I’d heard such bad things about this book that I was fully prepared to just grin and bear it in my mission to read/re-read all of Lisa Kleypas’s backlist. But, do you know what? I actually really enjoyed it!

I don’t think I can continue without a major spoiler, so if you want the full bonkers experience of reading Prince of Dreams for the first time, then please stop scrolling roundabout now! Just know that, if you enjoy the wild ride that an old school romance can sometimes be, then I’d recommend at least giving this one a go.

So, there’s a romantic legend about how the hero’s ancestor met and married his wife. At one point in the book, Nikolai “time travels” back to this period and lives out their story. Now, I can see how this could be viewed as cheating, but for me, I saw it more as regression into a past life (does anyone else remember that random “Have I Been Here Before?” show that was on ITV in the 00s?!). In the main timeline, Nikolai’s body doesn’t disappear anywhere while he’s “time traveling”, and he 100% believes that the woman he marries in each era is an incarnation of the same person. I didn’t think too hard about the fact that their past selves were his great-great-great-grandparents or something (bit weird!!) - so in the end I was (mostly) ok with all of this.

What I really didn’t like was how Nikolai treated Emma throughout the story. He decides that she’ll one day be his when she’s an actual child, and then when she’s an adult he manipulates her into being his wife - only to treat her like utter shit. Of course, deep down he loves her, but it’s loving the past version of her that makes him realise this, and that was ANNOYING. But then again, his behaviour probably isn’t that unusual for an 80s/90s hero - and Emma’s (not so evil) stepmother warned her about what she was getting into.

Having said all this, I read Prince of Dreams compulsively and really enjoyed the experience. It had that Kleypas sense of time and place, which I love
- but with this touch of the supernatural that made it a bit weird and different, and a solid four stars for me. This may be my most chaotic review ever, but that’s probably a pretty good reflection of the book, haha!