I think this is my favorite Dumas book - beautiful, touching, and yet adventurous!

After finishing this book, I am struck by how much I miss Milady. There was by far too much fainting going on in Louise de la Valliere for me not to recall one of my favorite lines of Milady's: "I faint? I? Do you take me for some weak woman? When I am insulted I do not faint, I avenge myself!" Louise is a poor heroine who never seems to be able to make her mind about anything. Louis is not much better- I suppose for a king it is nothing to send away a woman's fiancé for the purpose of seducing her, but it seemed to me that all Louis's actions are rather reprehensible. It's hard to feel at all interested in a love story when even the love of the two parties condemns them. I confess, I only forced myself to finish Louise de la Valliere for the sake of the preceding books I had loved so well and the concluding part for which I still have high hopes. ...And also for the sake of Montelais and Malicorne; those two are awesome.

While The Three Musketeers was a swashbuckling adventure, the books that follow are all soap operas that have as much to do with what is going on at court as they do with any of the Musketeers. However, the characters are much better defined in these later books. You gotta love Porthos.

Not enough D'Artagnan.

There's not much action here, unlike the other books in this series. And there isn't all that much of the Musketeers either. Instead it involves a rivalry between two finance ministers for Louis XIV. One arranges to bankrupt the other by forcing him to pay for Louis' amusements. In the meantime, Louis is smitten with Louise, who is a maid to Henrietta, the wife of Louis brother. She's jealous because she and Louis had had an affair, and she still craves his attention. So she does whatever she can to prevent Louis from seeing his life long love of the moment. Others work to enable Louis to see her.

Of course, Louise is engaged to Raoul, but Louis manages that easily enough by sending him off to England so he can have some nice cuddly times with Louise. Dumas does a fantastic job of portraying Louis as an entirely self-absorbed jerk. Other than that, this book simply sets things up for the finish.

Noble Porthos ! A quoi bon les châteaux regorgeant de meubles, les forêts regorgeant de gibier, les lacs regorgeant de poissons et les caves regorgeant de richesses ! A quoi bon les laquais aux brillantes livrées, et au milieu d'eux Mousqueton, fier du pouvoir délégué par toi ! Ô noble Porthos ! soucieux entasseur de trésors, fallait-il tant travailler à adoucir et dorer ta vie pour venir, sur une plage déserte, aux cris des oiseaux de l'océan, t'étendre, les os écrasés, sous une froide pierre ! Fallait-il, enfin, noble Porthos, amasser tant d'or pour n'avoir pas même le distique d'un pauvre poète sur ton monument !

The only thing that would make this book better would be if d'Artagnan played a larger role. He's only in about half the book. However, it was great! I can't wait to read the next one.