The Devil Wears Plaid by Teresa Medeiros

Title: The Devil Wears Plaid

Author: Teresa Medeiros

Published: 2010

Series: n/a

Rating: 2 1/2 stars

It’s every young girls dream to get married to a powerful, wealthy laird, is it not? Well, sure, for many it is. But when your darling groom to be is rapidly approaching 80, has teeth made of porcelain and is a bit hunched in the back, it’s not quite the dream come true.

Emmaline Marlowe has to marry someone rich to keep her family out of the poor house. With her third and final season in London coming to a close with no suitors beating down her papa’s door, the whole family is ecstatic when the Earl of Hepburn picks her as his third bride.

In comes dashing Jamie Sinclair, with a chip on his shoulder and revenge in his heart. The Hepburn’s and the Sinclair’s have been feuding for so, so long. But Jamie has sworn to avenge past injustices, and this time it’s personal. He steals poor, bewildered Emmaline away, willing to give her back once the ransom is returned. Obviously, things go wrong. How can he give her back, when she deserves far, far better than the Earl? Better than Jamie himself? And most appalling of all, to Emma, at least, is she’s beginning to realize she doesn't even want to be returned.

The Devil Wears Plaid by Teresa Medeiros was an interesting read for me. This is my first read by her, and although I noticed and appreciated how she did certain things differently, there were a few other things I could have done without.

These Highlanders are different from the Highlanders I’ve gotten accustomed to. I would have thought they were Lowlanders, they were so different. The story felt short to me, as if there just wasn’t enough of anything but she still put it all together. The romance, while sweet and lighthearted, didn’t give the oh my gosh, this is love vibe. The romance, the furor, the passion was lukewarm to me. No real action to speak of, except someone gets shot and they are promptly taken out of range and cared for. Oh, and we have the ever present fever that strikes.

If you want a story to breeze the time away, and aren’t too particular about your Highlanders, and don’t much mind tepid romance, go ahead and pick it up. I’ve read so many books that have the same story line, and I expected TS to take one aspect of the story line and change it, make it unique, but unfortunately, she did not.  TS seems to be a promising author though, so I’m not writing her off yet. I’m thinking about trying another of her historicals, such as Some Like It Wicked or Nobody's Darling and I’m very interested in trying her contemporary, Goodnight Tweetheart. But I will NOT be reading The Devil Wears Plaid again.