Review: Provoked

Provoked by Joanna Chambers
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Provoked had some very interesting characteristics that I found set it apart from some of the other romances set in the same period.
First of all for once we aren't in London, although there really wasn't very much said about Edinburgh, it was nice to be somewhere else for a change. Secondly, David Lauriston isn't of the Ton and isn't of the lower-class, he's basically just on the cusp of lower-middle-class thanks to his dedicated scholarship and has a very good chance of bettering his place even more.
The drawback of this is that we end up having to read a bit too much about how he misses working on his father's farm. These jaunts into semi-depressed nostalgia gets a bit wearing at times but goes into David's character as being a bit heavy on the self-flagellant side of things.
Which leads me to my next point, true to the time period and David's very clear ideas of what is right and wrong, he has some major issues about his love for men. His thoughts about this can be a bit on the depressing side of things to read to say the least.

Counter that mind-set with Lord Murdo Balfour aggressive anything goes and pleasure before theological debate view, and neither character comes-off at their best.

I found myself highly irritated with Balfour's dismissive and insulting attitude towards David's beliefs, not just those in the bedroom, but about human kind at large. There were more than a few times that I muttered 'you can do better than HIM David,' throughout the book.
Without giving too much away, the main issue I had with David's self-denial was that it seemed to weaken him to Balfour's desires too easily and to an extent that I was a little worried about David's consent.

This is the first in a series and ends on a sort of sweet-sour note. I am interested in reading the next one mostly due to wanting to see David ending up in a happy place. Balfour can take a flying leap for all I care.

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