Kiss An Angel
Title: Kiss An Angel
Author: Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Pages: 384 (Mass Market Paperback)
This was one of the few SEP books I hadn't read yet. Considering I pretty much devour anything Phillips puts out, it's amazing that I had missed this one over the years.
Kiss An Angel was an interesting read for me. The back cover blurb kind of threw me off, with the talk of Alex wanting to "tame" Daisy. A part of my brain kept thinking, "bodice ripper alert!" But the other part of my brain kept saying, "But this is SEP. SEP doesn't write bodice rippers. Plus, this is a contemporary. Can contemporary romances even *be* bodice rippers?"
Bodice ripper this was not. Granted, there were some aspects of the book that were definitely throwbacks to the old school bodice ripper--an arranged marriage, heart of gold heroine, alpha male heroine, domineering father, possible connection to a Russian dynasty, traveling circus...
Okay, so maybe the traveling circus part kind of took this out of bodice ripper territory. But still, all the old tropes were there. I mean, what kind of father forces his daughter to either marry some stranger or go to jail, do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars? Max Petroff, that's who.
See, Daisy's dad (the aforementioned Max Petroff) is just a tad bit obsessed with Russian history. And, well Alex (according to Max) is actually a Romanov and the heir, so to speak, of the Romanov throne/fortune/title. And Max thinks Daisy's fluff-brained enough to fall for the whole scheme, do as they both say and be a good little girl. The problem is that Max doesn't give his daughter enough credit and vastly underestimates her intelligence, not to mention her pluckiness.
At any rate, the book opens with Alex and Daisy getting married--and Daisy can't remember Alex's name (she'd only met the guy the night before for the first time). After the ceremony, they don't even stay long enough for cake--Alex is carting her off to the airport and North Carolina, where they join up with the Quest Brothers circus, which Alex manages. Now, Daisy's led a pretty pampered, sheltered life and has never had to work, so imagine her surprise at A) living in a beat up, rusty travel trailer and B) having to, well, work. And travel with the circus. There's that, too.
Daisy, though, is stubborn. And even after being framed by a teenage girl for stealing 200 bucks (and being ostracized by everyone in the circus--somehow that concept seemed really funny just now when I typed it out), she stands her ground and doesn't give up. Of course Alex begins to develop a grudging sort of admiration for her, even though he thinks she's a thief.
Speaking of Alex...talk about one screwed up hero. SEP tends to write heroes with mommy issues. Alex has uncle issues, as in his uncle used to get his rocks off by beating Alex bloody every day with his whip (like, a horse whip y'all). This has made Alex a little, how can I say this gently? Well, a little bit a prick. He's cold, shuttered, an asshole. Honestly, I couldn't stand him for about the first hundred pages of this book, and I almost stopped reading it numerous times because he was just too alpha and too mean to Daisy at times. But I forged ahead because, well, this is SEP we're talking about, and I have faith. I know if anyone can redeem an overbearing asshole of an alpha hero, it's SEP. And redeem him she did.
I have to say, too, that the whole circus thing really threw me off. At first I was like, "The circus? Seriously? The circus?" But the circus itself was almost like another character in a way. Yes, the fact that it was a traveling circus helped to force Daisy and Alex into close quarters on a daily--and nightly--basis, so in that way it was a different twist on a well-used romance plot device. But the politics within the circus really helped to create all kinds of conflict between Alex and Daisy (and other characters). I have to say it was a very well used plot device, and ended up being quite interesting.
Most interesting, though, was the slight hint of a paranormal element in this book. See, Daisy ends up being able to communicate with the circus' tiger, an aging Siberian who's quite cranky (he has every right to be cranky, though). What's funny about this is that, well, Daisy's afraid of animals, especially little yapping dogs. So she befriends Sinjun (the tiger) and takes over the care of the menagerie, where there's also a gorilla, a llama and a camel. Honestly, though, my favorite character was probably Tater, a baby elephant who pretty much falls in love with Daisy. He's just so...adorable. He follows her around everywhere, gives her elephant hugs and kisses, bats his eyelashes at her...it's just freaking adorable.
This book honestly wasn't as good as most of SEP's other novels. I'm not saying it was bad, because it was far from it, but it just wasn't as good as what I'm used to from her. Like I said, I had a hard time getting through the first 100 pages or so. It wasn't as witty as her work usually is. And there's head-hopping, which I don't usually notice from her.
But the idea of a modern arranged marriage was an interesting one, and worked well, I thought. The circus element added a lot to the story, and it's hard not to like Daisy. She's just so freaking sweet.
I give it:
