‘A BREED APART’ BY JEANNE DAY LORD

I have seen A BREED APART (Pocket, 1988) very often during my many trips to used bookstores across the land but I always chose to leave the novel behind. Why? Well, it does have a great ‘80s cover art by famed photographer Onofrio Paccione, I’ll admit that, but the subject matter is a little bland for my taste. It’s all about horses; thoroughbred racing, to be precise. I figured if it isn’t written by Jilly Cooper (Google her) the best thing is to keep away, and I did, for many years. Then one late summer during our vacation in Miami I found a copy real cheap. Again I got tempted and, suffice to say, succumbed despite my misgiving. Did I eventually regret the decision of buying it? Keep on reading, people. 

First and foremost, I had no idea at the time that A BREED APART was written by Robert Rosenblum, this multitasker fellow whose use of pseudonyms (Joanna Kingsley, Jessica March...) made him hot for a little while in the ‘80s. To me, Jeanne Day Lord was solely a one hit wonder novelist published a year earlier in the UK. It took this blog and the web to finally figure out who she really was.  

Since my last Rosenblaum novel, FACES by Joanna Kingsley, failed to impress me, I held on a couple of years before venturing into this one. One night after reviewing many forthcoming books for Net Galley I decided to give this guy another shot. Who knows? I might hit the jackpot after all. Besides, I was in desperate need to read some vintage trash, any vintage trash. People often think that calling a book trashy or sleazy is quite demeaning. But to me, it’s always been the highest of compliments. It means that the work in question is hitting all the right buttons. The more glamorous the novel gets, the more fun I end up having. Sure, the narrative needs to always be on point but put me up with the trouble of the rich and I’m a happy guy.  

This Jeanne Day Lord effort, however, failed to get me there, probably because the novel focuses too much on the main character’s long rise as a top vet (300 hundred pages of it) and not enough on her life as a jet-setter. Sure, the author redeems himself in the second-half by getting her right into the swing of things—without ever relinquishing the ABCs of horse breeding and racing—but it all ends up being just a little too late and too much for this reader.  

Oh don’t get me wrong. A BREED APART is far from being a bad book. It is actually well-written and the heroine is quite likable. Her story of a child of poverty who makes a name for herself despite the odds is almost gripping at times but in the long run I found it to be quite boring. I’m sure there are plenty of horse lovers out there who will dig it. It just isn’t for me. It’s the second time that a novel penned by Rosemblaum fails to win me over. I cringe into thinking what the rest of his work looks like. Better stay away, I think. On second thought, TREASURES, again by his nom de plume Johanna Kingsley, looks mighty tasty.

Until next post—Martin

UK edition

'FACES' BY JOHANNA KINGSLEY

Based on the success of her first novel, author Johanna Kingsley is one of the few who should have become a household name. SCENTS did sell over a million copies.  But like many of her peers her subsequent novels didn’t fare as well, forcing her eventually to vanish into thin air.  Not so, it seems.  According to this, she just keeps re-inventing herself, using other pseudonyms such as Jeanne Day Lord, Jessica March or Angelica Moon, just to name a few.  Her real name is Robert Rosenblum and he is a multitasker who has chosen to stay out of the spotlight.  There isn’t much to say about him, except that he owns a Twitter account that has been non-active for more than three years. But whatever’s been going on with him, it is clear to say that it’s time to celebrate this fellow.  But there’s a catch.  As I was all set to praise his work after finishing up his second Kingsley offering, FACES, it suddenly dawned on me that I didn’t dig him as much as I thought I would.  The reason is quite simple: the novel left a bad taste in my mouth.  What a guy to do, then?  Forget him or just go on?  What follows speaks for itself. 

FACES centers around Eugenia Sareyov, a beautiful Russian who flees her homeland to come to America where she’ll eventually be courted by a rich man’s son and an artsy-fartsy hunky type before settling with… well, I don’t want to spoil anything too major for you.  One thing I can say is that she’ll become the biggest plastic surgeon there is. But before getting there she’ll suffer heartbreaks, heartaches, and partake in a couple of well-described sexual situations.  Her greatest challenge, however, will be mending her rocky relationships with her long-lost parents, especially her disfigured dad whom she had shied away from after he nearly got killed in an explosion during the Russian revolution.  Guess who’ll end up with a reconstructed face later on? 

Taken with a grain of fluff, FACES may excite some readers.  It has all the ingredients necessary: a strong-willed female protagonist, opulent wealth and sceneries, sex; but for some strange reasons the novel doesn’t gel with me.  What bothers me most about it is the way it tends to always go for the saccharine-glaze jugular.  As if readers couldn’t hold on to the story otherwise.   In effect, it causes the book to be bland, repetitive, even passionless at times.  And Rosemblaum’s lack of empathy for his Little Miss Perfect makes it an even harder chore to finish. One thing that’s in the author’s favor, though, is his strong use of a rich, crystal clear narrative, which is highly exemplary for any budding writer out there.  If only it was accentuated by a fulfilling plot.  Oh well.  Let’s just hope his other offerings by the Kingsley name fare better, but I doubt that I will visit them, or any work by his other pseudonyms, come to think of it.

Until next post—Martin 

UK pb edition