Forever Amber [Paperback]

I have read this book several times but had lost my copy of the book. Luckly I found a copy on Amazon and can enjoy it again. The story covers several areas of Britains history and is so well told I feel as if I am there.

Amber St. Clare never felt she belonged with the poor family who raised her, and one day a troop of cavaliers ride into her village and she's swept away by Lord Bruce Carlton. Well, actually its more like the other way around - Amber won't say no and begs Bruce to take her to London and against his better judgment he agrees. Although lust for the beauteous Amber might have something to do with it. Bruce makes it perfectly clear he'll never marry her and when duty calls she's on her own and under those terms they're off to London as Charles II is crowned and his bawdy court and courtiers are in full swing. As he warned, Bruce soon has to leave and it doesn't take long for Amber to get herself swindled royally out of every farthing Bruce left her and thrown into Newgate prison for debt. Not one to be down and out for long, Amber soon hooks up with a notorious highway man and he breaks them out and the game is on......

Until of course Black Jack Mallard is caught and then Amber finds herself in another pickle and she goes for the stage - but she still needs to find man to keep her in the style in which she wants to become accustomed to - and handsome Captain Rex Morgan will fit the bill as soon as she takes him away from his current mistress. Of course, once Bruce is back Amber manages to screw things up nicely and fresh out of likely prospects in London (young men with money) Amber finds herself an older wealthy one to protect her from life's little problems. But then older men don't live forever and when their family doesn't like you well then we're off on the hunt yet again....

Amber's story takes her through all walks of Restoration England, from prison to theatre to the decadent, conniving court of Charles II, from the plague (A.W.E.S.O.M.E.) to the Great Fire and from man to man and bed to bed. Amber is most definitely one of fiction's most flawed heroines and despite the many lessons life dishes out do you think she ever learns from them? Not on your life, not does she ever figure out that Bruce is never ever going to marry her - Sleep with her, yes. Don't worry though, as busy as Amber is in the bed chamber and despite the fact that when published in the 40's this was so scandalous it was banned in Boston, the sex is pretty tame and left to the reader's imagination (how refreshing). Amber is quite flawed and very unlikable most of the time but it's like watching a train wreck - you can't take your eyes away for fear of missing what's going to happen next. As for the ending? Oh yes, she most definitely gets her just desserts in the end. A grand and glorious romp through Restoration England, don't miss it.

If ever a book was written that required a sequel, it was this one.
Sixteen year old Amber St. Clare, ward of a yeoman farmer and his wife, falls instantly in love with a handsome cavalier who happened to stop by her tiny village for refreshment. Almost immediately, she surrenders her virtue to him and begs him to take her to London. "I won't ever marry you, Amber," he states and he keeps his word in spite of fathering three of her children over a ten year period. During his numerous absences, she manages to land in Newgate Prison for indebtedness, be rescued by a notorious highwayman, marry several men for their money or titles, take up a tarnished career as an actress and become one of King Charles IV's favourite mistresses.
Throughout it all, she maintains her love for the devastatingly handsome, Bruce Carlton. To my mind, Lord Carlton is the real villain of the piece. His vacillating between his obsession with her beauty and his desire to marry "quality" is annoying and unfortunately the "undoing" of Amber. It is a sad commentary of what a woman alone in that period had to do to get along in the world. She may have become hardened and scheming due to her circumstances, but she more than proved her mettle during the terrible London plague.
For all it was banned in Boston in the 1940s because of Amber's immoral life style, there is nothing explicit or graphic in this book. I could have liked it immensely, simply for the wonderful research the author did with regard to the 17th century Stuart Restoration period. One experiences that time and place as in no other book I have read about the era. As it is, like many other readers, I hated the ending which left me with an overriding feeling of aggravation.