It is always impressive to me when an author has the ability to constantly surprise me by meeting my already high expectations. I adore Eloisa James's romances so I was expecting to enjoy Once Upon a Tower and I did. But, I was blown away by how different this one was from the others in her Fairy Tale series with the tone, the romance, and the characters.
Our hero is Gowan, an extremely wealthy Scottish duke, who has come to England for a business venture and always plans on finding a wife. I really enjoyed Gowan's character. I thought it was interesting that he was younger than most historical heroes (early twenties) though he shows considerably maturity due to the fact that he has held his current title since he was a young teen. Gowan has been a duke for almost ten years and has a ton of responsibilities which he is diligent about taking care of. His opinions of romance are shaped greatly by the complex relationship of his parents and it is obvious that he is desperate not to repeat those mistakes. Yet he falls for Edie and proposes rather quickly though he claims not to be an impulsive person by nature. I also need to mention another aspect of his character that I enjoyed which was the fact that Gowan is a virgin though still pretty sensual. This unusual predicament ends up being a major plot point that I don't want to spoil for possible readers, but I applaud Eloisa James for bringing it up.
Edie was a little harder for me like at the beginning. She is a beautiful lady with an amazing talent for playing the cello. Despite that, she has some self-esteem issues, mostly associated with being right for marriage and motherhood. This has forced her to have a very cynical view of love that is threatened by her growing feelings for Gowan. I started liking Edie when she began showing her more humorous side to Gowan early in their courtship and it gave me hope that she could be a worthy heroine for him since I was already rooting for him. Edie's views on love and romance have also been shaped by her observations of her father and stepmother's tumultuous marriage which helped me understand why she was afraid to address the issues that she and her husband were having in the bedroom. I did think she reacted a bit dramatically to Gowan's reaction, but I thought Eloisa James explained well enough by the end.
Gowan and Edie's relationship started off as an example of insta-lust so I was not sure about their compatibility beyond that. But, I began rooting for them when they started exchanging bawdy letters while Gowan was away on business. They seemed to connect with each other quickly and it was nice to see the balance between sexual tension (which was definitely visible) and emotional intimacy. They do have issues in the bedroom which I thought was an intriguing, and realistic, complication to their relationship. Both of them are virgins so it is to be expected that there would be some bumps on the road. Despite that, they did seem to want to work out their relationship (until a certain point) and were willing to know more about one another. There were some communication issues, but they did not annoy me the way that they usually do because of the realistic way that Ms. James showed their reactions. Also, it was nice to read a romance that focused primarily on the couple with very few subplots getting in the way.
The only major plot, besides Gowan and Edie's relationship, was a sweet secondary romance. It involved Edie's father and stepmother trying to get back to their initial feelings for another which was easier said than done. I thought this was a great choice because of the influence that this relationship had on Edie's outlook on romance. I love troubled marriage story lines so I definitely enjoyed this one.
One thing that I love about this series is the fact that Eloisa James is influenced by the original fairy tales, but she doesn't force herself to follow them literally. Once Upon a Tower is a retelling of Rapunzel and there is a tower involved, but it was a pretty minimal plot point and I didn't actually mind that. Most of the book was taken up by the events that forced Edie to go into the tower which is part of the Rapunzel fairy tale that I am always intrigued by though I loved the way she did the hero climbing the hair aspect at the end. Very clever and shows how dangerous that really can be!
In conclusion, I absolutely loved this romance and think it is in my top two from this series (the other being When Beauty Tamed the Beast). I definitely am looking forward to whatever Eloisa James comes up with next!
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Such a sweet love story. Even better if you are a music lover. It is not your standard historical romance. It has substance without being the same old six and seven. Characters so 3D.. Fairytale Ending will take your romantic breath away.
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