The Piratical Miss Ravenhurst by Louise Allenreviewed by Lyndsey LeaskSeptember 2009, 288 pages, Publisher: Harlequin, ISBN: 0373295596 Back Cover Blurb: Miss Clemence Ravenhurst never expected to find herself dressed as a boy and fleeing through the night time streets of Kingston, Jamaica. Nor was being snatched by some of the nastiest pirates in the Caribbean the sort of thing a wealthy heiress expected to happen. But even worse than life on board Red Matthew McTiernan's ship was the realisation that she was falling in love with Nathan Stanier, renegade naval officer, ship's navigator and her only protector. Clemence finds herself fighting for her life and her love on both the high seas and the drawing rooms of fashionable England alongside a man with his own battle between his desires and his duty.
The Piratical Miss Ravenhurst is the final installment in Louise Allen's Ravenhurst sextet, and features everything from pirates to appearances from five happily married couples. While I doubt that I could possibly deeply enjoy any book which marked the end of such a fun series, simply because I don't want it to be over yet, I do wish that this novel had concluded the sextet on a stronger note.
Before I go any further, I have to say that I really admire Ms. Allen for bucking convention with many of the couples in this series. So many historical romances feature heroines whose heroes are richer or of a higher station than they are. Not so with Those Scandalous Ravenhursts, and perhaps this subversion of the trope is part of what makes the Ravenhursts so very scandalous indeed. Three of the stories feature men being the ones to marry up, and two feature marriage between those of equal station. I found this so refreshing over the course of the series, especially since the men were very strong and sexy despite not being richer or more aristocratic than the heroines.
The death of Clemence Ravenhurst's father left her in quite a lot of trouble. Her uncle, now her guardian, isn't exactly the outstanding man her father had expected him to be. In order to gain access to her fortune, he's trying to force her to marry his equally horrid son, Lewis. When faced with an ultimatum - she must marry Lewis or he will rape her each night until she becomes pregnant and, consequently, has to marry him - Clemence decides that she needs to escape. She fakes her own death and disguises herself as a boy, hoping to gain employment and travel to England on one of the ships she's inherited and take refuge with her powerful family there. Things go wrong when she's captured by pirates and forced to act as the new navigator's cabin boy.
Nathan Stanier doesn't like the pirates he's working for on his new undercover assignment, but knows that if he stays focused and does his job properly, they'll be apprehended. Sounds simple, right? Too bad his new cabin boy is intruding on his thoughts so much, especially since he's never been attracted to another male before. But there's just something about young Clem...
When Nathan realizes that his cabin boy is actually a girl, he's relieved. But he's also aroused. Clemence, in turn, is drawn to Nathan despite believing he's voluntarily working for the pirates. Will their budding relationship be able to survive when their time on the pirate ship is over and the truth of Clemence's identity is revealed? Will Nathan marry her to save her reputation, now in tatters, or will memories of his miserable first marriage destroy any chance they have at a happy future?
Nathan and Clemence are a good match, and I can both believe and understand why they're in love with one another. I loved that the pirates – the real pirates, not the sexy undercover naval officer – were truly piratical. They were nasty, cruel, and crude, and it felt much more authentic than many of the stories I've read in which the pirates were really privateers and therefore "good guys." I also loved revisiting characters from the previous books and knowing they were happy. I especially enjoyed reading about Sebastian and Gareth, my two favourite Ravenhursts.
What I didn't like was that Clemence's behavior veered towards being TSTL a couple of times on the pirate ship, particularly when Nathan had to suffer the consequences of her unnecessary actions. She did eventually stop doing dumb things, but by then there was a part of me that just couldn't like her much. I also got frustrated with Nathan in the second half of the book. His protestations felt a bit too similar to Eden's in The Notorious Mr. Hurst, but Eden had more reason to be making them than Nathan did. As a result, I felt Nathan came off as a bit whiny.
Overall, though, The Piratical Miss Ravenhurst is a decent conclusion to the Ravenhurst sextet. While I wish its main characters had been a bit different, there were many things I enjoyed about it. It could have been better, but it could also have been much, much worse.
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