Valentina's interactions with her two suitors seemed somewhat artificial. The affectionate nicknames that her suitors used when addressing her kept jarring me out of the flow of the plot.

The author unnecessarily paraded a number the characters from the first two books in the Skye O'Malley series in and out of the story without adding much value to the plot. This was particularly true of Skye's children. Some of them (especially Padraic) played a useful role in the plot, but others seemed to appear solely for the purpose of providing readers of Small's earlier books with a quick update on the lives of everyone. I found these walk-on appearances by characters who did little or nothing to further the plot of this book to be somewhat irrelevant, annoying, and gratuitous. Lost Love Found was the first Bertrice Small book I ever read, and I felt lost most of the time, especially in the parts of the book set in England. I kept wondering, "Why in the hell was this character introduced? S/he has not played any important role in the plot!"

In Conclusion

I felt this book was weaker than some of the others that Bertrice Small has written. I definitely preferred The Kadin and A Love For All Time over this one. Still, if you really enjoyed the other Bertrice Small books in the series about Skye O'Malley's and Janet Leslie's families, then you'll want to read this one to uncover the further adventures of the characters that appeared in them.

If you're the kind of person who enjoys historical romance novels, particularly ones with a hefty dose of passionate sex scenes, then you'll probably like this book very much. However, if you've never appreciated romance novels, or if you are squeamish about books with lots of explicit sex including some bondage, this is not the right book for you.

Valentina's sojourn in Turkey provided a mostly unhappy view of the Orient, which I think was good--it appropriately debunks the fantasy view so many people have in which they imagine life in a Turkish harem as focused on pampering and beauty. It reminds the reader that the world of the harem was a world of slavery, a world where women were denied control over decisions affecting their own lives.

This book is number five in a series of stories about a woman named Skye O'Malley and her extended family. (See below.) In addition, it is a partial sequel to Love Wild And Fair--it carries forward the stories of the Istanbul-based characters who were prominent parts of that story. If you want to read Lost Love Found, I would first urge you to read the other books that precede it in the continuity. Although the story is designed to stand on its own, and the book does provide brief explanations when necessary of what came before, I didn't find those explanations sufficient to help me understand the past events that held such an important influence over the plot of this one.

Here is the order in which I would recommend reading Bertrice Small's books, with links to the reviews I have written of them:

The Kadin. Although this is not part of the Skye O'Malley series, it introduces characters and context that are referred to in Lost Love Found.
Skye O'Malley. This is the first book in the series about Skye and her extended family. I highly recommend reading this before reading Lost Love Found. Otherwise, when you read Lost Love Found, you'll feel like you need a scorecard to keep track of the many characters that Small parades in front of you.
All The Sweet Tomorrows. This is the sequel to Skye O'Malley. Although I was a bit disappointed with this book, I would still recommend that if you do want to read more books in the Skye series, then you should read this before the others. Otherwise, you'll find some of the references to past events and characters in the later books confusing.
A Love For All Time. This book tells of how Skye O'Malley's brother Conn found love with Aidan St. Michael. It was one of the better books in the series of books about Skye and her extended family. Lost Love Found is the direct sequel to this book.
Love Wild And Fair. This is not one of the books in the Skye O'Malley series, but it is the sequel to The Kadin and part of the plot takes place in Turkey. You could read This Heart Of Mine without first reading Love Wild And Fair, but I would recommend reading Love Wild And Fair before reading Lost Love Found.
This Heart Of Mine. I don't plan to review this one for my site, because the heroine's adventures take her to India, which falls outside my geographical scope. But if you've enjoyed the other books about Skye's family so far, you'll want to read this one, which is number four in the series.
Lost Love Found. Here is where the book described in the review on this page falls in Small's timeline. This one comes fifth in the "Skye" continuity, and third in the "Leslie" continuity.
Wild Jasmine. This is the sixth book in the story of Skye O'Malley's world, and it's the natural sequel to This Heart Of Mine. I don't plan to review this one for my site, because the heroine's time in the Orient takes place in India, which falls outside my geographical scope. But if you're hooked on the Skye O'Malley series, you'll probably want to read this one, too.