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Review: The Winter Rose, by Jennifer Donnelly

The Winter Rose is the story of India Selwyn-Jones and her lover, the fugitive from justice Sid Malone. The book is a continuation of The Tea Rose, starring the Finnegan family, and it follows the main characters through the underworld of turn-of-the-last-century London.

The bad: The good guys are too good and the bad guys, personified in India's fiancé Freddie, are too bad. India seems as though she's a 21st-century woman in 19th-century garb. The writing is over-the-top and unbelievable at times, and it sounds as though the author cut-and-pasted it from a romance novel. Its too much of an epic, and I felt as though Donnelly tried to bite off too much.

Still, in spite of all this, I found myself turning the pages rapidly. Donnelly knows how to keep the action fast-paced, and she keeps her readers hooked, not knowing what's going to happen next. Recommended for readers who liked The Crimson Petal and the White.
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