Vixen in Velvet

Loretta Chase's newest follows the youngest of the three Noirot sisters in her Dressmakers' series. Ms. Chase has previously stated that VIXEN IN VELVET was delayed due to a lack of creative juices, so to speak. Knowing this, I find that I didn't love this book as much as I wanted to after finishing SCANDAL WEARS SATIN. All the things that made me love the previous Dressmakers books are still present: the fabulous dresses, the spunky heroine, the lush descriptions. I just found that this book never rose to the level of making my insides melt.

Leonie and Lisburne enter into a wager concerning the marriageability of one of Leonie's clients. While I don't really like bet-based plot devices, my issue with their bet is not the bet itself, but the terms of the bet. Leonie wants a painting Lisburne owns, while Lisburne wants 2 weeks away with her. Proposing an illicit sexcapades getaway doesn't strike me as hero material, and even after Lisburne realizes he's in love with Leonie, he continues to make reference to the terms of the bet. I just found that plot line distasteful and not in keeping with hero behavior. Similarly I thought Chase relied heavily on the Dreadful DeLucey "brand" as code for character traits that could have been better fleshed out.

Had I not known that VIXEN IN VELVET was delayed because of problems, I wonder if I would have liked it better. Complaints aside, I did think Leonie and Lisburne were well matched, and I enjoyed the secondary characters as much as the cameos of previous pairings. I think this may be the end of the Dressmakers series just based on the epilogue provided, but I hope not because there's many more characters I'd like to see get their happy ending, and I just plain old like the world that Chase has built here.