THE THROBBING MEMBERS REVIEW: The Windflower by Laura London
Where was the romance in this romance novel? It was just plot. -Catherine
I just wanna know which one of the authors got Cat in the divorce. -Smurf
No criticisms... only pirates. -Sarah
I wish someone had walked the plank but I was along for the ride. -Margo
Theme Song: Horny Angry Tango by Rachel Bloom & Scott Michael Foster
Summary: In the middle of the War of 1812, Merry is kidnapped by Pirates, who all become obsessed with her. Especially the hottest pirate of them all... Devon.
Review: Laura London may claim to be a romance novelist, but clearly, she is more interested in describing the landscape than developing the alleged romance (or sexual tension) between Merry and Devon(?). I was nearly 300 pages in before I could figure out which character was supposed to the love interest. Like I KNEW, they were supposed to be the main characters and therefore they had to be in ~love~ or lust or whatever, but dear god, they did not show it. Even now that I have determined that Devon is the love interest, I am convinced that she made a mistake and actually means for it be Cat.
Merry, despite her name, is clearly determined to be miserable. As of pg. 370, and theres not been any sex yet. What the fuck. “Foolishly, [I] felt a hollow aching need for[…]” this book to be fucking over.
This terrible married couple who later got divorced were mixing their tropes, and it was obvious which person wrote each section. There would be things like Devon’s grandmother bringing Merry to London to marry her Grandson, which is ironic and funny, and then some deeply underwhelming sex scenes with deeply weird word choices. Ultimately, I was let down my promise of it being a deeply problematic bodice ripper about pirates and very disappointed. Maybe thats on me though, I let my expectations get ahead of me.
Perhaps like this review, the book just went on too long. It seemed like there was an arbitrary word count they needed to make and so they had to keep coming up with new complicated subplots, most of which are either inconsequential or boring. For reasons that escape me, there was a very dragged out subplot about Merry nearly dying from Malaria after she tried to escape in what has to be one of the worst escape attempts of all time (next to every other single one of her other attempts) was truly deeply unneeded and it made the book much longer than it needed to, and therefore much worse.
Most of the description was so unneeded. It must have added at least 200 pages of things that no one cared about. But the description of everyones clothes? NOW that is important information that is needed.
Once again, I have chosen a terrible book.
Historical Accuracy: 5/10
The authors clearly did their research, but it was ruined when the characters opened their mouths.
They were having fun, but there were way too many words used.
The flower nicknames were okay at first but by the time we got to the end we were done.
Notes: Why couldn’t Devon have been a little bit meaner?
