Julie Garwood

Julie Garwood was my first introduction into adult romance books.  Mostly I was fascinated by the setting of the stories - I liked the historical ones that happened in medieval England with castles and Scottish lairds. I don't know if I liked them cuz that's what my fantasy books were like (kings and wizards and magic), or because my mom liked them and that's what she had at home.  :)  Anyway, my two favorites by Julie Garwood were "The Prize" and "The Bride."

In "The Prize," it's a Norman vs. Saxon setting.  The guy is the big bad Norman ("baron warrior," according to the back of the book) and the girl is the gentle Saxon, with a strong spirit (they're always like that).  What I liked about this one is the depth of the characters - they all had their personal motivations for the way they behaved (the interaction between the hero and the heroine's brother is great, and I like all the pages and lower ranking knights), hobbies that make them interesting (chess was a big factor in this book), and, of course, there's always a bad guy that they all hate and bond over.

"The Bride" is similar (of course), but in this case, the heroine is English and the hero is a big bad Scottish laird.  This one is more of a mystery suspense than a straight up boy meets girl story.  This sounds ridiculous, but my favorite thing about this book was the description of the characters.  Jamie (the girl) had black hair and violet eyes!  I thought it would have been the coolest thing in the world to have violet eyes.  :)  And horses played a big role in this book and I was horse crazy at the time, lol!  The ending has a really memorable scene as well - the Scottish lairds are all divided (think Braveheart) and Jamie does something for each of them throughout the story that make them all loyal to her and they protect her from being stolen by this sniveling, greedy English lord.  Woot!  :)