Before he died, the king of a vaguely European country called Castaliae drafted a will to reign in his son’s profligate tendencies. This will calls for the next would-be king to marry a woman of faultless virtue before he can ascend to the throne. Alas, that son is now dead too, and the new heir, Alastair, must also abide by the bizarre terms set forth by his predecessor.
Enter Penny-Rose, the perfectly angelic damsel who agrees to a one-year marriage contract with cynical Alastair and wins him over with her emotional availability and courage, as demonstrated by working as a stonemason to provide for her siblings’ education and darting into traffic to save an injured puppy. (Please believe that I do not normally snicker at injured puppies, but I could not help it this time.)
I try not to expect too much from these Harlequin manga, but this one is particularly lackluster. Both main characters are bland and their uninteresting romance is propelled by some amusingly melodramatic circumstances. I suspect most of the problems can be attributed to the original source material, but there’s nothing about the art or manga adaptation to compel one to overlook such flaws.
Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.
Yeah, this one was…bleh. I hate those virginal, angelic, (usually) blond haired and blue eyes lead females. So annoying…. Hilarious that the queen just took one look at her and suddenly decided “This is the girl for my son.” Was not a fan of the art, either.
Yeah, that was weird. I’m not sure what led the queen to come to that decision, either. Seeing a girl working so cheerfully or something?