Margaret Way – Cattle Baron: Nanny Needed
September 21st, 2010 by Lucy Pratt
Unfortunately, I only had time to read one more Mills & Boon during my Mills & Boon week. This one was part of the ‘Romance 2-in-1’ series, and came with ‘Bachelor Dad on her Doorstep’ by Michelle Douglas. This series is apparently characterised by its ‘Pure Romance, Pure Emotion’.
The cover features a from-behind shot of a couple walking through a sunny field arm-in-arm. In her biography, the author describes herself as a ‘definite Leo’ and claims to have written 100 books, which is pretty impressive.
As far as the plot is concerned, Cattle Baron: Nanny Needed is surprisingly complex. The first chapter is set at a society wedding, where we meet our two main characters, Amber and Cal. Amber is a journalist who gatecrashes the wedding because her cheating ex-fiancé is the groom. Cal is the bride’s cousin and an usher, who owns a cattle ranch in the Australian outback.
When they meet at the wedding, Amber and Cal are obviously attracted to each other. Through a strange chain of events, Amber ends up leaving the block of flats she shares with her friend Jono, a stereotype of a gay man. (He finishes lots of his sentences with ‘sweetie’ and feels the need to talk about being gay constantly). She goes to live with Cal on his cattle ranch.
Amber is enchanted by the outback, and enjoys being waited on hand and foot by the aboriginal maids. The way this is portrayed is slightly creepy. The aboriginal people talk in some kind of weird broken English throughout. At one point a maid sees Amber and thinks she is a spirit. They come across as a bit primitive, which isn’t kosher in a book that was published in the UK in 2009. (Or ever, really.)
Oh and everyone always goes on about how lovely and white Amber is, and how she has to wear loads of sunblock to protect her lovely white skin. Although it is set in the Australian outback so I guess that’s acceptable.
Anyway, the biggest problem at the ranch is Janis, the wife of Cal’s uncle. (The family connections in this are very complicated.) Janis has just had a baby, which she is rejecting. At first, Amber thinks she has post-natal depression, but then she decides she is just nasty and self-absorbed, which is what everyone else seems to think. This is another aspect of the book that I found creepy. At one point Cal talks about how his uncle had ‘loads of her favourite flowers flown in’, and it’s made out that she’s selfish for being unhappy when she has all the flowers and stuff she wants. Amber starts looking after Janis’ baby, which makes her even more attractive in Cal’s eyes. There’s nothing more repulsive than women who can’t take care of a baby, after all.
Amber and Cal slowly fall in love, but obviously there are plenty of obstacles to get past, the main one being their mutual lack of trust. This book was quite a lot less explicit than the other Mills & Boon I read, and the physical side of it all takes a lot longer to get off the ground.
In addition to the slightly racist, homophobic and chauvinistic edges which probably weren’t intentional by the author but present nonetheless, this book had some other problems. One of my main complaints would be that the author always goes into great detail to describe what the characters are eating. And I mean really great detail. And everyone in the book seems to be able to fly a plane. (And talk and kiss and caress at the same time). It also shared the perspective problem with The Sheikh’s Convenient Virgin- the narrative didn’t focus on one person’s point of view, it zoomed around and tried to get everyone in. Although I would say it was a bit less distracting in this book.
The book was an interesting end to my Mills & Boon week. I am actually quite tempted to extend it and explore different series- there’s a ‘Medical’ series which looks pretty interesting. I am determined to find a Mills & Boon novel that I actually like, because I think it’s a shame that reading them has only confirmed my original prejudices about them. There are so many of them, you’d think that according to the laws of probability at least one of them would be suitable.
Favourite Quotes:
- ‘Cal held the goddess’s gaze for long measuring seconds, more entranced than he cared to be.’
- ‘“I’m mad to make love to you…I don’t think I can last another day without having you. Are you taking me seriously? You should.”’
- ‘It was a great life. A total life. A life to shout about!’
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