Dream Hunter

When Arden, Lord Winter, travels to Africa in 1838, he agrees to let a young Bedouin boy lead him across the desert in return for which Arden will take the young man to England. But the young man is in fact a young woman, Zenia, whose adventurous mother (recently deceased) insisted she hide her sex for protection. In due course, Arden and Zenia are captured, and Zenia's hoax is uncovered, so to speak. Feeling sure they are about to be executed, the two take advantage of the pleasures available. Shortly thereafter, Zenia, believing Arden dead, makes her escape during a battle and finds her way to his family in England, where she discovers that she is pregnant. With so much happening at first, it's quite a shock to find the tale grinding to a sudden halt. Even when Arden comes home three years later, the plot still lags. There is no joyous reunion, merely constant bickering over the upbringing of the child. Once it is decided that Arden and Zenia marry legally, the arrangements are gone over repeatedly by different characters, leaving the reader to suffer the same tiresome passages again and again. There are no diverting subplots, no reason, in fact, for the reader to torture him or herself by attempting to finish this tedious tale. (Dec.)