Pride Before Fall

[from dj flap of Mills & Boon reprint] At eighteen years old, Judy Wetherstone had never been ruled by anyone in her life, and had no intention of accepting any kind of authority or interference in her affairs; Joch Strathlean, the imperious Scotsman to whose guardianship she found herself entrusted, was equally determined to shoulder his responsibilities and to instil discipline and social polish into his rebellious ward. Finding this task too complicated in the confines of London, he bore her off to his family castle in Scotland, and there, against the wild yet magnificent background of the Highlands, the battle between the two implacable wills, between defiance and pride, reached its stormy climax.

First off, the book reviewed under this title and author on Amazon is NOT this book. At all. It's a prequel by Charlie Dalton (Perrin Briar, borrowing from DPS?) to his post-apocalyptic trilogy "After the Fall", complete with virus-induced Rage zombies, a city of safety and hope, and Dr. Graham Beck who (per reviews) is best friends with the President of the United States and, to my surprise, doesn't seem to end up being the one who actually created the virus. If that's your thing, check out its actual page. This Pride Before Fall may be equally derivative, but it's drawing from a WHOLE 'nother source.

I'm having trouble finding out much about Nan Sharpe, other than that she wrote a number of other titles for Mills & Boon. This one features one of their earlier, gorgeous dust jackets, and, our copy, an inscription on the flyleaf:

To Flora

with love

from Mam

Christmas 1948

I love this.

Pride Before Fall is a guardian/ward romance. I don't tend to warm to those -- I find the young girls' immaturity embarrassing, the older men's domineering (+, usually, sexism) annoying, and partnering with someone who's been in a position to discipline all kinds of red flags-inducing. This book is all that but Jock Strathlean's actually a more sympathetic character than many of his type -- he's only 32, and Sharpe gives him a VC, an almost over-the-top-traumatic backstory, and a rather surprising career. I don't want to spoil it (though, I suppose, I do, in the tags) but it's always fascinating to discover what occupations and avocations have been coded masculine or feminine at different points in history. The descriptions of how he's exercised his craft, while brief, are some of the best parts of the book -- they're wonderfully era-specific (see, for example, pages 154 and 157). Jock's also a great grandson and respectful of his grandmother in a way that makes you think he'd get over his sexism quickly were his destined partner not a young girl who really does behave, as he says at one point, as if she's "painfully stupid".

Otherwise, there are some interesting descriptions of Scotland's countryside (the Highlands) and Scottish history. I learned, among other things, about the Glencoe massacre of 1692. There's a bit of suspense, too, but it's mainly crammed into the last chapter, which feels rushed.

Flags: Suicide mentioned