Wild Orchids download epub

I DNF at 6%. Why? First, inconsistency in the heroine’s backstory. Her mother became disabled when heroine was 17. Heroine spent the next 10 years caring for her mother. Her mother would not allow a non-family member to take care of her, and the only other family was heroine’s uncooperative older married-with-children sister. For instance, Heroine took one weekend away and her mom ended up with a broken hip and blamed heroine. Get the picture? She was a martyr. A doormat. But wait! She’s a teacher! But at what point did she have time to get a degree and teacher’s certification, then become gainfully employed? She is 27 years old as the story opens, so there hasn’t been time, right? Oh, and how did she get a fiancé of 4 years if she couldn’t leave her mom alone. At what point would she have had a chance to date?
Second reason to hate the heroine and DNF. The racism and stereotyping of Mexico and its inhabitants are blatant. Also, shouldn’t this woman have understood (or researched) what the weather was like in Cancun in July? Heroine is very whiny.
Third (and biggest) reason for DNF is the “hero” and the heroine falling in love with him (I’m assuming, since I quit reading after he got violent the second time).;He kidnaps her at gunpoint, calls her bitch twice and gets physically abusive. There is no excuse or reason this guy could redeem himself in my eyes. A man who terrorizes an innocent person cannot become a sympathetic character, I don’t care what kind of stress he is under. In fact, if stress causes him to get verbally and physically abusive, that is pretty much a guaranteed go-to response. And this guy is supposed to be the romantic lead? This woman is supposed to fall in love with him? That ain’t love. It’s Stockholm Syndrome.
This type of book, and the “bodice rippers” published in the same era (1970s-80s) were why I quit reading romance for over a decade. My sister had to convince me that rape romance was a thing of the past before I would read one of her recommendations (of course, since 50 Shades was published, sexual violence in romance is becoming more common again).

Karen Robards is a good writer; I have enjoyed many of her books. However, Wild Orchids, written back in the 80's or thereabouts will not be going on my keeper shelf.

The hero Max in Wild Orchids kidnaps heroine Lora in the opening chapter. They are in Mexico, Cancun, when he jumps into her car at gunpoint and forces her to drive him out of the city. Lora is a school teacher on vacation by herself and she is rightfully terrified of Max who is brutish, hostile and menacing. Several times he threatens to strangle her.

The two end up together for a while due not only to Max's gun trained on Lora but also because they are stuck in the Mexican jungle. Seems Max likes to hang out with some bad guys, no surprise, and now Lora is along for the ultimate travel adventure. Lora gets over her initial terror of Max, finds him a hottie and she falls in love. She looks over his bad traits and finds the good supposedly hiding inside. This is Stockholm syndrome 101.

I like a bad boy in a romantic tale but Max left me wanting more. He is cruel and threatening. And unlike many bad boys that turn out to be romantic heroes, he lacks nobility and doesn't do much to redeem himself. He uses the threat of rape and murder to subdue the heroine and he also threatens other innocents, this was to save his own skin, not for some higher purpose of protecting others. It's night impossible to enjoy a book where the hero is so blindingly selfish. What keeps this from a one star rating is that Karen Robards really knows how to create a scene, whether it is in the jungle or in a cramped VW. Her hero though lacks charm.

Reading Wild Orchids by Karen Robards for the 3rd time doesn’t seem to have diminished my enjoyment factor of the novel by even one iota. Call me crazy but even with the massive amount of books I have on my review pile, I just had to pick this one up and read it in one sitting yet again because the magic that is Max and Lora is an unbeatable one for me.

37 year old John Roberts Maxwell (Max) is a man hardened by the reality of war that had been his way of life when he had been enlisted in the Vietnam war. Leaving a piece of his soul behind due to the decisions he had been forced to make, Max comes home a changed man, a man incapable of giving what his innocent wife had demanded of him. A cynic to the core, Max doesn’t realize that life as he knows it would cease to exist the moment he kidnaps the prim and proper Lora in his attempt to evade the authorities of Mexico.

27 year old Lora Susan Harding is finally a free woman with the right to while away her time as she pleases. Having spent most of her life trying to put others needs first, Lora is ecstatic with the thought of exploring the exotic Mexico, the first vacation she has ever taken in her life. However, from the very start, her vacation refuses to proceed along as she envisoned it and being kidnapped at gun point by a disreputable looking man with an American accent just seems to be the icing on the cake.

At first, Lora is scared out of her wits at the thought of the less than savory acts her captor might try and force on her. A lady through and through, Lora hardly accepts herself to find her captor ridiculously sexy to the extent of ogling him and eating him up with her eyes every chance she gets. No stranger to the world of intimacy, Lora however has no clue that the uninhibited creature that emerges from deep within her that just wants to lick her delectable and broody captor from head to toe is a side of her that exists.

After Lora’s multiple attempts to escape which falls flat on her face every single time, Lora comes to the disturbing conclusion that she has a bad case of the Stockholme’s syndrome if judging the way all her emotions go haywire around Max is anything to judge herself by. Through a chain of events, Lora finds herself stranded in the midst of a Mexican jungle, depending on Max for her very survival. As the proximity heightens the already taut live wire of sexual tension between them, both Max and Lora find themselves to be no match for its heady power.

Wild Orchids would always remain by far my most favorite novel by Karen Robards. For some, Max might not be the stuff dreams are made out of. But when push comes to shove, Max is a man who delivers and Lord does he deliver! A man who is leery of commitment and relationships, Max cannot believe himself when he starts lusting after the prim schoolteacher who lands in his life. The harder he tries to shove her thoughts and presence out of his mind, the more tenacious her hold on him becomes and its a match that Max loses, rather ungraciously at first. Vital, sexy and the ultimate dangerous hero is how I would describe Max.

Lora’s character is an endearing mix of innocence and practicality all laced into one with a body that practically drives Max to the brink of insanity. It is the way she reaches far deeper than just his baser emotions that has Max struggling to shove her away with all his might, a man reluctant to share his demons with a woman Max thinks would be just as incapable of handling reality as his ex-wife had seemed to be.

Though towards the end, I definitely want a bit more grovelling from Max every time I read this one, I think the ending itself might be growing on me as I didn’t find it that sorely lacking the third time around. It seemed a fitting ending based on both Max and Lora’s characters and my bet is Lora loves Max too much to even give him enough leeway to do much grovelling even if it were to come to that.

The best thing about this book, hands down is the raw, explosive and primitive passion between two people that just serves as one whole session of sensory overload from start to finish.

Highly recommended!

MBR's Rating = 5/5 [OUTSTANDING READ!]