Nita Good Book

Ah, the old amnesia trope. I was a bit worried going in. This story could have turned out really bad. I can only think of one other story where the plot device of amnesia worked for me (Dead to the World by Charlaine Harris). And this one did too, for the most part.

At the beginning of the book we meet Georgia Milton as she makes her way down a street in New York City. She accidentally bumps into another lady, and the ribbon holding her bonnet is rescued by a British gentleman. Georgia can tell right away that he is obviously very wealthy. So when he asks her to coffee at his hotel, she says no. She assumes he is really asking for something else, and she knows nothing good could come out of such a dalliance between a man of his wealth and poor New York woman. As she keeps walking her bag is snatched by a boy, and the gentleman chases after him. By the time she catches up to them, the man has been hit by an omni. He is rushed to the hospital and after 10 days of care, the doctor declares he has "memory loss".

Feeling guilty, she ends up taking him in, while the doctor tries to discover who he actually is. The two days they are together before he is finally discovered by his father are fun. Georgia can be quite crude. She says it how she sees it. And even though Robinson (what they have decided to call him while he has the memory loss) can remember his manners and repeatedly asks Georgia to please control her language, he falls for her from the start. There attraction for each other is quite heated, and between their banter and heated looks they decide they like each other very much. Of course this is when Robinson's father shows up, and he finds out who he really is. His memory finally resurfaces.

At this point you want to shake Robinson until he gets some sense. He begs Georgia to go with him back to England and after she agrees, he changes his mind. He won't see reason, even after Georgia comes up with a plan that will accept her into society. Even though I was frustrated with Robinson, I really liked the fact that it was the woman who ends up taking action so they can be together. Robinson decides not to see past their class differences, but Georgia saw a way for them to be together. And she gets a little revenge for his stupidity.

The side-plot involved the reason for his being in New York City with his father in the first place. It involves the wishes of his dead mother and a map she gave him when he was a child. It was interesting, but almost all of it was told to us, and not really shown in any way. It seemed almost overly complicated to create just to get him in New York City, but was very simply concluded.

Also a couple things were presented and then never explained. Robinson gets all of his memory back, except for his time in New York before the amnesia. Why? This doesn't make any sense to me. Second, Georgia ends up running into a couple guys from her poor neighborhood in London. She is able to hide who she is from them, so as not to ruin her plans. It is the most random, unbelievable and unnecessary coincidence, mostly because it is never ever explained.

But overall, I enjoyed. Georgia and her mouth made up for everything.

ARC provided by NetGalley.