I loved Westwood, and it’s increasingly rare that I love books at first read. I generally rather enjoy Stella Gibbons’s work (and I reviewed The Matchmaker here) but apart from Cold Comfort Farm, which I adore unequivocally, I’ve found Gibbons’s novels to be pleasant rather than stimulating. Westwood (1946) manages to be both comforting and sparkling, a Victorian novel of morality and marriage with a Regency comedy of manners at its heart, and sprinkled with the fragments of a modernist tale of disconnection, dysfunctional marriage, […]
“When you keep quiet, people fill in their own most intelligent thoughts on your behalf.”
What happens when you aren’t built for the life you’re in? In The Heiress Effect Courtney Milan takes us along with her characters to find out. I know that’s not the tagline that many would use to convey the point of this historical romance set in 1860s England. There is all the rich historic detail that infuses Milan’s other works in the Brothers Sinister series (and man do I love reading her Afterwords going over those details), we have Oliver Marshall’s quest for Parliament and […]
Contemporary romances for when you don’t want to overthink it
The Sex, Love, and Stiletto series is three books so far, and there will be a fourth. It’s about a group of four women in the infamous “Dating, Love, and Sex” department at Stiletto magazine, who are each, basically, Carrie Bradshaw, but each one has her own specialty when it comes to writing about romance. The series is fun and harmless, if not especially relevatory, romance. The sex scenes, especially in the first two books, are appropriately steamy and well-written. The books are short and […]
Vampires, and vampires, and more vampires
I’m now halfway through the Vampire Academy series with Book 3: Shadow Kiss (2008) by Richelle Mead, and I’m hooked. I have to find out what happens, I have to finish this series, and it’s likely going to happen soon. Well, pretty soon. I’ve got some other books to read, too. These books aren’t great literary masterpieces, but they’re fun and entertaining. Even though this last book dragged a bit in the middle, it’s still easy, engaging reading. Mead has created a world where there […]
A woman for a different time
Another day, another Courtney Milan novel. My library can be a little slow in stocking Milan’s latest novels, and then sometimes I forget about them. So, The Countess Conspiracy was published back in 2013, but I’m only getting to it now. The story involves Violet Waterfield, Countess of Cambury and Sebastian Malheur, well-known rake. Violet is a closet scientist, obsessed with plants and their genes, in a time where many dislike Darwin, dislike discussing procreation in public, and where women scientists are nonexistent. Violet’s old […]
Yeah, the criminal justice system doesn’t work that way
Karen Robards is another–original–favorite romance author of mine. I found her ages ago. Sometimes her books can get a little too violent and bloody, but they’re consistently fast-paced and easy to read. I usually enjoy them. So when I saw Hunted (2013) by Karen Robards on bookshelves, I picked it up–at the library (because I’m cheap). Quite often with Robards comes murder and mystery and Hunted is no different. Reed Ware is a New Orleans Homicide Detective and his fated love interest, Caroline Wallace, is […]
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