An Affair With Mr. Kennedy by Jillian Stone (The Gentlemen of Scotland Yard #1)
Historical Romance
January 31, 2012
Pocket

Reviewed by Mandi

Set in the late 1800’s, Zeno Kennedy is a well known detective with the Scotland Yard. Having lost a mistress to a bombing years ago, Zeno has set his mind to keeping London safe. But he knows there are a group of men, “The Bloody Four” he calls them, that want to harm his city. These four are wealthy men who are for an Irish revolution, and will murder, conspire and threaten those that get in their way. Zeno is on their trail however, and won’t back down.

Meanwhile, Zeno has a new tenant in the building he owns, a Ms. Cassandra St. Cloud. Cassie is a widow, who is just coming out of mourning. A very talented painter, she has decided to live on her own now, and start a new chapter of her life. A very progressive woman (with an even more progressive mother) Cassie has no qualms about taking a lover or living on her own. When she meets her new neighbor, the very sexy if not a bit cranky detective Kennedy, she can’t help but peek out her window to observe him. And he does the same thing. When it comes to light that Cassie’s brother in-law is involved with The Bloody Four, Cassie gets whisked into Zeno’s investigation.

I’ll admit it. When An Affair With Mr. Kennedy arrived unsolicited in the mail, I opened the envelope and was immediately drawn to the title and cover of the book. When I saw that the series includes a Scotland Yard detective, I was in. I didn’t even read the blurb. I like the set-up of this book and I like the characters although I do think this book is slow at times and I was a little disappointed in the suspense part of the book. More on that in a minute.

First, we are presented with a lovely hero and heroine. Zeno is a little more on the brooding side of things. He takes his work very seriously, and hates to be in the papers or recognized because of the past bombing involving his love interest. When he sets his sights on Cassie, he can’t look away. Cassie comes from a family of doctors, and has a mother that would much rather talk about sex and birth control than tea and the weather. So Cassie is definitely not a prude. She is very independent, and has more of the mind set that she wants to take a lover. She also lounges around and smokes cigars. Definitely a different type of heroine. 

While the romance unfolds (and again, I really liked the romance in this one – it is very naughty) I did have problems with the suspense. These group of men are set to terrorize London, and they do have a nasty ringleader who is slightly obsessed with Cassie during the book. But I think there is a lot of slow time leading up to the big finale with this group. I kind of wanted them to be more of a threat. And then at the end, it isn’t hard to guess what is going to happen. There is also a point in the book where Zeno must deal with someone from his past and it felt like this development should have been more dramatic.

Overall, I liked it, but not as much as I was hoping to. I’m happy to see on Goodreads that two more books are coming in this series. I don’t think we get enough romances with this kind of setting.

Rating: C+

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