The Wife Test by Betina Krahn, historical (2003) Berkley, $6.99,
ISBN 0-425-19092-7  Structurally, The Wife Test is written in a
way that mirrors the author's previous book, The Husband Test:
we have a road trip for the first half of the book, court stuff
in the second half, and enough stupid heroine antics to make me
wish someone would swat all these horrible creatures to pancakes
with some giant almighty fly-swatter. Seriously, watching Chloe
of Guibray and her entourage of near-nuns crashing through the
wilderness is like watching a bunch of children running through
a Nazi concentration camp thinking it's a new Girl Guide
jamboree gathering site.  The stupidity begins early on, when
our heroine Chloe persuades the elderly nun to let her, a know-
it-all empty-headed loudmouth, lead the other four women from
the Convent of the Brides of Virtue to England. See, the patron
of the Convent, the Duke of Avalon, is unable to get his people
to raise enough ransom to free him. So he decides to use his
four "daughters