GENRE: Fiction/Historical Romance
SETTING: Mississippi, USA 1875
SERIES: Bragg Saga, #3
PURCHASE: link
MY GRADE: C
SYNOPSIS: Impassioned suffragette Grace O'Rourke made a startling first impression on golden-boy Rathe Bragg when she crashed a society party wielding a six-shooter and spouting feminist slogans from atop the grand piano. And from that moment the sparks between them never stopped flying.
Soon, the irrepressible Grace had outraged the entire town of Natchez with her radical ideas -- infuriating Rathe most of all. Yet he was obsessed with taming the vibrant, stubborn, passionate lass ... and making her his mistress. But despite her shocking attraction to the virile rogue, Grace firmly rejected his scandalous proposition. And for Rathe, of course, "no" was the ultimate challenge!
Grace is a school teacher and a women's rights activist. She meets Rathe briefly in the prologue, which takes place in New York. She meets him again two years later, in chapter one, because he's Louisa's lover, and he's there visiting her at her plantation home when Grace arrives to begin her job.
Rathe is attracted to Grace right away and soon recognizes her as the woman from New York two years before. Rathe and Grace don't get along at all. He gives Grace a ride home one night and Louisa gets very jealous and fires Grace. Grace is on her way to visit her friend Allen Kennedy and runs into Rathe again. He overhears Grace telling Allen that she's almost out of money. Rathe then decides to make her his paid mistress.
The rest of the book is just plain boring. Grace is desperate for money and finally gives in and becomes his mistress. They love each other, he wants to marry her but she'd rather be his mistress because that way, she's still her own woman and can do as she pleases without having to answer to a husband. She wants to continue trying to teach school to young black children even though some people, including the sheriff, are trying to run her out of town. She leaves Rathe, with the help of his ex mistress Louisa. The sheriff rips her necklace off of her when he see's her at Louisa's. Later, the new church is burned down and there is a burned body there wearing her necklace. Rathe assumes that the dead body is Grace and is upset, obviously. He travels home to Texas to visit his parents and sister Storm and her family. While they're all out somewhere, he see's Grace. He rushes over to her and they decide right there to get married.
In the epilogue, it's over four years later and they have a four year old daughter named Lucy. She has her own book, one of my top favorites, The Fires of Paradise.
I've read this book at least three times since I first bought it in 1995. I didn't like it too much the first time and I still don't like it at all.
The Bragg series is to be read in this order:
Innocent Fire- This is the story of Nick's parents.
Firestorm- The story of Nick's sister Storm.
Violet Fire- Story of Nick's brother Rathe.
Dark Fires- Nicholas Bragg.
The Darkest Heart- The story of Shoz's (from The Fires of Paradise) parents.
The Fires of Paradise- Nick's brother Rathe's daughter Lucy's story.
Scandalous Love- Nick's oldest daughter Nicole's story.
Secrets- Nick's youngest daughter Regina's story. Her husbands name is Slade Delanza.
After Innocence- The story of Slade's youngest brother Edward and his wife Sophie.
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