Heather Simmons once lived in London with her father, wearing nice clothes and always have plenty food to eat. But her father was deep in his grief for his late Irish wife, Heather's mother. Now two years later, after losing him and being forced to come to live with her aunt and uncle, she now is their servant. All her belongings sold, except for one nice dress she isn't allowed to wear unless her aunt deems it necessary. An aunt who has no friends and is very bitter and a shrew of a woman. But then circumstances change, and she heads to London with her aunt and her brother, whom tries to force himself on her, and so she defends herself, thinking that she has killed him, flees from the scene, and finds herself taken onto Captain Brandon Birmingham's ship.
The Flame and the Flower is the first in the first in the Birmingham series. I think it was back in High School since I have read this one, so it was wonderful to read such a story such as this once again. There were many things that I had forgotten about it, and bit and pieces that left me surprised and delighted at the same time. This is a story of two people that seem complete opposite from the very beginning, however throughout the story we see how love can heal and build a trust. I truly loved both of these characters, however what I didn;t like was Brandon's character at the beginning of the book. But his edges got smoothed out throughout the rest of the book, so it was wonderful to see a change in this character. I found The Flame and the Flower to be a Sensational Romance which swept me off of my feet from beginning to end!!

First of all, this is a bodice ripper… the first one ever I believe. So if you aren’t into that, you will want to skip it. There is rape and slavery in the book. Of course, that’s where the name bodice ripper comes from, so it shouldn’t be a surprise. I don’t love that part of them, but I wasn’t shocked.

I couldn’t put this book down. A solid 5 star read with no rounding. After the rape, there is a forced marriage and then it’s all about the slow burn baby! Compared to today’s historical romance, the spice level is pretty low. I loved the mix of mystery, murder and intrigue mixed in with this love story.

Yeah, noooope - even in 1972 when this was written, the heroine's first night with the hero is Rape. With a capital 'R'.
There is nothing vaguely romantic about these scenes, there are even jokes made about it later. And yes, you read correctly - SCENES. As in multiple rapes.
Perpetrated by the hero. But I digress...

After nearly destroying my Kindle, I walked away for a day and then hung in there to finish the book as I was assured it got as better. No. False.

Second to the raping (as if we needed another reason to hate this book) the heroine is likely the reason the phrase TSTL even exists. Flat out the most useless, inconsistent, idiotic female I've ever read. Combine her with her rapey hero and the whole thing was just a dumpster fire. Cannot unread! 😖

#RitaWoodiwiss #RetoRita2
Primera experiencia bodicerippeada superada!

This was the worst book I have ever read. Wow. I have a strong Desire to bleach my brain now .
We start with Fatshaming the Aunt that is oh so jealous of her skinny Beautiful niece which is Why she abuses her :) Before we fatshame the aunts brother that "safes" her just so he could rape her. The way she escapes the rape is one of the most ridicoulus Things Ive ever read.
And then she meets Love Interest boy wo - although she begs and crys and screams and bites and says NO- rapes her. Not just once but twice.
We learn he thought she was a prostitute but NEWSFLASH a no is still a no! He then continues to be the embodyment of human garbage which just ....wow.
I feel betrayed by this book because it tried to Trick me. Had I know how fucked up it was , I would habe Never read a Single page.
Dont read it if you know whats good for you.

I love enemys to lovers but I Never signed up for rapists to Lovers -.- Could I give this book 0 Stars, Id do it.

At first, I wasn't sure what to make of it as the book is "old", but by the time it ended, I really enjoyed it. I've felt like I accomplished something as this book, supposedly, is the start of the romantic era.

content note, for my review, and for the book: rape (multiple rapes, by multiple men, of multiple women, the majority of whom are murdered after?)

It has never taken me this long to read a romance novel before.

And this is not because I never wanted it to end.

No, it's because the first couple chapters are RELENTLESS in the abuse of the (17yo) main character, ranging from sexual assault to emotional manipulation, by both family members, strangers, and eventual lovers. I literally had to stop reading it a few times. I stayed up later to avoid reading it before bed. If the author wanted to inspire a visceral sense of disgust and fear in me, well, she succeeded.

These feelings of disgust were all the greater in part because our romantic hero? He's the (primary) rapist, who then the book slowly tries to redeem, mostly by showing that he's a good person (...maybe slave-owner, maybe not?) in other aspects of his life.

In some ways, the book gets credit for calling a spade a spade: both characters acknowledge it was rape. But then we have moments like this intimate scene in bed, close to their HEA, when I suddenly understand all these alpha male characters who get filled with rage and just need to SMASH.

Brandon: "I'm glad that bastard who thought of putting you [in a whorehouse] met his end. Otherwise I might be tempted to go back and wring his blasted neck. He got what he deserved for trying to rape you."

She looked at him slyly. "You were the one who raped me. What were your just desserts?"

He grinned leisurely. "I received my just rewards when I had to marry a cocky wench like you." "

WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK.

There are still moments, very close to their Happy Ever After, when he gives her an ultimatum (accept him or another rape, how pleasant for his wife/mother of his child, but y'know, men gotta men, apparently), and when she is afraid that he will hit her.

I have never felt so gaslit by a book before. He never apologizes, his regret always comes with conditions, and the book tries to convince us that we're supposed to care for him? Heather, I can understand why she falls in love with him; this 18yo girl has been through a LOT (mostly at his hands) and I can't help thinking what a therapist would have to work through with her. But the "voice" of the book overall made me distrust the narration, if that makes sense. I refused to suspend my disbelief, because, nope. That ship sailed along with the Fleetwood, way back in Chapter 1.

I understand that it was published when premarital sex was frowned upon and women's sexual desire was more complicated. And there are some interesting elements, like how sex is not a path to intimacy, the mc is pregnant for most of the book, and how in domesticity lies Heather's power, drawing on her mother-in-law before her. And honestly, in some ways, the sheer lack of character development is kind of a marvel (I'm a bit serious here - I'm surprised that the book maintains its energy considering that Brandon does not change. at all).

But it's not worth it. Do not read this book unless you're doing so to gain a sense of romance novel history - or, of current times, since, y'know, it is still in print...

For more discussions of the racism (side-eye), ugly/fat/etc villains (eye-roll), and more, I recommend Hannah's review.

i swiped this from my step-mother (then, my father's girlfriend) and when my fourth grade teacher saw me reading it, she took it away and called my parents. then, i was in a world of shit and had to finish reading it surreptitiously as i was already more than halfway through and had to see how it ended. now, the whole episode strikes me as hypocritical and pointless since i'd already read both The Happy Hooker and The Lonely Lady. when i grew up, i had three kids and let them read whatever the hell they wanted to. so there.

More reviews available at my blog, Beauty and the Bookworm.

The second-to-last category of my 2017 romance reading challenge is done, and it was the last category I was dreading, since I saved one I was looking forward to for my final book. What was the category, you ask? The bodice ripper. And when you look up bodice rippers, the name of Woodiwiss abounds, so one of hers seemed like the logical choice to fill this category. Of course, bodice rippers are known for an abundance of rape and creepy men and unlikable heroines, so I pretty much knew what I was in for going into it.

The story is about Heather, living a life of drudgery with her aunt and uncle until her aunt's brother offers to bring her to London to get her a position teaching at a school--though when they arrive, he promptly attempts to rape her, ending in a struggle in which he's stabbed and Heather flees. Her flight ends rather abruptly when two sailors get hold of her and take her onto a ship where she meets Brandon Birmingham, the captain, who thinks she's a prostitute and does proceed to rape her, several times, despite her repeatedly telling him no and declaring she's not a prostitute. So, nice guy. Heather manages to flee again, back to her aunt and uncle, until it's discovered she's pregnant and they all return to London to force Brandon to marry her, with the help of a family friend. And then Heather is whisked away to America, where Brandon lives and plans to stay after retiring from his life at sea.

So, this is basically the story of an eighteen-year-old girl falling in love with her rapist, who is nearly twice her age. Brandon declares that he hates Heather for trapping him into marriage, and that she'll be nothing but a servant to him, but he never treats her as such. Though he does eventually threaten to rape her again if she doesn't come to him willingly. So there's that. Overall, he's not as rapey and creepy as most bodice ripper heroes, but I definitely still would not put in him the categories of "good guy" or "desirable romantic interest" because of the way he basically disregards Heather's feelings while simultaneously panting after her for the entire book. And, you know, how he says that he raped her eight months ago and she should be over it by now. Of course, to balance out Brandon's rather mild status are a bunch of other bodice ripper tropes--all other women hating Heather because she has Brandon and they don't and is prettier than them, all the other men wanting to rape Heather because she's pretty and innocent and naive, and a few murders thrown in for good measure.

The writing here is measurably better than the last bodice ripper I read, Savage Ecstasy, which was quite a relief. I wouldn't go so far as to say I enjoyed this book, but reading it wasn't the form of torture that SE was. It's all rather purple and melodramatic but again, that's something that I expected of a book in this genre in general. Heather's feelings for Brandon were completely unrealistic--she's afraid of him for a bit and then gaga over him in quick succession and laughs off her extremely traumatic rape within less than a year. But that's probably to be expected because Heather doesn't really seem to have much agency at all. Every now and then she gets mad and stamps her foot or breaks something, but these rages never lead to actual action and she just goes back to doing whatever Brandon wants--or whatever she thinks he wants--the next time he appears on the page. And then there's the portrayal of people of color--Brandon's housekeeper is black woman who is basically the embodiment of the Mammy stereotype (a la Gone with the Wind; it's a thing in books that take place during the era preceding the Civil War that black women are either portrayed as "the Mammy" or "the Jezebel" with little else to distinguish them) and it's questionable whether or not the "servants" were actually slaves. They're called servants, but everyone else in the Charleston area has slaves, sooooo...

Obviously, this is a very problematic book. The portrayal of "romantic rape," the women who are clearly sluts because they want sex but are not Heather, the "all ugly people are bad," the stereotyping of people of color, and all the other things I mentioned above all add up to it. However, as it wasn't as terrible--in writing, in brutality, in pretty much anything, as the last one I read, sooo...

1.5 stars out of 5.