Review: Pride & a Pregnancy Secret

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ll state up front that Secret Baby plots are my least favourite substrain of romance. The thought of getting pregnant by some man who doesn’t want children fails to ping any of my particular kinks. Also, the way the heroes of these things suddenly flip 180° on a fairly serious matter, and suddenly discover they want a houseful of children after all, annoys me. I’d honestly find it more romantic if at the end the hero declared he loved the heroine too much to live without her, proposed, and confessed he still wasn’t that into kids but would try his best to be a good father anyway.

So why did I buy this? Well, the hero is a green-eyed Australian. I may not like fertile wafflers, but I have a definite thing for green-eyed Australians. And I liked the title–it not only provides clear warning of the Secret Baby plot, but the reference to Austen is cute, and the author later provides a house nicknamed Pemberley, and a line for the hero in which he says, “I’m not some Jane Austen hero.” You’re telling me, dude.

The book’s main strength is its heroine, Jessica Cotter. She suffers the usual self-induced miseries of Secret Babyhood, but she has enough backstory to make her actions credible. Also, she has a slight chip on her shoulder about rich arrogant bastards, which makes more sense than if she’d fallen for this particular hero without envy, resentment, or any sense of being an outsider.

Another strength: the other female characters. Only one is a jealous backstabber. The others are supportive friends, or encouraging members of the hero’s family. There’s also the heroine’s mother, and the hero’s own deceased mother, both of whom had problems and hinted storylines of their own, and they’re presented warmly and sympathetically. Nice: it’s good to have a full, rich cast of supporting females who don’t hail from the Land of Jealous Cats.

The book’s weakness is its hero, Ryan Blackstone. It pains me to criticize anyone with green eyes and an Aussie accent, it really does, but Mr. Waffle here is an extreme case of conversion to Joyful Fatherhood. It’s extremely annoying. His ground rules, we’re told eleventy-billion times, are, “No cats. No kids. No press. No diamond rings.” By the last chapter he’s presented the diamond ring, declared himself proud and delighted to be fathering twins, is kissing Jessica at a press-laden launch of the new season’s diamond collection, and has invited her to bring her cat to live with them. In the face of firm opinions like his, one can’t help but wonder what their future holds. Will he change his name? His career? His sex? Sure, today he’s a gem dealer named Ryan Blackstone, but by the time the twins are born he could easily be a blonde welder named Sally. Let’s hope Jessica wants an adventurous life.