One Minute to Love

“I loves them ’orses, Miss Yolisa,” he said, “and when I’m big I’m goin’ to be a jockey.” - jockeys have first hand experience in seeing beautiful horses injured and killed due to racing...

He was well aware that Yolisa was different from other girls of her age. So different he was afraid that she would be hurt or upset by what went on outside her home. He could not imagine any man he had met so far to be in any way suitable for his lovely daughter. - nice father to think of her this way. Most of the time, daughters are sadly not valued.

“The mission I have been given,” he said, “will take me to one of the smaller countries in the Balkans.  It is, the Prime Minister believes, in danger of being taken over by the Russians.” Sir John raised his eyebrows but did not speak and Lord Langford went on, “The Czar is like all his predecessors, determined to expand Russia by taking over all the smaller countries in the Balkans that he can.” “The only country that Russia is at all frightened of,” Lord Langford said, “is Great Britain.  That is why we have to prevent them from expanding, as they are trying to do, all over Asia as well, adding thousands of square miles to the Russian Empire on a regular basis.” - kinda like the British empire looted, pillaged and colonized other nations???....

“Then why does Her Majesty not provide him with an English Princess?” Yolisa enquired. “The answer is quite simple.  The Queen has, for the moment, run out of relations of marriageable age.  She has one in mind who would suit Prince Nikos perfectly, but she is only fifteen.” “That is certainly too young to be married,” Yolisa concurred. “It is something that might happen in the East, but not in the West.  But the Prime Minister and I have thought up somewhat complicated means by which we can keep the Russians at arm’s length until Prince Nikos’s bride-to-be is old enough to take her place beside him on the Throne of Kavalla.” - not true. A number of royal european brides were under the age of 14 well into the 18th century...

“In this story the good has to win,” Lord Langford said firmly. “The Russians are doing quite enough damage already in Europe and in Asia.  Everyone knows it would be a real disaster if they could gain the entry they need so desperately into the Aegean Sea.” - errr... again, Russia/British Empire = same goals...

Her Majesty was unable to supply the Union Jack in the shape of a British Royal Bride for a country in such a key geographical position as Kavalla. Yolisa had read many books about the history of Europe and she had followed with great interest the wars that had been caused by one country after another trying to seize power and expand their boundaries. She was, in fact, well aware how dangerous Russia was at the moment. The ambition of the last three Czars had been to gain supremacy in every direction and she had learnt that the present one, Czar Alexander III, was an exceptionally unpleasant man. - there were enough monstrous British rulers - this author loves painting her country as unblemished...

He showed none of the kindliness of his father and the moment he came to power had been unbelievably cruel to the Jews whom he hated. Thousands had been murdered and thousands more exiled to Siberia. She could well understand any small country being terrified of being at the mercy of such a man. - What the British did to the Boers in South Africa (concentration camps), the Indians in India etc. is no joke. Let's not pretend they were saving countries out of altruism...

She felt as if she had met him, not for the first time, but he had somehow been there in her life all down the centuries. - lovely sentiment 💖

Great Britain, which was certainly the greatest country in the world, had blessed them with a British Queen. - *yawn*. They were a nice couple but the idiotic false/fake history is something Cartland loves to prop up as fact.