The Bride and the Beast
If you are looking for a book well grounded in its time and place, full of interesting historical events and details, this book will not satisfy you. If you are looking for a romantic story, it may. This novel takes place in the superstitious village of Ballybliss, Scotland in 1761. Fifteen years earlier someone in the village betrayed the local Laird and his young heir to the English for a thousand pounds in gold. Their ruined castle is now inhabited by a Dragon, which makes periodic demands upon the village. One night they seek to placate the Dragon by offering it a sacrificial offering–a virgin. The townswomen seem a rather lusty lot, and there is only one virgin available, our heroine Gwendolyn. She is well-read and very intelligent, and doesn’t quite believe in dragons. However, this doesn’t make her any more amenable to being a sacrifice.
The Dragon, if dragon he be, is able to assume human form. After lashing out at her imprisonment in highly luxurious quarters, Gwendolyn begins to feel more than anger at the Dragon. And does the Dragon return her feelings? Much of this novel plays out in the castle ruins, where historical events are few and far between, though later in the novel the reader is given a better sense of the situation between England and Scotland. This was a light, fluffy read.
