1 star

It was a bad sign that Bertrice Small’s The Innocent features one of her dullest covers ever. The lone positive was that it was designed as one last covers created by legendary artist Elaine Duillo, for her dear friend Bertrice.

Taking a break from Small’s usual romances where the heroine is captured by some salacious sultan and enslaved in his harem, The Innocent is a rather ho-hum medieval. The heroine is a former nun named Eleonore, who goes by the ridiculous name Elf. Elf is a paragon of virtue, saintliness, and sweetness and is totally dull. She is made to marry Ranulf, an equally boring character who patiently introduces Elf into the arts of love.

There’s an evil villain, a hired killer, who falls in love with Elf for her purity and goodness, but all I could wonder was WHY? She, like most Small heroines, is perfect beyond belief.

Ok, I lied when I said the reason behind the cover was the sole positive aspect of this book. The villainess, Isleen, is such a caricature of slutty evilness, she’s hysterical. She hates Elf and is her total opposite: a cruel, bitchy who-ore who will stop at nothing to have Elf killed.... Read more “Historical Romance Review: The Innocent by Bertrice Small”