The Groom Wore Plaid
By Gayle Callen
Publisher: Avon
Release Date: February 23, 2016
The follow-up to The Wrong Bride, The Groom Wore Plaid’s hero and heroine, Owen Duff and Maggie McCallum have agreed to honor the marriage agreement that Owen’s father tried to cheat the family out of having to fulfill (see: The Wrong Bride). Maggie has loved Owen from girlhood and at first believes this is a dream come true. Until she has one of her prophecy dreams, in which she sees Owen die on their wedding day. Thus, she spends the rest of the book trying to convince Owen (a man of science, no less) that her gift-curse is real and if they marry, he will die.
Owen, of course, thinks she’s just saying whatever to get
out of marriage, innocent that she is, and he keeps trying to reassure her
their marriage will be fine. Nothing to be afraid of. She does a number of
things to turn him off her: dressing as if she were getting fat and
unattractive, acting in ways that would embarrass him, and a number of other
tried and true marriage-killers. None of them work, because Owen—the man of
science—knows she’s just being superstitious and silly and he will prove
nothing is going to happen.
Of course, there are disturbing incidents made against
Maggie—someone clearly doesn’t want her to be part of the clan. Owen
rationalizes most of these, but does make sure there are more people around his
bride-to-be, just in case. For reasons I’m still not clear on, they end up
making love; and a week or so later, Maggie comes to Owen and says she’s reluctantly
agreeing to marry him after all because she had another dream in which it was
revealed she is carrying his child and she doesn’t want her child born a
bastard.
On the day of their wedding, after a day of festivities,
Owen is stabbed and left bleeding to die. Her dream is coming to truth after
all. After some scrambling around, the culprit is discovered…and it is
discovered Owen had requested a doctor to stay with them during the wedding
festivities so Owen is saved after all. He didn’t believe her, per se, but he
respected her fears enough to make sure a doctor was on hand.
I did not enjoy this one quite as much as The Wrong Bride. I
could not read it straight through and I did not form attachments to either
Owen or Maggie (i.e. I did not care about their outcomes). Part of me was
annoyed by Owen’s rather patronizing way with Maggie, how he didn’t respect her
gift, which while logical for the character did not make me believe this story
could end in happily ever after when he couldn’t respect her beliefs. Maggie’s
behavior confused me and I simply could not lose myself or believe in the
romantic storyline of these characters. I give it 3 stars for these reasons.
~Hellie
Thanks for the review. I do have this book but haven't started it yet. Now, I don't think that I will bother to read it.
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