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Making a Medieval Marriage Law Work For You
Lynne Graham's delightful novel, The Desert Sheikh's Captive Wife, is about arrogant Sheikh Rashad, doe-eyed Tilda Crawford, and the endless misunderstandings that led to their break-up five years ago. Unfortunately for Tilda, her mother is a complete dolt when it comes to her finances, and years ago signed over the ownership of her house to Rashad. Incredibly, she was not able to make a single mortgage payment, so she and her other children are about to be tossed on the street.
Tilda swallows her pride and pays a visit to her somewhat creepy ex-boyfriend, who is only open to collecting payment from her as a concubine in a faraway desert land. With no other options available to her, she reluctantly agrees. If the author had just left it with that scenario, the book would probably have been fairly hot, but something happens that will require readers to completely suspend all sense of the already suspended reality necessary to read romance novels in the first place.
To his senior aide, Rashad declares of Tilda, "She is my woman. She does not require a visa."
That seemingly innocent utterance sends in a motion a chain of events that result in the quickest of romance novel quickie weddings. We're treated to the explanation, "Once you declared Tilda yours before witnesses, it was a marriage by declaration." Apparently, this ridiculous law was enacted decades ago to clean up the scandal caused by Rashad's grandfather when he ran off with his grandmother with not the slightest intention of doing anything other than bedding her.
Uh huh.
I could possibly buy that, but I might suggest skipping such an elaborate, easy-to-poke-holes-through explanation and just writing something benign like "It was the law because it was always so" or something equally as vague. I mean, it's a fake country we're talking about anyway. So whatever.
So anyway, once the wedding occurs, the marriage is consummated, the misunderstandings are resolved, and Tilda's obligatory escape to London succeeds in bridging the gap between the two.
Needless to say, the final two chapters are exactly as tidy as you'd expect.
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