Monday, June 16, 2014

Audio Book: A Kiss at Midnight by Eloisa James


Read by Susan Duerden

Synopsis: Miss Kate Daltry doesn’t believe in fairy tales . . .or happily ever after.

Forced by her stepmother to attend a ball, Kate meets a prince . . . and decides he’s anything but charming. A clash of wits and wills ensues, but they both know their irresistible attraction will lead nowhere. For Gabriel is promised to another woman—a princess whose hand in marriage will fulfill his ruthless ambitions.

Gabriel likes his fiancé, which is a welcome turn of events, but he doesn’t love her. Obviously, he should be wooing his bride-to-be, not the witty, impoverished beauty who refuses to fawn over him.
Godmothers and glass slippers notwithstanding, this is one fairy tale in which destiny conspires to destroy any chance that Kate and Gabriel might have a happily ever after.

Unless a prince throws away everything that makes him noble . . .
Unless a dowry of an unruly heart trumps a fortune . . .
Unless one kiss at the stroke of midnight changes everything.

My Thoughts: I was completely drawn to this audio book because of the gorgeous art cover. I was also drawn to it because it was based on the fairy tale story, "Cinderella." I love books based on fairy tales so I was highly looking forward to this book. Unfortunately, A Kiss at Midnight disappointed me.

I was attracted to the first half of the story. It was decent and had a few humorous moments. However, the plot began to weaken halfway through. I found myself not caring for the characters, finding the "first time" together sickening, and losing interest after the love scene. I simply did not like the chemistry between Kate and Gabriel. I felt like they were not meant to be. Separately, they were fun characters since they both had a sense of humor. What I disliked the most was when Kate and Gabriel first made love. Gabriel had to keep sneaking off to meet with his fiancé while Kate stayed behind in the rooms waiting to be raptured. It was plain disgusting to me.

I was also not too impressed with the audio. Susan Duerden did a decent job in narrating the story, but she's not my favorite. Some of the characters she was able to voice wonderfully, especially Kate. I could easily picture the type of character Kate was. The other characters, especially the men, sounded weird. I was sometimes unsure who Susan was supposed to be reading since some of the men sounded like women. Also, for some reason Susan's pronunciation of "boat" annoyed me.  Very silly, I know, but it was distracting.

As a whole, this book showed promised but fell short. I liked the first half of the book, but simply didn't appreciate the second half of it. It did have a cute ending though.  I rate it:

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