Very good romantic mystery.

This book has been on my to read list for 6 years and I am now kicking myself that I haven’t gotten around to reading it sooner!
I was skeptical about about the book at first, as I am of Asian descent and this book is written by a Caucasian male. To be completely honest I was worried that this book would be filled with overt racist characterizations of Chinese people, but I was happily proven otherwise.
While I must admit that the Chinese characters were not written in depth at all and for the most part existed only to move the plot forward. I can see that the author very likely did not mean any harm by writing them as such and I like to take things as face value. In fact, the author seems more open minded than how I believe some people in the 70s would have thought about embracing foreign cultures.
If I were to choose one point that did not make sense to me was the orphan girls inability to pronounce Lucy’s name. It is mentioned that the girls must speak only English every morning, and yet none of the girls, who were basically raised from the cradle by Lucy, could speak her name unaccented?
Despite what I mentioned above, this is truly a beautiful story of a girl finding her place and herself.

I enjoyed learning about China at the time this book takes place, and the reminder it give about how much we really have. There were a few twists that I️ had guessed but it was still fun to read them.
I️ like Lisa and her strength of character.

Review of Moonraker’s Bride:

This I grabbed at the Medford Library free book event for three reasons…it smelled amazing, the cover was so beautiful, and on the cover it said ‘a novel of romantic suspense’.
How could I not get it?
After all I am in a very strange place in what I have been choosing to read as of late and was in the mood for a little suspenseful calamity.

A story about a riddle that once solved, would lead the victor to treasure.
Along the way our protagonist gets dragged between two rival families fighting to solve the riddle first.
I loved most of this book.
It was strange and curious.
I could never guess who the good guys or bad guys were which I loved.
It had me all the way until the last page.
THE LAST PAGE you guys.
I don’t even know how to rate something I enjoyed all the way until the very last page…last sentence really…ugh! What is one to do?

This author also is a pen name. It’s a woman’s name, but the writer is a male which I found curious and didn’t judge until…you guessed it…the VERY LAST PAGE.
Do I recommend such a fate to befall you?
I will merely leave you with this warning.
Read at your own risk.

A very good historical romance novel with a lot of intimate details about Chinese (or rather, peasant) life - like cats being sold as rabbits, and a detailed appraisal of Chinese vs Western beauty standards. Quite a few minor characters were very likeable, and realistic, e.g. Mrs Falcon, Lord Shipley, and Dr Langdon. None of the Chinese characters were memorable, not even Yu-lan, whose character was never explored.

Lucy herself was a saint, but without personal development. Her character, though interesting, brave, and well written, intentionally never changes.

The obstacles she had to overcome never felt too difficult, because she herself just went along with it no matter what! She does not tell anyone until much later about two separate occasions that she was put in great jeopardy. Granted, her childhood explains this, but perhaps it would have been more believable had she reflected on the real possibility of death and took steps to prevent something similar from reoccurring, which she never did. She just went with the flow for the course of the novel.

A few interesting uses of Chekhov's Gun - the executioner, and the shield on the wall.

Because of the lack of personal introspection, this novel was a little frustrating, but the rest of it more than made up for it.

I would have to give this book a 4.5 at least. It has been a while since I read it. It is worthy of being read again, and I will!

I cannot remember how I managed to get this book in my possession-but I am forever glad that I have. This book is an amazing suspenseful novel. Though the beginning is a little slow, it picks up speed to the point where you don't want to put it down until the chapter is finished, which then the ending appears all too soon.
The characters are realistic and the plot detailed without over-fluffing. The author did a great job and I will be looking out for her other novels.

This book is no longer in print so good luck finding it. My sweet sister-in-law gave it to me, as I do a "book club" with my sisters-in-law. This story is so great! So different from anything I've ever read, very refreshing.

The writing is a bit more simplistic than what I'm used to, but it didn't bother me, considering it WAS written in 1973.

If you can get your hands on a copy of this book, I highly suggest you read it!

I received a book as a gift, and it has now become my go-to book to give people who love reading. Although everyone seems to love it, none of the people I have gifted it to have read it. The book is a delightful story with a strong female character, and it falls under the genre of historical fiction which I personally enjoy. Reading the book took me on a journey of distinguishing between what is accurate history and what is a part of the story, and it inspired me to delve deeper into the stories and lessons that the past can teach us.

So nostalgic! I was obsessed with this book as a teen and still love it.

The main character is born to English parents while they are missionaries in China in the 1800s. Her parents die and she is raised in an orphanage. When she is 17 she is sent to England to live. It was a fun read--part romance and part adventure. The target audience is young adults. There are a lot of coincidences in the book, but it is still a fun read.

Where has this book been all my life?! I've always passed over it, thinking I had read it back in High School when I was an avid reader of such writers as Phyllis A. Whitney and Victoria Holt, assuming it to be the same kind of saccharine historical romance. Then I read a synopsis of it more carefully and realized that it didn't sound familiar at all, so I decided to try it. What a revelation! Madeleine Brent's writing is way, way beyond the trite and redundant plotting and style of the aforementioned authors. This book has a lot of real substance to it as well as genuine research regarding the Boxer Rebellion in China during the last years of the nineteenth century. It tells the tale of an English girl born and raised in a poor Chinese-Christian mission, who is suddenly removed from her known environment and thrust into an upper-class British family. The culture shock and the resulting hilarity it produces is laugh-out-loud funny and an unexpected treat!
Is it perfect? Not at all. It has flaws to be sure. There are too many questionable coincidences and far-fetched resolutions to be realistic, but the compelling drive of the narrative more than makes up for these defects.
Another issue I found extremely appealing, is the handling of so-called feminism in the book. It is copyrighted 1973, so just as the feminist movement was gathering force. This concept is treated as I personally believe it deserves to be treated. That is: by acknowledging the sexist barriers which have existed for centuries, exposing the differing levels of cultural bias towards women in various countries, while showing women and girls in action, proving how absurd some of the customs and restraints were. The capable women portrayed in this story did not have an ax to grind, they just got on with circumventing any socially accepted barriers to their gender and quietly proved what they could do! In complete contrast to the heroine of the book, Lucy Waring, there are the ultra-Victorian women of the Gresham family. They would make even the most reactionary chauvinist cringe!
I thoroughly enjoyed the book until the last 15 pages when the author suddenly starts channeling Barbara Cartland's Regency Romances by giving the reformed rake his classic speech of how he was beyond redemption until true love saved him!
My advice? Quit reading on page 335 and you won't miss a thing except an anticlimax!