B reads that intrigue

And so to my last category of B reads. I've had one that pleasantly surprised and one that slightly disappointed. Now onto the one that intrigued.

The Seducer is the first Madeline Hunter I've read. She's one of those well-known-in-the-US writers that a British romance fan might just hear about on blogs. I can't recall precisely where I heard her name, but recently Sula commented on a post of mine that she wishes Hunter still wrote medieval romance and Ann Aguirre commented over at CJs that she is a writer who never disappoints.

As is par for the course with me, I have selected, for my first read of a new-to-me author, a book right in the middle of a series. But then reading non-chronologically doesn't bother me especially.

The series deals with the various members of a fencing academy. Daniel is a mysterious and wealthy French merchant, and one of the few non-peers in the group. He is driven by an overwhelming desire for revenge, the full reasons for which only become apparent fairly late in the story (I was glad there was more to it than I had initially imagined). Diane was somehow rescued by Daniel as a child (when he was in his early 20s it seems) and deposited by him in an austere school for girls in France. He visits her there once a year. On his last visit in chapter 1 of the book, he takes her away with him, having discovered that she is in fact 20, though she could pass for younger, and that she intends to leave the school anyway to discover what she can about her family.

It is made plain from the outset that there is something about Diane that makes a relationship with her unpalatable to Daniel despite his attraction to her. It is also made plain that he is considering using her in his plan for revenge. Over the course of the book, we discover more about Daniel and Diane's respective histories and they gradually fall in love. There are a number of villains (of varying degrees) and a tightly plotted story. It's a well-structured, well-written book.

I didn't, however, find it entirely satisfying. Daniel is the seducer of the title but the only evidence we are given of his seductive personality is various hearsay comments by other characters in the book that he has seduced his way into society. We are never given any details of these seductions or the targets of his supposed skills. More than that, Daniel didn't strike me as a seductive man at all. In fact he was cold and distant and withdrawn. That has its own appeal but it struck me as odd that he was cast as a 'seducer' to no apparent end or purpose.

Nor was I entirely convinced by the central romance. There was a slight lack of a spark there for me. It was all very competent but it lacked that certain something that would have taken me that last step into total belief in the characters and the connection between them.

However, as I've said, what the book did do was intrigue me. There were a number of scenes that I took note of, thinking Hmmm, interesting. Here is a writer I want to read more from. In particular, that first chapter in which Daniel takes Diane away from the school has a fairly excruciating scene in which Diane is humiliated in front of Daniel. I was wincing and closing my eyes as I read. Any author that can make me feel that conflicted and uncomfortable (in a good way) gets my attention.

So have any of you read Madeline Hunter? Can you recommend a Hunter that might be an A read for me? I'm not a huge medieval fan but willing to give it a try.

Here ends the short series of B reviews.