Oh that is interesting! You know, I never thought about the punishment aspect, because usually I'm being driven crazy by the whole "We defy society! Our love is so pure and good that it exists outside of moral bounds!" attitude of the lovers.

The thing about this book is that marriage vows actually are broken (i.e. they have sex before the marriage is broken), but I wasn't too surprised, given the whole romance novel factor. Can't have all that tension without release ;). But I guess Gaffney tried to mitigate that by having the husband be an absolute jerk.

Hrm. Now want to think of more examples, except the whole romantic triangle thing makes me so sporky that I can never finish these things!