Wicked Widow (Vanza)

by Amanda Quick

Madeline Deveridge is all too aware of the whispers behind her back, the rumors that she dispatched her husband to the next world and concealed her crime. But Madeline has a far more pressing problem than being called the Wicked Widow. She fears that she and her beloved aunt are being haunted!

• ISBN10: 0553574116
• ISBN13: 9780553574111
• Publish Date: 27 February 2001 (first published 4 April 2000)
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Out of Print: 24 November 2015
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Inc
• Imprint: Bantam USA
• Format: Paperback (UK Trade)
• Pages: 330
• Language: English

Reviews

[celinenyx]

I enjoyed the idea of this novel, but the execution is horribly repetitive. Vanza, a core concept of this series, is a sort of secret society that focuses on collecting this mystical kind of scholarship, including fighting skills. This in itself is quite fun, but Vanza becomes a blanket term for anything in this story without any nuance or detail. There are Vanza herbs, Vanza fight moves, Vanza mazes, Vanza books, Vanza people, and they are referred to every page. The word lost all meaning to me.

The romance wasn't my cup of tea either. The first sex scene is horrifying: the hero doesn't know the heroine is still a virgin, and basically just thrusts his way in there like a storm ram. How romantic. The hero is patronizing in stressful situations, which is one of my least favourite tropes. Meh.