A- #BookReview: Always Remember by Mary Balogh

A- #BookReview: Always Remember by Mary BaloghAlways Remember (Ravenswood #3) by Mary Balogh
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, large print, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical fiction, historical romance, regency romance
Series: Ravenswood #3
Pages: 366
Published by Berkley on January 16, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Lady Jennifer Arden and Ben Ellis know that a match between them is out of the question. Yet their hearts yearn for the impossible. Discover a new heartwarming story from New York Times bestselling author and beloved “queen of Regency romance” Mary Balogh.Left unable to walk by a childhood illness, Lady Jennifer, sister of the Duke of Wilby, has grown up to make a happy place for herself in society. Outgoing and cheerful, she has many friends and enjoys the pleasures of high society—even if she cannot dance at balls or stroll in Hyde Park. She is blessed with a large, loving, and protective family. But she secretly dreams of marriage and children, and of walking—and dancing.When Ben Ellis comes across Lady Jennifer as she struggles to walk with the aid of primitive crutches, he instantly understands her yearning. He is a fixer. It is often said of him that he never saw a practical problem he did not have to solve. He wants to help her discover independence and motion—driving a carriage, swimming, even walking a different way. But he must be careful. He is the bastard son of the late Earl of Stratton. Though he was raised with the earl’s family, he knows he does not really belong in the world of the ton.Jennifer is shocked—and intrigued—by Ben’s ideas, and both families are alarmed by the growing friendship and perhaps more that they sense developing between the two. A duke’s sister certainly cannot marry the bastard son of an earl. Except sometimes, love can find a way.

My Review:

At the beginning of the Ravenswood series, back in Remember Love, I compared the late and more or less lamented Earl of Stratton, Caleb Ware, with the late and entirely unlamented Humphrey Westcott, Earl of Riverdale, the discovery of whose marital perfidy kicked off that series, and found both of them wanting in only slightly different ways and degrees.

As that earlier series continued through the stories of all the family members impacted by the lies that were shockingly revealed upon Westcott’s death, the man was never redeemed – not even in memory. In fact, as the impacts of his lies rippled out in the years after his death, the worse a character he became.

Therefore, one of the fascinating things about Caleb Ware, Earl of Stratton, is the way that his memory has been redeemed in the years after his death. Not that he wasn’t unfaithful to his wife from the very beginning of their marriage, and not that he didn’t constantly seek love, approval and attention wherever he went, but the reasons behind his actions become clearer with each book – even though that book is centered around another character entirely.

That is especially true of this third book in the series, after Remember Love and Remember Me, because the male protagonist of this story is Ware’s illegitimate oldest son Ben, whose mother was, as it turns out, truly, the love of Ware’s life.

A woman of his own class who he would have married if he could have, but that would have made her guilty of the same sin as Humphrey Westcott. It would have made Lady Janette Kelliston, who her son only knew as plain ‘Jane Ellis’, a bigamist.

But this is, after all, Ben’s story and not the story of his parents, although his discovery of the truth about that relationship and so much more is a central part of his story. While he does not discover those truths until well into this story, it does set the stage for the things he already does know about himself.

That in spite of his complete and thoroughgoing acceptance by Caleb Ware’s legal family for all of Ben’s life, he is, and always will be, the Earl’s bastard. And therefore, not eligible to marry any of the girls – and now women – he meets as part of his membership in the Ware family.

Which means that when widowed Ben and his three-year-old daughter Joy come to Ravenswood Hall to celebrate the revival of the annual Summer Fete, even though he has marriage on his mind he does not expect to find anyone who would consider him suitable among his family’s aristocratic guests.

Because he is NOT suitable, as the rest of the world is all too willing to remind him. The question is whether he, and the woman with whom he falls in love in spite of all the whispers against it, are willing to damn the consequences and the social opprobrium likely to follow in their wake.

Escape Rating A-: I came into Always Remember with high hopes after a bit of disappointment with Remember Me. I liked the characters of that book well enough, but Lady Philippa Ware was a bit TOO perfect and too privileged to identify with and that affected my reading of her story quite a lot.

The heroine of this entry in the series, Pippa’s now sister-in-law Lady Jennifer Arden, is far from perfect – although she fakes it well. Not the perfect beauty that Pippa absolutely does have, but rather, a perfect amiability – or at least the appearance of it – that allows her to find as much happiness and fulfillment in the life that the lifelong disability that remains after a childhood illness (most likely polio) has left her with as is possible. Which is quite a lot if one puts their mind to it, which Lady Jennifer absolutely does.

So this is a romance between an unconventional hero – at least for a Regency romance – and an equally unusual heroine – for any romance at all. That it is their differences from the others around them that brings them together – even as their differences in social position pulls them apart – that made even the possibilities of this story something I was definitely looking forward to.

Ben Ellis and Lady Jennifer Arden find a bond because they are able to see behind each other’s masks to find the real person within. Both are in positions where they ‘should’ be grateful. He because his father’s family took him in and made him their own – as much as they could and considerably more than he knew he had any right to expect. Lady Jennifer’s entire family has rearranged itself, and continues to do so, in order to make sure that she is taken care of, has as much freedom and opportunity as they believe is safe for her, and in general has a good, well-privileged life with friends and opportunities and someone always available to take care of her.

But they are both in pursuit of the missing pieces in their lives. Ben needs to know about his mother’s family, for the sake of his own identity as well as that of his daughter. Lady Jennifer is twenty-five years old, she needs to find out what her OWN limits are. From her perspective, she has one blighted leg but the rest of her, including most definitely her heart and her brain, are just fine. She is an adult and needs to forge her own path – even if that path is navigated on crutches or in a wheelchair.

Ben sees possibilities for her. She sees answers for him. Together, they forge a path that no one expected, and that some would have preferred they not even begin to try. I half expected the author to contrive a solution that would make Ben legally legitimate no matter the actual circumstances of his birth in order to clear that path, but it made for a much better story that the easy solution was not taken after all, making this a deeply earned HEA that kept me up late because I had to find out how it ended.

Speaking of endings, this could be the ending of the Ravenswood series, but I sincerely hope that it is not. The late – and now reasonably lamented – Earl of Stratton and his Countess had several more children who have yet to find their own HEAs. I’d LOVE to see their stories added to this series!

#BookReview: Remember Me by Mary Balogh

#BookReview: Remember Me by Mary BaloghRemember Me (Ravenswood, #2) by Mary Balogh
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, large print, paperback, ebook
Genres: historical fiction, historical romance, regency romance
Series: Ravenswood #2
Pages: 368
Published by Berkley on June 20, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Can Lady Philippa Ware forgive the man who once shattered all her youthful dreams? Discover the passionate and heartwarming new novel on the redemptive power of love from New York Times bestselling author Mary Balogh.
Philippa, elder daughter of the Earl of Stratton, grew up eagerly anticipating a glittering debut and a brilliant marriage. Then her brother caught their father out in a clandestine affair and denounced him publicly. The whole family was disgraced, and Philippa's hopes grew dim, then were fully shattered when she overheard the dashing, handsome Marquess of Roath viciously insult her upon learning of her father's identity. Only years later does Philippa find the courage to go to London at last to meet the ton. She is an instant success and enjoys a close friendship with the granddaughter of a duke. Only one man can spoil everything for her, but surely he will not be in London this year.
The Duke of Wilby is nearing death and has tasked his grandson and heir, Lucas Arden, Marquess of Roath, with marrying and producing a son before it is too late. Lucas, who usually shuns London, goes there early in the Season in the hope of finding an eligible bride before his grandparents come and find one for him. He is instantly attracted to his sister's new friend, until that young lady asks a simple question: "Remember me?" And suddenly he does remember her, as well as the reason why the daughter of the Earl of Stratton is the one woman he can never marry--even if his heart tells him she is the only woman he wants.
Unfortunately for Philippa and Lucas, the autocratic duke and his duchess have other ideas and believe them to be perfect for each other. They will simply not take no for an answer. Telling Philippa the full truth is the hardest thing Lucas has ever faced, and the discovery of it will change them both before they discover the healing power of love.

My Review:

The elderly Duke of Wilby may be the most aptly titled character to ever grace the pages of a Regency romance. Because his will has been done, generally to his satisfaction, for most of his long life, and he fully intends that his will be done one last time before the end that his doctor has predicted comes to pass.

On the whole, Wilby is a rather benevolent dictator when it comes to his family, but he seems to have never been faced with an opposition implacable enough to stand against him that couldn’t be overcome. With the possible exceptions of time, old age and death. Although even there he’s negotiating for better terms – or at least terms of his own choosing.

He has only one surviving heir, his grandson Lucas. Lucas’ father died of recklessness years before, there was no spare, the old Duke had no brothers and the next heir is a cousin that frankly neither he nor Lucas believe is worthy of the title. Someone they know will have no care for the many female members of the family who will be left to his dubious mercy if Lucas dies before he has his own ‘heir and a spare’.

The elderly Duke – and his redoubtable Duchess – are determined that Lucas, now twenty six, will spend the coming Season in London, scouring the Marriage Mart for a bride they all find suitable – whether he wills it or not. For that matter, whether SHE wills it or not as well.

The seemingly immovable object standing in the way of Wilby’s plan is Lady Philippa Stratton, daughter of the late Earl of Stratton. Her brother now holds the title. Pippa is twenty two, wealthy in her own right, and her brother is no longer her guardian. She can do as she pleases when it comes to the Season and the Marriage Mart.

She does not please to marry Lucas Arden. Because once upon a time, just a few years previously when they were both a bit younger and a whole lot less cognizant of the effect a few careless words might have on the people around them, Pippa heard Lucas refer to her as ‘spoiled goods’. Not for any action of hers, but for her father’s indiscreet, utterly scandalous, behavior.

A scandal that touched Lucas every bit as closely as it did Pippa. But eavesdroppers seldom hear anything to their credit, and that was the case here. He owes her an explanation AND an abject apology. But it is water very much under the bridge at this point. That she let his words blight the next four years of her life isn’t ALL on him. Although she still doesn’t owe him the time of day.

But the Duke of Wilby is certain that Pippa and Lucas are perfect for each other. And he’ll move heaven, earth and everything in between in order to get them to see it too. Before his negotiations with his Maker come due.

Escape Rating C+: I had intended to read the third book in the Ravenswood series, Always Remember, this week but when I realized that I’d skipped this second book, Remember Me, I switched things up. I’ll get to Always Remember sometimes in February because it’s still the right month for a LOT of romance.

Howsomever, I ended up with a lot more mixed feelings about Remember Me than I expected after the first book in this series, Remember Love – which I liked rather a lot.

There were a couple of things that kept me from falling quite as hard for this second book in the series, one of which was the sheer proximity to yesterday’s book. Part of the reason I enjoyed A Body at the Séance so much was that I found Mabel Canning’s whole, entire life easy to identify with. She’s not rich, she’s not privileged, she’s a woman making it on her own and her life and times are just close enough that it’s easy to step into her shoes. Possibly except for the murder investigations she keeps falling into but still, she’s someone I’d love to have tea with.

Lady Philippa Ware is certainly a good character, as well as a decent human being, but in comparison with Mabel she’s too rich, too privileged, too beautiful and just too damn perfect to be anything other than a fairy tale princess character – including the title. I liked her, I could see why all the other characters warm to her, but she’s got it so easy in so many ways, in a time and place where so many people did not, that I didn’t love her nearly as much as I did Mabel – or as Lucas and his whole, entire family came to do.

I also need to confess that the conflict in this story, the engine moving the plot forward, the way that the Duke of Wilby in his role as benevolent tyrant pushed so hard to have his will be done, to make all the characters move on his chessboard without ever listening to a word they said about their own lives, is triggering for me in ways I can’t explain. And I fully recognize this is a ‘me’ thing and likely not a ‘you’ thing.

But still, I found myself utterly conflicted between the fact that ‘dammit he was right’ and just how much I wanted someone to push back against him and make it stick that it spoiled the story for me. There are so many ways his pushing and shoving could have and should have gone wrong that I wanted to scream at someone the whole way through.

Your reading mileage may definitely vary. In fact, I hope it does because I think a LOT of people are going to love this book. I’m just not one of them although I certainly expected to be.

Which leads me back around to the NEXT book in this series, the one I thought I’d be reading this week, Always Remember. I’m looking forward to that story because Lucas’ sister, Lady Jennifer Arden, has faced hardships and tragedies in spite of her wealth and status, and it looks like she’ll be finding a life-partner in spite of all the predictions that a woman with a fortune who can’t walk and can only get around in a push chair has no chance to marry anyone who will not be more invested in her fortune than herself. I have high hopes that Pippa’s older half brother Ben, the child of one of her father’s many, many scandals, will prove everyone wrong. Because Jenny deserves her own happy ever after and I’m looking forward to seeing her get it!

Review: A Duke’s Lesson in Charm by Sophie Barnes

Review: A Duke’s Lesson in Charm by Sophie BarnesA Duke's Lesson in Charm (The Gentlemen Authors) by Sophie Barnes
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: historical romance, regency romance
Series: Gentlemen Authors #3
Pages: 274
Published by Sophie Barnes on October 24, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKobo
Goodreads

She was the last person he ever expected to marry…
Callum Davis, Duke of Stratton, never expected to get along with Emily Brooke, but thanks to his ward, he starts to realize she’s pretty good company. The more time he spends with her, the better he likes her. But rather than let their relationship grow at a gradual pace, a pretend courtship leads to a whirlwind romance that quickly collapses when Emily finds out what Callum has written about her. Now he must make every effort to prove his love for her is real, or risk losing her forever.
There is only one person Lady Emily Brooke must avoid at all cost, and that’s the Duke of Stratton. Since her debut, the man has threatened her safety by stepping upon her toes, spilling drinks on her gown, and sending her head first into a fountain. But when he invites her for a walk so the boy in his care can spend time with her dog, she cannot resist. What surprises her most is how charming the duke can be. Until a mistake on his part makes her question his feelings and his intentions.

My Review:

What has made this series so much fun is that it has followed the creation of a romance novel designed to capture the then-recently-late Jane Austen’s fans, not merely through the process of writing the thing but more specifically through the trials and travails of getting it published and into the hands of as many readers as possible.

The first book, A Duke’s Guide to Romance, planted the idea in the heads of three financially embarrassed dukes by a young gentlewoman who binds books in the back of her uncle’s popular bookshop. Along its merry way it introduces Anthony Gibbs, Duke of Westcliffe to Ada Quinn, the love of his life, AND gives both the dukes and the readers a peek into the way that books were printed and published in Jane Austen’s day.

The second book, A Duke’s Introduction to Courtship, moves the story about how books get made into the hands of the potential printers and publishers for the Gentlemen Authors’ completed novel. As Brody Evans, Duke of Corwin, learns the editing and publishing business from the ground up, he falls in love with the printing press’ crackerjack print compositor, Harriet Michaels. Who has done an entirely too convincing job convincing everyone, including Brody, that the print compositor is a young man named Harry.

Their book, A Seductive Scandal, is ready to be put into the hands of its readers. Which is where this third book and my envy come in. Book discovery has probably been an issue for authors, publishers and readers since the first text was chiseled into a stone tablet. It was a problem in Jane Austen’s day, it’s still a problem today and will probably still be a problem for as long as there are so many books and so little time. Meaning forever.

To convince people to buy their book, potential readers need to know it exists and believe that it will be worth their time to read. Which is where the Lady Librarian comes in. The Lady Librarian has the most popular book review column of the day, published in an equally popular and widely distributed newspaper. She has the Gentlemen Authors’ new novel at the top of her TBR (To Be Read) pile, and plans for her review to be published in the Mayfair Chronicle on the morning that A Seductive Scandal arrives in bookshops all over London.

Which it will be. Whether that review will be a paean or a pan is the saga told in A Duke’s Lesson in Charm. Because Lady Emily Brooke has come to believe, after years of clumsy contacts between herself and Callum Davis, Duke of Stratton, that this particular duke has no charm whatsoever.

Callum has no idea that the Lady Librarian is Lady Emily’s alter ego, while Emily is not aware that Callum and his two friends are the true authors of the book she’s been asked to review. The resulting misunderstandings, misidentifications and missteps threaten to scupper any possibility of A Seductive Scandal paddling the Gentlemen Authors’ respective fortunes away from the River Tick. And may just cost Callum and Emily the love of their lives.

Escape Rating A-: This final book in the Gentlemen Authors series is one that I have been anticipating with more than a bit of envy. The romance was lovely, but then ALL the romances in this series have been lovely.

What I was REALLY looking forward to was the story of a heroine who produces something extremely similar to what you are reading right this very minute. Lady Emily Brooke is a book reviewer. It’s the perfect ending to this series about getting a book to its readers, and I was just plain curious to see a bit of how this particular part of the process worked back then.

I do envy Lady Emily the reach of her publication and the size of her audience. She can literally make or break a book, which becomes the final bit of dramatic tension in this story.

But it’s hard to make an entire story about the solitary acts of reading and writing. We’d just be inside Emily’s head the whole way and probably not as entertained by that as she ultimately is by the book.

What we do have is a charming and sometimes fraught romance that manages to be both as filled with non-traditional female agency as the first two books in the series while still telling a story that is a bit closer to what is thought of as a traditional Regency romance.

Unlike the heroines of the first two books, Emily is a member of the ton in good standing. It’s Callum’s reputation that has taken a bit of a hit, both as a result of the behavior that wrecked his finances AND his quiet attempts to keep the bill collectors at bay by selling off some items that he won’t miss and letting go of some staff he can no longer afford to keep.

His title and his person seem to be the only assets Callum has on the ‘Marriage Mart’, and Emily’s father has some serious questions about Callum’s suitability to marry the well-dowered Emily. Her father’s objections are very nicely handled. Too often in historical romances, the father of the bride is a bit of a villain, but the Earl of Rosemont’s reaction to Callum’s suit for Emily’s hand hits all the right notes.

On the way to that suit, one of the best parts of the story is the way that Callum and Emily finally manage to get over their years of disastrous encounters through Callum’s adoption of his young cousin, and said cousin’s insta-love for Emily’s dog Heidi.

Once Heidi helps them leap over their initial apprehensions, their original animosity turns to real friendship, and then more, in the best enemies-to-lovers fashion – at least until a series of self-inflicted misapprehensions nearly breaks them apart.

All in all – and I realize there’s been a LOT of all in this review – A Duke’s Lesson in Charm was a marvelous and utterly fitting ending to what has been a lovely Regency romance series. As always, I can’t wait to see what the author comes up with next!

Review: A Duke’s Introduction to Courtship by Sophie Barnes

Review: A Duke’s Introduction to Courtship by Sophie BarnesA Duke's Introduction to Courtship (The Gentlemen Authors #2) by Sophie Barnes
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: historical romance, regency romance
Series: Gentlemen Authors #2
Pages: 320
Published by Sophie Barnes on September 26, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKobo
Goodreads

Love caught him completely off guard and forced him to question everything…

When Brody Evans, Duke of Corwin, goes incognito at a printing press, he doesn’t anticipate meeting Mr. Michaels, a charming young man with whom he shares an instant connection. Soon he’s questioning everything he believed to be true of himself, while losing his heart in the process. Accepting the way he feels is not only hard, it’s also illegal and downright dangerous. Until he learns the truth and is forced to wonder whether or not the person he fell for is real, or just an illusion.

Dressed as a boy, Harriet Michaels acquires a job at a printing press so she can support herself and her younger sister. It seems like a good idea until she meets Mr. Evans, the new assistant editor. Her attraction toward him cannot be denied, but it must be concealed if she’s to avoid detection and the risk of losing her job. The more time she spends with him, however, the closer she comes to heartache and ruin. For as it turns out, Mr. Evans is not who he claims to be either.

My Review:

This second book in the Gentlemen Authors series has made the theme of the overarching story of the series more apparent while still giving readers a lovely historical romance. Although the romance isn’t nearly as frothy as readers often expect from a Regency romance – and is all the better for it.

There are two stories being told in parallel. The individual story in each book in the series, beginning with A Duke’s Guide to Romance, is the story of a romance between a duke in dire financial straits of his own making and a woman who has been forced to make her way in the world through her own hard work and and has chosen a rather unconventional way of going about it.

At the same time, the overarching story of the series as a whole is a fictionalized version of how a book made its way from being a glimmer in the author’s – or in this case authors’ – eye to being put in the hands of readers.

As this series began, the three dukes have finally gotten their feet back under them after their fathers’ sudden death in a cow pen explosion. Unfortunately along the way of their grief, they seem to have egged each other on in wasting much too much money, even as they held each other up emotionally.

The bills have come due. Ruinously so. Which is where their romance novel, A Seductive Scandal, comes in. They need a plan to make money even though most careers are closed to them, socially speaking. It’s just not done.

In the wake of Jane Austen’s recent death, there’s a vacancy in the publishing landscape that readers are crying out for someone to fill. The three dukes undertake to write a romance novel, à la the late Austen, and succeed beyond their wildest dreams as far as the readability of the book is concerned.

Their next step is to get the damned thing published, which is where this story begins. The Duke of Corwin, Brody Evans, walks by a printing press’ office and spies a ‘Help Wanted’ ad for an assistant editor, beginning immediately. He takes the job, planning to slip their manuscript into the slush pile after several days of doing the work and ingratiating himself with the owner.

He comes to enjoy the job far more than he ever imagined. He’s being paid a pittance from his perspective, but he’s being paid to READ ALL DAY. What’s not to love?

His enjoyment of the job is both increased and confounded by his surprising attraction to the company’s print compositor, Harry Michaels. Harry is the best the printing press’ owner has ever seen at the job, fast, efficient and accurate. He comes early, stays late and makes the whole place hum with productivity.

And he has a secret. Harry Michaels is really Harriet Michaels. A masquerade that she absolutely must keep, because she needs the money to support herself and her younger sister and knows that no job suitable for a woman will pay as much as any job reserved for men.

Which means that Harry must resist Harriet’s attraction for the new assistant editor, ‘Mr. Evans’, no matter how much she wants to give in, even as Mr. Evans’ attraction to Harry Michaels makes him question everything he thought he believed about himself, and wonder just how high a price he’s willing to pay for love.

Escape Rating A: A Duke’s Introduction to Courtship isn’t nearly as frothy a confection as A Duke’s Guide to Romance, and honestly it’s all the better for it. (Not that a good frothy romance can’t be utterly scrumptious as the first book is, but too much of a good thing usually results in a tummy ache – or in this case a headache – from overindulgence in too many sweets.)

We’ve already seen the situation that Brody and his friends are in. It’s not exactly life-threatening, but it is serious from their perspective. First of all, they’ve all been really stupid and they all regret it. They all miss their fathers who were taken from them MUCH too soon. What allows the reader to have sympathy for a group of men who are fantastically well off but merely not as rich as they could be comes down to the way they approach their situation. They are not thinking of themselves but rather of the people who depend on them, and that’s a position that is easier to respect.

What makes this entry in the series work, and also be more serious at the same time, is Harry/Harriet Michaels’ considerably more dire straits. Harriet and her sister are on the knife-edge of poverty. Harriet’s masquerade as Harry makes their situation survivable but just barely. All it will take is one slip and they’ll both be off to the workhouse or working on their backs. Or dead and that seems the most likely. A fact that is brought home to Harriet when Lucy gets sick and Harry is beaten and robbed on the way to fetch a doctor. A doctor that Lucy still needs but that Harry can no longer afford to pay after the robbery.

Harriet is caught between a rock and a hard place, or perhaps a better description would be between Scylla and Charybdis, with sea monsters to either side and slippery rocks underfoot the whole way.

The way that Harriet’s necessary deception leads to Brody’s soul searching added something very special to the whole story, giving his portrayal considerably more depth than might have been expected. Not that this particular scenario hasn’t happened before, and hasn’t been used well, most recently in Jane Dunn’s An Unexpected Heiress, with Cat Sebastian’s Unmasked by the Marquess and even the classic movie Victor/Victoria using the same idea to terrific effect.

Brody’s decision that he loves Harry and damn the consequences, and his subsequent confusion and even sense of betrayal when Harry turned out to be Harriet after all gave the story its final bit of tension AND made Brody’s stake in the situation come much closer to equal Harriet’s than might have been expected.

I’ve written more about this book than I expected because it turned out to be several cuts above what I expected when I started it. I expected froth and fun. What I got went a bit deeper on multiple fronts and still managed to deliver a very satisfying happy ever after at the same time.

I’m really looking forward to the final book in the Gentlemen Authors series, A Duke’s Lesson in Charm, coming next month. Especially since this book should finally reveal to readers just how well the ducally-written romance does at the booksellers!

Review: An Unsuitable Heiress by Jane Dunn

Review: An Unsuitable Heiress by Jane DunnAn Unsuitable Heiress by Jane Dunn
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: hardcover, large print, paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical romance, regency romance
Pages: 350
Published by Boldwood Books on May 22, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

'Do you realise, Corinna, just how hard it is for a young woman of irregular birth, without family, fortune or friends in the world? Marriage is the only way to get any chance of a life.' Following the death of her mother, Corinna Ormesby has lived a quiet life in the countryside with her cantankerous Cousin Agnes. Her father's identity has been a tantalising mystery, but now at nineteen Corinna knows that finding him may be her only way to avoid marriage to the odious Mr Beech. Deciding to head to London, Corinna dons a male disguise. Travelling alone as a young woman risks scandal and danger, but when, masquerading as a youth, she is befriended by three dashing blades, handsome and capable Alick Wolfe, dandy Ferdinand Shilton and the incorrigible Lord Purfoy, Corinna now has access to the male-only world of Regency England. And when she meets Alick's turbulent brother Darius, a betrayal of trust leads to deadly combat which only one of the brothers may survive. From gambling in gentleman's clubs to meeting the courtesans of Covent Garden, Corinna's country naivety soon falls away. But when she finds her father at last, learns the truth about her parentage and discovers her fortunes transformed, she must quickly decide how to reveal her true identity, while hoping that one young man in particular can see her for the beauty and Lady she really is. Sunday Times bestselling author Jane Dunn brings the Regency period irresistibly to life in a page-turning novel packed with romance, scandal, friendship and colour. Perfect for fans of Jane Austen. Janice Hadlow, Gill Hornby, and anyone with a Bridgerton-shaped hole in their lives.

My Review:

We tend to think of the Regency period, popularized by Georgette Heyer’s glittering comedies of manners and romance, and the Napoleonic Wars, producer of so many dark and brooding romantic heroes to be separate – when they absolutely were not, as is brought home to both the reader and the Earl of Ramsbury in the opening chapter.

An Unsuitable Heiress opens with that self-same Earl feeling a bubble of utmost joy in the news that Napoleon has been defeated at Waterloo, and, considerably more important for the Earl, that his only son and heir is NOT on the battle’s long casualty lists. Only for that hope to crash to the ground a few mornings later, when he receives a dispatch that his son was killed in action in the waning hours of the war.

His title will go to a cousin who, at least as the story begins, is not worthy of it. The title and the lands that go with it are entailed, and no one has any choice in the matter. But the Earl has been fortunate in his fortunes, and has personal holdings he can bequeath wherever he wishes. He wishes to leave his personal holdings to his illegitimate daughter.

He just has to find her before his own heart gives out. Literally.

But Corinna Ormesby is not sitting around waiting to be found. Corinna has left the cousin who reluctantly took her in, out of fear that she’ll be forced into a marriage that will take away what little independence of thought and mind she possesses, and kill her dreams of a life of her own choosing.

So she runs away – by borrowing her best friend’s clothing and pretending to be a man. Because young men have the freedom to go where they want – if they can afford it – and work how they choose. Without requiring a chaperone at every turn. Without being coddled and ‘protected’ in every instance.

As a young woman, as Corinna Ormesby, her life is never, ever her own. As a young man, as mere Cory Ormesby, ‘he’ can buy a ticket on the stage and take ‘himself’ to London to teach drawing at a school to make ‘his’ way, and take the opportunity to search for the mysterious father whose name ‘he’ never knew.

She sees her chance, and she takes it. Straight into a fight with a man three times her size beating his horse, and from there, into the coach of a group of young dandies who are happy to take her under their wing, show her the town, help her find her father and give her the chance she needs to become the person she was always meant to be.

As long as her ruse holds up.

Escape Rating B: If Someone to Love by Mary Balogh (the first book in the Westcott series) and Unmasked by the Marquess by Cat Sebastian had a book baby, it would be An Unsuitable Heiress. (I’ve just realized that this works on two levels, as An Unsuitable Heiress IS a blend of the two books and that by certain measures all of the heiresses in all three books are judged to be a bit – or more than a bit – unsuitable as their respective stories unfold.)

The fun of this story is in Corinna’s eye- and mind-opening introduction to what life is like as a man, or at least a moderately well-off or well-sponsored man, in the Regency period. But that’s not where the drama of this story came in – although that’s certainly where I expected it to be.

At first I saw Corinna as a bit of a sister to Charlotte Sloane in the Wrexford and Sloane series, which also takes place in this same period. They initially seemed like kin not just because Charlotte Sloane frequently dons young male attire in order to have the freedom to go where she wants and do what she needs, but also because she makes her living under a male pseudonym. (At the point I currently am reading in the series, she is kicking and screaming, at least internally, as her increasingly rising profile and finances curtail her freedom to do as she wills and as she must.)

I expected a bit more drama, or at least a bit more of that same kicking if not the screaming, over the reveal of Corinna’s true identity, but as plucky as she is, she’s just not that sort. I also thought that there would be more drama and pathos when Corinna and her father finally did meet, but that was also more of a whimper than a bang – as his heart gave out soon after.

The drama in this story, as the blurb very much alludes to, comes in the long-simmering sibling rivalry between the cousin who inherited her father’s earldom and his younger brother, who just so happens to be one of the group of friends that took ‘Cory’ under their collective wing.

A rivalry which traps Corinna at its center, as cousin Darius wants Corinna in order to get possession of the other half of what he sees as HIS inheritance – no matter how many people he has to ruin along the way – while his younger brother Alick just wants Corinna. Although in the best romantic tradition, he hasn’t figured that out yet.

That Darius has already found a very unsuitable heiress – or at least countess – of his own makes his plans to ‘ruin’ Corinna just that much more dastardly. That this story manages to drive itself into a happy ending in spite of its characters’ actions just adds to the fun, and makes for a delightfully frothy conclusion to the story.

Review: A Duke’s Guide to Romance by Sophie Barnes

Review: A Duke’s Guide to Romance by Sophie BarnesA Duke's Guide to Romance (The Gentlemen Authors #1) by Sophie Barnes
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: historical romance, regency romance
Series: Gentlemen Authors #1
Pages: 276
Published by Sophie Barnes on August 29th, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKobo
Goodreads

He only wanted to purchase a novel, now he’s falling madly in love…

Anthony Gibbs, Duke of Westcliffe, needs an income. Bills must be paid, appearances kept, and arrangements made for his sisters' debuts. In short, he must either marry or seek employment, neither of which sounds remotely compelling. But then he meets Ada and she suggests a third option. Now he's penning a novel while losing his heart to the bookish miss, a woman he cannot afford to marry unless he’s prepared to make some difficult choices.

Ada Quinn has no connections, no dowry, and consequently no prospects. Her plan for the future is limited to her skill as a bookbinder. Until Mr. Gibbs walks into her uncle’s bookshop and starts to romance her. Handsome, thoughtful, and utterly charming, Mr. Gibbs is precisely the sort of man Ada always dreamed of falling in love with. Until she discovers he’s not who he claims to be and that he intends to marry another.

My Review:

Three years before our story begins, Anthony Gibbs, Duke of Westcliffe and his friends Brody Evans, the Duke of Corwin and Callum Davis, the Duke of Stratton survived a life-changing catastrophe by working through their collective shock and grief together when their aristocratic fathers were killed during a rare instance of random bovine combustion.

Meaning all of their fathers were caught in the literal crossfire while purchasing livestock when a cow pen exploded. (Fertilizer really is highly explosive, and the primary ingredient in fertilizer is manure. Which is what naturally falls out of a cow’s backside to rest on the floor of their pens.)

Ahem. Apologies. I couldn’t resist.

While sticking together solving one set of problems by sharing their grief, it created another, as they spent the past three years frittering away their time and wasting their money in pursuit of one distraction after another while neglecting their responsibilities, their estates and the increasingly empty state of their coffers.

The bills have all come due, they are all swimming up the River Tick. They are individually and collectively skint – or at least heading there fast. And keeping up appearances is damn expensive all by itself, without the added costs of deferred maintenance on their estates AND making sure their dependents are taken care of.

In Westcliffe’s case, those dependents include his two younger sisters, who have just reached the age for their first Seasons in the ‘Marriage Mart’. Seasons that are critical for their futures, but are guaranteed to put an equally critical drain on the family’s remaining cash.

All three of the 20-something Dukes entertain the possibility of marrying for money. It would not be an uneven trade, but a marriage of convenience would make for a shatteringly awful life. Particularly as the woman who has set her cap at Westcliffe is a conniving, manipulative harpy.

Which is when Ada Quinn walks into Westcliffe’s life. Or rather, he drops a book into hers. Literally. Onto her head. And both of their wits are addled ever after – but in the best way possible.

Westcliffe’s conversation with Ada in her uncle’s bookshop sets all of their lives into glorious motion. First, and most important for the series as a whole, their conversation puts the idea into his head that he and his friends can save their finances by writing the kind of novels that made the late Jane Austen famous. Readers are crying out for more books like hers, but the author has recently passed away and no one has taken up her pen.

Second, and most important for the protagonists of this first entry in the series, Westcliffe and Ada bring each other to sparkling life in a way that neither expected or planned on. In a way that seems guaranteed to break Ada’s heart, as she is all too aware of the disparity in their stations.

But, in a romance worthy of Ada’s favorite Austen novels, Westcliffe is convinced that society can go hang and love will find a way. As long as they trust in each other, communicate honestly with each other, and brush all of the harpies away.

Escape Rating A-: A Duke’s Guide to Romance is a deliciously frothy confection, light and fluffy and full of wit and sparkle with just the barest hint of a misunderstandammit to keep the characters on their toes until the very end.

As a Regency, it’s an excellent antidote to follow my recent reads in both the Sebastian St. Cyr and Wrexford & Sloane series, as they both explore and expose the seamy underbelly of the Regency. A Duke’s Guide to Romance, and I expect the rest of its series of Gentlemen Authors will as well, floats lightly on top of the glittering effervescence that we tend to expect in a Regency romance.

At the same time, it doesn’t shy away from the difference in social station between Westcliffe and Ada – at least from Ada’s perspective. As much as she’s fallen in love with the man, it’s clear from their differing perspectives on the potential issues that they face that she is the more realistic of the pair. The silver spoon he was born with, as well as the privilege of having been born male, leads him to believe that all their problems can be swept away easily, where she knows it just isn’t so.

Which leads to the big misunderstandammit that almost derails their happiness, as he keeps forging ahead without informing her of his decisions and change of heart because the world has always bent to his will in a way that it never has to hers.

At the same time, I very much liked the way that their romance didn’t merely invoke Jane Austen’s work but also served as an homage to it as the progress of their romance would have fit right into hers. Something that is highlighted in the way that the romance Westcliffe and company are writing plays into the romance that Westcliffe is experiencing and vice versa.

All in all, A Duke’s Guide to Romance was a very pleasant way to while away a stormy afternoon. I’m looking forward to seeing this delicious series continue with A Duke’s Introduction to Courtship and A Duke’s Lesson in Charm in the months ahead.

Review: A Rogue at Stonecliffe by Candace Camp

Review: A Rogue at Stonecliffe by Candace CampA Rogue at Stonecliffe (Stonecliffe, #2) by Candace Camp
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical fiction, historical romance
Series: Stonecliffe #2
Pages: 384
Published by Canary Street Press on June 27, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.org
Goodreads

New York Times bestselling author Candace Camp invites you back to Stonecliffe, where an unwelcome reunion between a lady and a rogue calls up old feelings…and new dangers.
When the love of her life left without any explanation, Annabeth Winfield moved on despairingly, knowing she’d never have a love as thrilling as her first ever again. Sloane Rutherford was roguish and daring, but as Annabeth grew up, she realized that their reckless romance was just a passing adventure, never meant for stability. Twelve years later, Annabeth is engaged to someone new, ready to start her life with a dependable man.
That’s when Sloane returns. And he brings with him a serious warning: Annabeth is in trouble.
After spending the past dozen years working as a spy, Sloane thought he’d left espionage behind him. But now a dangerous blackmailer is after Annabeth. Sloane offers to hide his former lover at Stonecliffe, the Rutherford estate, but stubborn Annabeth demands to be part of the investigation. As the two embark on a dangerous and exciting journey, memories of their past romance resurface. Sloane and Annabeth aren’t the wide-eyed children they used to be, but knowing they’re wrong for each other makes a nostalgic affair seem very right…
A Stonecliffe Novel
Book 1: An Affair at StonecliffeBook 2: A Rogue at Stonecliffe

My Review:

Fictionally speaking, the Napoleonic Wars are a gift that just keeps on giving. And taking, as happens in this second book in the Stonecliffe series, after last year’s An Affair at Stonecliffe. (Which I have not read – yet – but am now looking forward to!)

The Napoleonic Wars are long over when that rogue of the title returns home to Stonecliffe, but that is not when this story begins. It began twelve years earlier, in 1810, when the war within the war known as the Peninsular War was still going hot, and the cold and chill war of spies and smugglers was complicating progress on both sides of the Channel.

Sloane Rutherford and Annabeth Winfield were young, in love, and expecting to marry as soon as Anna attained her majority at 21. As the children of somewhat spendthrift second sons of the aristocracy, they’ve been raised on the fringes of the ton without ever being truly part of it. They can marry for love – and that’s exactly what they intend to do.

At least until the seemingly endless war interferes with their hopes and dreams, in the person of Britain’s spymaster, Asquith. Asquith needs someone to pose as a disaffected spy and smuggler, and has decided that Sloane is the perfect man for a job that the younger man has no desire to do.

But Asquith has leverage. Not against Sloane himself, but against Anna’s beloved father, who has turned traitorous spy because someone in France has leverage on him. Sloane is faced with an impossible choice, whether to give up Anna, let everything think he has turned his back on his own country, and steal back the incriminating documents that keep her father in thrall, or let Asquith expose her father’s treachery and let the ensuing scandal fall on Anna and her family.

Sloane is damned if he does – literally – and equally damned if he doesn’t. So he does, because his choice is always going to be action over inaction. He leaves Anna in the painful lurch, and pretends to be everything that the ton ends up believing, that he’s a rogue, a smuggler, and a spy.

Even after the wars are over, and Sloane is back in England running the shipping empire that was his well-earned pay for a deadly and dangerous game, he and Anna stay far, far away from each other.

Until that incriminating paper that was once held over her father’s head puts Anna’s life in danger. So Sloane does what he always does – he acts. He’s the only one who takes the danger seriously enough to protect Anna at any and all costs – especially to his own heart.

Escape Rating B: The story in A Rogue at Stonecliffe reads like a combination of the chickens coming home to roost and an old truism about it not being the original crime that gets someone in trouble nearly half so much as it’s the coverup that does them in.

Mixed with a second chance at love story whose tension isn’t “will they, won’t they” because they already did, or even “should they or shouldn’t they”, because it’s obvious early on that they should, but much more about whether they can manage to get past all the damage that they’ve already done to each other.

Or more to the point, all the damage that Sloane has already done to Anna. Because he seriously effed up by taking solely unto himself a whole heaping helping of decisions that should rightfully have been shared. And that’s something they’re going to have to work on together in order to have any kind of future.

And it’s not easy to do that when bullets are flying and people are trying to kill one or both of them and there’s a dangerous secret at the bottom of the dirty barrel that neither of them knows the full depths of until it’s nearly too late.

There’s more than a bit of romantic suspense in this, as Sloane and Anna are searching for a secret that once damned her father and has the capacity to take the rest of the family down with him now that he’s dead. All the while, Sloane is trying to keep both of them a few steps ahead of a traitor who has been hiding in plain sight for over a decade.

But what makes this one so much fun is Anna and her relationship with Sloane. Not the hazy dream they had in the past, but the real, and increasingly honest and equal one they have in the present. Sloane wants to keep her safe. Anna has the right to know all the truths and make her own decisions. Navigating that minefield is even more of a threat to any possibility of their future happiness than any sharpshooters taking potshots from the woods.

The Stonecliffe series has proved to be a fascinating mix of historical romance and romantic suspense, at least based on this second book in the series. So I’ll be reaching back for that first book, An Affair at Stonecliffe, and looking forward to the third, A Scandal at Stonecliffe, coming next year.

Review: The Bride Wore White by Amanda Quick

Review: The Bride Wore White by Amanda QuickThe Bride Wore White (Burning Cove, California, 7) by Amanda Quick
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, large print, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical romance, paranormal, romantic suspense
Series: Burning Cove #7
Pages: 316
Published by Berkley on May 2, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

A psychic desperate to escape her destiny—and a killer—finds her future in the coastal town of Burning Cove in New York Times bestselling author Amanda Quick’s latest novel.

Being Madame Ariadne, Psychic Dream Consultant, wasn’t Prudence Ryland’s ideal gig, but it paid well which was reason enough to do the work—until she realizes that her latest client intends to kill her. But Prudence, a master at reinvention, finds a new job and home as far away as possible and is finally able to relax—which turns out to be a big mistake. Letting her guard down means being kidnapped and drugged and waking up in a bloodstained wedding dress in the honeymoon suite next to a dead man. With the press outside the hotel, waiting with their cameras and police sirens in the distance, it’s obvious she’s being framed for the man’s murder. Prudence knows who is responsible, but will anyone believe her?

It doesn’t seem likely that rumored crime boss Luther Pell or his associate, Jack Wingate, believe her seemingly outrageous claims of being a target of a ruthless vendetta. In fact, Prudence is convinced that the mysterious Mr. Wingate believes her to be a fraud at best, and at worst: a murderer. And Jack Wingate does seem to be someone intimately familiar with violence, if going by his scarred face and grim expression. So no one is more shocked than Prudence when Jack says he’ll help her. Of course, his ideas for helping her involve using her as the bait for a killer, but Prudence feels oddly safe with Jack protecting her. But who will protect Prudence from her growing fascination with this enigma of a man?

My Review:

So much revenge is being served, in so many seriously chilling and chilled ways, that at first it seems impossible to determine who – or how many – are doing the serving. Even without using her powers, Prudence Ryland knows she’s in over her head.

Prudence makes her living as a psychic dream consultant, just as her grandmother did before her. She’s good at her job – even though she seldom uses her very real powers. After all, most people want the same things when they come to have their dreams analyzed. All it takes is knowledge of human nature to give it to them.

But Prudence’s last client – both for the day and for her life as Psychic Dream Consultant Madame Ariadne, is not in her office for a dream interpretation. He’s there to kill her. So she uses those powers that she definitely does have to disable him long enough to get the hell out of Dodge.

Only to reinvent herself in another small, coastal California town. As a research librarian. When she comes to in a hotel room, dressed in a formal bridal gown, covered in the blood of the dead man lying beside her, she recognizes that she needs a certain kind of very specialized help.

The help of someone who both accepts the supernatural community AND knows how to get things “fixed”. Prudence goes to Burning Cove California to just about throw herself on the mercy of Luther Pell, the owner of the exclusive Burning Cove Hotel and one of the central characters of both the place and the series that began with The Girl Who Knew Too Much.

Luther decides to kill two birds with one stone – along with solving the mystery. His friend and confidential agent, Jack Wingate, needs a case to solve to keep him from brooding on his recent betrayals and to help him with his groundbreaking work on criminal profiling. Prudence needs an investigator AND a bodyguard wrapped in one package, as she needs protection as well as someone to figure out who really is out to get her.

Jack is skeptical about Prudence’s claims of psychic abilities as well as her protestations of innocence in not one but two spectacular murders. He’s planning to profile her for his book. She’s trying to stay alive.

And Luther Pell has a reputation – not just for fixing problems – but for fixing up his clients and his agents into surprising happy-ever-afters. After they figure out whodunnit.

Escape Rating A-: Burning Cove has turned out to be a fascinating place. To the point where, when I get the next installment, I can’t resist sitting down with it immediately – and I’m caught up in it from the very first page. The Bride Wore White was no exception.

This series whips up a lot of disparate elements into an absolute froth of a story. I say froth both in the sense that it has a certain lightness in the way that the protagonists banter their way towards romance – if occasionally just a bit too quickly – and in the way that the tension gets whipped into a frothy fury as more and more motives, opportunities and suspects get added to the brew.

As a long time reader of this author under her many, many names (Amanda Quick, Jayne Ann Krentz and Jayne Castle) I particularly adore the way that each new series teases at events both past and present in everything connected to the Jayneverse. It’s not necessary to have read her connecting series to enjoy Burning Cove, but they are all oh-so-much-fun that once you’ve bitten into one you’ll be compelled to taste the rest!

What made this case so compelling was the way that the longer it went on the wilder and crazier things got. It’s clear at the beginning that someone is out to get Prudence, but as the story progresses the way it shifts from Prudence being at the center to Prudence being the means to someone else’s end changes the situation from something straightforward to something with twists and turns and wheels within wheels.

There’s a long game being played and it takes the reader and the investigators quite the chase to even begin to see the shape of that game and its purpose.

That Jack is working on something that will become the start of criminal profiling as we know it now added a bit of icing onto the cake. We may not know how the case ends, but we know what criminal profiling has become and his work grounded this paranormal story into the real in a surprisingly satisfying way.

Burning Cove as a place and a series, and The Bride Wore White in particular, have all the elements to mix spellbinding suspense, a satisfying mystery and a delightful romance into one delicious cocktail of a story.

I want another, so I’ll be waiting with that proverbial bated breath for her next suspenseful, paranormal, romantic adventure, whether in the past as Amanda Quick, in the present as Jayne Ann Krentz, or in the future as Jayne Castle. And it looks like that next adventure will be The Night Island, written as Jayne Ann Krentz, the second book in her Lost Night Files, coming in January 2024.

Review: The Echo of Old Books by Barbara Davis

Review: The Echo of Old Books by Barbara DavisThe Echo of Old Books by Barbara Davis
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: hardcover, paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: books and reading, historical fiction, historical romance, magical realism, mystery
Pages: 443
Published by Lake Union Publishing on March 28, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Rare-book dealer Ashlyn Greer’s affinity for books extends beyond the intoxicating scent of old paper, ink, and leather. She can feel the echoes of the books’ previous owners—an emotional fingerprint only she can read. When Ashlyn discovers a pair of beautifully bound volumes that appear to have never been published, her gift quickly becomes an obsession. Not only is each inscribed with a startling incrimination, but the authors, Hemi and Belle, tell conflicting sides of a tragic romance.
With no trace of how these mysterious books came into the world, Ashlyn is caught up in a decades-old literary mystery, beckoned by two hearts in ruins, whoever they were, wherever they are. Determined to learn the truth behind the doomed lovers’ tale, she reads on, following a trail of broken promises and seemingly unforgivable betrayals. The more Ashlyn learns about Hemi and Belle, the nearer she comes to bringing closure to their love story—and to the unfinished chapters of her own life.

My Review:

Instead of Four Weddings and a Funeral, The Echo of Old Books is a tale of Four Tragedies and an HEA – at least – and on both counts. The story folds together the bitter and the sweet into a saga that begins in mystery, middles in anger and ends in hope while it puts the readers, both of the story and within the story, through a wringer of emotions, keeping them turning the pages of not just the book in hand, but of the two mysterious books within.

It all begins with Hemi and Belle and the two seemingly anonymous, most likely privately published books that hold their separate perspectives on their clearly doomed, inevitably tragic WW2-era romance. But those little books are only the beginning of the web that has been woven.

A web that catches rare-book dealer Ashlyn Greer within its sticky strands. At first, she is snared by the emotions that she can feel pouring off the pages. And then by the mystery of how these two books came to be.

She knows, with her gift of psychometry, that the emotions held within the pages are real – but can’t be certain whether the story told within is the true story of the seemingly star-crossed lovers or merely a fiction intended to conceal a deeper emotional truth.

As she reads, and as we read with her, she also becomes caught up in the puzzle of it all. Were Hemi and Belle real? If so, who were they? And how far will she need to travel in order to learn that truth?

Her search takes her to an intrepid librarian who ferrets out much of the historical data with a twinkle in her eye and a spring in her step. But the real treasure trove of information comes from Ethan Manning, who brought the books – along with many other considerably more mundane works – from his late father’s library to the used bookstore where Ashlyn first encountered Remembering Belle and Belle’s response in Forever, and Other Stories.

Together they read the story of his great-aunt Marian (nicknamed Belle in the books) and the love of her life. Whoever he was and however he broke her heart – just as she broke his. Along the way, they learn more than either of them wanted to know about a past that STILL isn’t quite dead.

And discover that the tragedies locked in their own pasts do not mean that they can’t find a brighter future, if they can just manage to paradoxically, let it go.

Escape Rating A: I’m pretty sure I initially grabbed this for the cover. Because books. Seemingly endless stacks of books. I couldn’t resist the story even if I can now manage to walk out of a bookstore without carrying stacks of books out with me, if only because text is hard these days and ebooks are much easier to read and to carry.

Howsomever, I moved this book to a bit earlier in the week for two reasons. One, I was hoping for an unequivocal happy ending, which wasn’t possible in some of this week’s books and seemed disappointingly out of reach in yesterday’s.

But even if this did not turn out to have a happy ending I could tell that it was at least going to have a cathartic resolution of some kind. Even if that resolution was bittersweet or downright sad. I needed something definitive, and I most definitely got it in this absorbing, compulsive page-turner.

I got all of that and more in The Echo of Old Books.

This is kind of a timeslip story, and it’s also more than a bit of a treasure hunt story. And appropriately, it’s the timeslip, the story within the books themselves, that grabs both Ashlyn and the reader first. So the story of Belle and Hemi dominates the early parts of the narrative in a way that is both clever and absorbing.

We also start out Belle and Hemi’s story knowing it’s going to be tragic, so it’s not exactly a spoiler that their 1941 idyll gets, well, spoiled. What we, and Ashlyn, are desperate to learn is how. And the way that the story spools out, at first being a whole lot of Belle and Hemi with only hints of Ashlyn, carefully shifts over the course of the story to less and less of the past – even as it gets more searing and races towards its seemingly inevitable denouement – and more of Ashlyn and now Ethan’s presents.

And their own searing, scarring pasts. The more we learn about both couples, the more we hope for HEAs all around – no matter how impossible that might seem. We become invested in both stories every bit as much as Ashlyn does Belle’s.

The Echo of Old Books was absolutely the right book at the right time for this reader, with its combination of historical mystery, tragic romance and historical ambiance both in Belle and Hemi’s 1941 and Ashlyn and Ethan’s “present day” of 1984.

I’m definitely going to be snapping up this author’s next book as soon as I see it. In the meantime, I’ll be picking up a copy of her next most recent book, The Keeper of Happy Endings, for the next time I need a book with an absorbing puzzle, a bit of an ugly cry in the middle, and satisfying, cathartic resolution with hopes of an HEA to keep me turning pages until the heartstopping end.

Review: The Wedding Dress Sewing Circle by Jennifer Ryan

Review: The Wedding Dress Sewing Circle by Jennifer RyanThe Wedding Dress Sewing Circle by Jennifer Ryan
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: hardcover, paperback, large print, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical fiction, historical romance, World War II
Pages: 411
Published by Ballantine Books on May 31, 2022
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Three plucky women lift the spirits of home-front brides in wartime Britain, where clothes rationing leaves little opportunity for pomp or celebration—even at weddings—in this heartwarming novel based on true events, from the bestselling author of The Chilbury Ladies' Choir.After renowned fashion designer Cressida Westcott loses both her home and her design house in the London Blitz, she has nowhere to go but the family manor house she fled decades ago. Praying that her niece and nephew will be more hospitable than her brother had been, she arrives with nothing but the clothes she stands in, at a loss as to how to rebuild her business while staying in a quaint country village.
Her niece, Violet Westcott, is thrilled that her famous aunt is coming to stay—the village has been interminably dull with all the men off fighting. But just as Cressida arrives, so does Violet's conscription letter. It couldn't have come at a worse time; how will she ever find a suitably aristocratic husband if she has to spend her days wearing a frumpy uniform and doing war work?
Meanwhile, the local vicar's daughter, Grace Carlisle, is trying in vain to repair her mother's gown, her only chance of a white wedding. When Cressida Westcott appears at the local Sewing Circle meeting, Grace asks for her help—but Cressida has much more to teach the ladies than just simple sewing skills.
Before long, Cressida's spirit and ambition galvanizes the village group into action, and they find themselves mending wedding dresses not only for local brides, but for brides across the country. And as the women dedicate themselves to helping others celebrate love, they might even manage to find it for themselves.

My Review:

Eustace Westcott was dead, to begin with. And it seems to be a relief for all concerned, especially his family. His deceased presence turns out to be a bigger blight on the lives of everyone who knew him than the war. Even the local pub still boasts “a certain ditty written in the men’s lavatory” proclaiming that “Eustace Westcott should stick his precious checkbook up a certain part of his anatomy.”

His estranged sister, the famous – or infamous in the late Eustace’s mind – fashion designer Cressida Westcott would certainly agree. She only attended his funeral to make absolutely certain the blighter was dead.

But speaking of that war, when the London Blitz takes out both her house and her design house in the same night, Cressida’s not sure where to go or what to do. She’s lost everything except the clothes on her back, the designs in her head, and a reputation in the fashion industry that she’s spent the last 20 years building. Those will see her through – but first she needs a place to live and regroup.

She never thought she’d go back home to Aldhurst. In fact, she’d sworn she wouldn’t. But Eustace is dead and she can at least hope that his two children, now adults themselves, haven’t turned into carbon copies of their not-so-dear old dad. Or that there’s still time for her to help them become functional human beings now that his oppressive influence over their lives has been removed.

What she finds in the old family pile is a second chance. A chance to get to know the village and its people – and become one of them. A chance to find family again by helping her niece and nephew see that their father’s ideas and influence are holding them back from living their own lives instead of repeating all the restrictions of his.

All the restrictions he tried to impose on Cressida and utterly failed at.

Cressida has a chance to explore a bit of the road not taken and let herself have as much of it all as could ever be possible – not in spite of the war but because of it.

Escape Rating A: I was looking for, not exactly a comfort read as most of my comfort reads start with murder, but rather a comfortable read for the end of this week. It’s kind of surprising that led me to World War II, not exactly a comfortable time for ANYONE, but this actually fit the bill quite nicely. I adored one of the author’s previous books, The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir, and was expecting more of the same – interesting characters who grow and change in a heartwarming story of the British homefront during World War II. And I was expecting a female-centric story because, well, the war.

And all of that is exactly what I got. With bells on!

The story revolves around three women, Cressida Westcott, her niece Violet Westcott, and the woman Cressida mentors in Aldhurst, Grace Carlisle. All of their lives have been knocked off their original courses by World War II, but the war also gives each of them a chance to change a course that they thought was set. Hopefully for the better.

Cressida’s change is a driving force in what happens, which is fitting because Cressida herself has always been a driving force in her own life. While her return to Aldhurst allows her to see the place with fresh eyes, her trip back home doesn’t change who she has become in all the years between.

She’s still a driven woman, determined to be in the top echelon of fashion design – and succeeding on her own terms. What her return to Aldhurst allows her to do is to open herself up to new experiences and new friendships. She is still who she has always been, but becoming part of the village – something she was not allowed to do when she was growing up – reminds her that in addition to making a living she also needs to make a life.

Violet and Grace are both in their 20s, and each has planned a certain life for themselves based on what they’ve been taught, what they’ve been told, what they’ve always believed in the “right thing to do.” Violet is honestly a selfish, self-involved little bitch, an upper class twit who believes that marrying a title is her due and that she’s entitled to all the privileges that come with her family’s wealth and status without ever working for them.

Grace is her opposite, the daughter of the local vicar, selflessly devoting herself to the village and parish work, never asking a thing for herself. She’s been shouldering much of her father’s caretaking of the village in the years since her mother died, and everyone else’s need for her has become her life. To the point that she’s planning to marry a clergyman herself, believing that it’s her best chance of recreating the happy family that raised her before her mother’s death.

Violet just needs to grow up – and for that to happen she needs to break out of a role that is designed to keep her childlike and uneducated. Conscription into war work forced Violet to see herself and the world around her with her own eyes, and it’s the making of her.

But it’s Grace’s transformation from colorless drudge to fashion design apprentice that gives the story its heart and its heartbreak. Her involvement with Cressida begins with her engagement, and her desire to wear her mother’s rather moth-eaten wedding gown on her own ‘special’ day.

It’s not just a wish out of love and nostalgia, it’s a necessity. Under wartime clothing rationing, there is no material available for new wedding dresses. There’s little available for repairing old ones, either. But with Cressida’s vast design experience and Grace’s eye for the best ways of ‘making mend and making do’ there’s a chance to make it happen.

Even though the process of design and exploration finally makes Grace wake up and realize that it shouldn’t happen for her – or at least it shouldn’t happen for her with the man she’s currently engaged to marry.

Whether Grace gets to wear the dress herself or not, out of her mother’s old dress both a new dress and a grand idea, The Wedding Dress Sewing Circle of the title, are born. The dress that Violet’s mother gave to Grace’s mother eventually becomes THE dress for many young women of Aldhurst and beyond, in an act of sisterhood that is carried not just around the country, but all the way back home to where it began.

The dress is beautiful on every woman who wears it. And the story of how it came to be is every single bit as lovely.