As always, Gayle Wilson's historical novels don't disappoint. The Gambler's Heart is no exception. Emotionally intense to an almost painful degree, Ms Wilson tells a complex, intriguing, gritty tale of two wounded people - one physically, the other emotionally - healing each other and finding a love that makes them whole again. A remarkable story by a remarkable writer who challenges the reader into feeling - living- being part of the hero & heroine's lives, emotions and, finally, their joy as they reach out into each other's souls to find a heart-warming, memorable love. ( )

I fell in love with The Gambler's Heart from the very first page. I loved the characters, their story, their gut wrenching, beautiful, moving and tender romance. The hero, Jean-Luc Gavereau and the heroine Madelyn Fairchild are magnetic and powerful characters, both very tortured, both, it seems, destined for each other. They are brought together thanks to a big coincidence: they meet at an inn, there's a bit of love at first sight action, then two years later Madelyn's brother Harry loses in a high stakes card game to Jean-Luc, the owner of a gaming hell. Harry offers his sister to Jean-Luc in marriage when he can't repay his debts. Despite this contrived beginning I'm still engrossed by the characters, Jean-Luc especially. Half his face and body is horribly disfigured by burn marks, and he wears an eye patch. (I admit it, I'm a sucker for beauty and the beast stories.) Needless to say he's very touchy, to put it mildly, about his appearance, and there's a lot for these two to overcome in the development of their relationship. There's all the doom and gloom and angsty tortured melodrama that you would expect from a scarred hero like Jean-Luc. And even though he is a bit over the top, I love him anyway, or maybe because of it. He's so dark and dangerous, but really vulnerable at the same time, in the way that he falls so hard for Madelyn.

As for Madelyn... what to say about Madelyn. She was alright for a while. She seemed strong and capable. She knows she wants Jean-Luc, and goes after him. But there’s something about her, once she’s married to him, that doesn’t quite add up. Her tortured act wasn’t nearly as convincing as Jean-Luc’s. I kept holding out for a big revelation that would help make sense of her character and actions, but none of it came together in any coherent resolution or consolidation of the disparate, underdeveloped parts of her character. I felt sorry for her at first, and it seemed for a while like both she and Jean-Luc could heal each other - but when it came to understanding what exactly Madelyn needed healing, I was like, really? That's it? It seemed she was making such a big deal over nothing. She has some traumatic family history, that’s never fully explained. All of her evil family members have to date died out, except for her brother, who gets to be the villain of the story.

The plot of The Gambler's Heart is really where things start to fall apart and a perfectly wonderful romance is utterly sabotaged. The plot, when it injudiciously strays from the relationship between Madelyn and Jean-Luc, is all about Harry causing trouble. It’s bad enough that their romance starts to have a bit of a claustrophobic feel to it after a while, because Madelyn, for some reason, decides that she doesn’t want to leave the comfort and safety of their love nest. When the two do try and venture out into the real world, everything goes horribly wrong.

Part of the problem is, Harry is a weak and pathetic villain, hardly a threat at all. Jean-Luc could totally take care of him - if it weren't for Madelyn's interference and stupidity. The only reason Harry wrecks as much havoc as he does is because of Madelyn. She lets him manipulate and blackmail her, all the while hiding the difficulty from Jean-Luc out of some misguided notion that she's protecting him from Harry - when the guy really doesn't need protecting. And even if he did, her actions don't help at all - quite the reverse, actually. When Jean-Luc finds out her first deception, and they have a heart to heart talk about honesty and working to keep an already shaky marriage afloat, I breathe a sigh of relief. I think, it was a bit of a hairy moment there, with the awful misunderstandings, but they talked about it and cleared it up pretty quickly, and we're out of the woods, right? Disaster averted. Ha. Not bloody likely. Because Madelyn has to keep on trying to protect Jean-Luc from Harry, who keeps trying to mess things up, and so she keeps lying to Jean-Luc over and over again - oh about so many things. (Though Jean-Luc is also guilty of the lying to keep the other safe nonsense, unfortunately.) Thanks to Madelyn’s idiocy, Jean-Luc gets stabbed, beat up, shot at, whipped, and blinded. The poor guy has enough trouble without this horrible excuse for a wife, I'm surprised he makes it through to the end of the book.

After he discovers her deceptions the whole thing goes up in flames. Everyone loses their mind. All sense of character and romance is demolished, and the story disintegrates into a manic spectacle of I hate you! Oh no I hurt you! I've lost you forever! I shall sacrifice my love and life for you! It's for your own good! I am unworthy! My fault! My fault! My fault! These sentiments are pretty equally divided between both hero and heroine. Jean-Luc goes berserk, absolutely nuts - and I don't really blame him, because of all the huge misunderstandings Madelyn orchestrates. There's a huge blow up, complete with a house fire, in the midst of which Jean-Luc flings insane, ridiculous accusations at Madelyn - all of which would be really funny if I wasn't so upset at the ruination of what started out as such a great book. I’m flabbergasted. I was enjoying The Gambler's Heart so much. The last quarter of the book completely blindsides me with this nosedive into insanity, and I can only ask why? Whyyyyyy?

Also, the gambler theme seemed tacked on, along with the random cameo appearances of unexplained characters from previous books in the series (which, since I haven't read those books, makes for some gaps in the narrative.) ( )