5++ stars I don’t even know where to begin with this one, but I’ll start with this. I received an ARC of this book from the author, and I melted into a puddle while reading it. While I couldn’t put it down, dying to know what would happen next, I was devastated when I finished it and had no more left to read. It’s not only the words used, which are poetic and evocative, but it’s also the characters, who are endearing and relatable. I can’t think of any other author who makes me so desperately wish I could step into the world of her characters and make it my home. Macaulay, Prince of Limehouse (and King of the Underworld) is not at all attracted to Pippa, the younger sister of his close fried Roan, a duke. He can’t be; Roan would kill him. Every thought Macauley has of Pippa is closely followed by an excuse or explanation to justify his actions. When one of his associates questions why he is running to save Pippa from one of her self-assembled predicaments, this is his response: “It isn’t like that,” Macaulay murmured. When it wasn’t. Although it was. A little. Pippa, who is trying so hard to become a lady for the sake of her brother and the rest of their extended family, sees herself as “a half-baked cake, crisped on the edges and gooey inside, unrefined and inelegant.” The banter between Macauley and Pippa is clever and wry, like when Macauley says, “Sorry to rescript your fairy-tale narrative, but…” Or when he finds her studying him and says, “...may I ask that you quit inspecting me like a horse you’re set to purchase?” shortly followed by, “My shoulder feels like it’s being carved from my body…in slow, sure degrees. Your scalding stare is not quite enough to dispel it.” There was one interaction between Macauley and Pippa which cracked me up. At a ball, Macaulay is approached by an old paramour whom he no longer wishes to see (because of Pippa, naturally). Still unwilling to acknowledge his attraction to her, but well aware of her attraction to him, he decides to use it to his advantage. “So when her gaze collided with his over his former lover’s shoulder, he changed his life by mouthing one word: help.” I had such a clear visual of this, I couldn’t wipe the smile off of my face. Shortly thereafter, Macauley finds it more and more difficult to resist her charms, “A twinkle shimmered in her eyes. Fearsome and frightening. Turning them sea-green and weakening something inside him. As if he needed that.” Closer to her than he should be, “This was glorious. Horrendous. Bewildering. He’d never desired anyone so fiercely—and so fiercely against his will.” So, of course, they kiss, and then, “They stood, staring, words lost. Passion an indescribable shackle linking them and tugging hard.” Macauley makes the mistake of using the word “us” when referring to the two of them and Pippa grasps that with both hands. Even though he claims he made a mistake in kissing her and turns to find her sister, “Most women would take his dismissal as a failure— but there was an us where there had never been before. No woman in London could claim an us with this man. His lips tightened. A light rain had begun to fall, and she stepped beneath the eave to protect what was left of her sad presentation. ‘Don’t fixate on any one pronoun I’m using, luv.’ Oh, he was clever, her rookery scoundrel.” Naturally, he cannot get her out of his mind after that and thinks back to their encounter in the garden at the ball. “When he’d pressed her up against the door, he’d had no notion but to go on kissing her until the end of time. Until they expired on the spot. A romantic, moonlit garden in the middle of Mayfair. The setting infuriated him, it was so maudlin.” At the same time, Pippa is trying to get Macauley out of her mind. “She’d finally given up. Let Macauley stay wedged like a splinter in her brain.” Pippa becomes more and more aware of Macauley’s growing feelings, while he continues to try to deny them to himself. He’s adorable, trying to reason his way out of heading the way of his happily-married friends, attached to wives, children, and cats. “Macauley found a spindle chair and threw himself into it. He didn’t care what, he was not attaching himself to a woman or a feline. He simply wasn’t. Pippa didn’t even seem to particularly like cats.” One has to wonder if even he realized how transparent he was. Truly, Pippa and Mcauley are perfect for one another, not only having much in common, but also balancing the qualities in the other with contrary ones. While she’s prepared to jump into a life with him, he spends too much time torturing himself with what-ifs and putting up roadblocks. Pippa is a skilled chess player, while Mcauley is not. Her advice to him is clearly intended to apply to life as well as chess. “You’re too rigid.” He coughed and straightened from where he rested against the settee. “Excuse me?” She gestured to the chessboard with her glass. “I think three steps ahead and react quickly while you agonize.” She nudged her knight into place. “About the moves. Every single one. Instead of going with the decision, then not worrying.” There’s also one particularly funny scene involving Macauley and two of his friends’ wives, Georgie and Hildy, discussing Pippa, trying to get their advice on winning her to his side (after messing things up badly). “Pip’s not a jewelry kind of girl. Not alone with nothing else to back it, that is. I need to know how to find my way inside the castle if you get my meaning. Pip’s drawn the bridge up over the moat.” Georgie giggled behind her teacup. “We thought your success with that venture was part of the problem.” “Not that castle. Ever heard of a metaphor?” He frowned, his cheeks, unbelievably, going hot. “What a lewd mind you have, Your Grace. I’m stunned to my boots and back. Posh upbringings don’t curb naughty natures, do they?” When Pippa and Macauley finally figured things out, I had a grin on my face. How could I not? Two characters, each unique and wonderful, and perfect for one another, finding their HEA. I loved it! Five stars is not enough. April 8, 2022
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5 stars The books in this series keep getting better and better, and the heroes more and more multi-dimensional. Other books in the series seem to be about 50% sex and 50% plot & character development. It feels like the ratio has shifted to 30:70, allowing Steele to delve deeper into the psyche of her characters and add more nuance. Keep in mind these percentages are purely subjective and just my impression. I might be totally off. The point is, in this book I felt like Seb is a more complicated character than any of the other Sovranos. On the other hand, maybe I just like him better. If you read Theresa and Axel’s book, it should come as no surprise that Seb and Elsa are the stars of this one. Theresa is Elsa’s best friend and owner of the flower shop she manages. Elsa is a bit of a dark character, survivor of an abusive marriage who craves to be a submissive, but not to someone who doesn’t actually care about her. Of course, Seb is happy to oblige in both arenas. She also has a little girl who immediately gravitates to Seb, seeing the soft, gooey center at the middle of his alpha personality. I enjoyed the interactions between Seb and Avery because they highlighted his compassion and hero-complex (which I don’t mean in a negative way). In fact, it is his desire to rescue Elsa and Avery that initiates the more significant connection between them. Fabio, Elsa’s ex-husband is the typical wife abuser—narcissistic, self-centered, unwilling to take responsibility, controlling, and a bully, with a bit of alcohol abuse thrown in for good measure. Although he could come across as one-dimensional, he doesn’t because these are characteristics that everyone who has known an abuser will recognize. It is glorious when Elsa finally reclaims her life. As with the other books in the series, I edited this one, but there’s something about this book that I just like better than the others. I anticipate the next ones will be even better and I’m looking forward to that. April 8, 2022 5 stars Apparently, this is the seventh book in a series about the Whickertons, but since I am new to this author, I’ve never read the others. I’m grateful that I received an ARC of this one from WOLF Publishing because I truly enjoyed it. The pacing and the plot were exactly right, and I found myself surprised by events again and again. Naturally, the final result didn’t come as a big surprise, but the twists and turns along the way were unexpected and kept my interest. This book is about Nora, recently widowed from a man with whom she shared no affection, and Troy, the man with whom she grew up who has not married. Of course, they are in love with one another, but both are hesitant to share their true feelings—Nora because she believes she is barren, and Troy because he believes she ignored his declaration of devotion five years earlier. Nora, pursued by her late husband’s cousin and heir to his fortune/title, Mr. Clarke, goes home to be with her mother, swearing never to marry again—even though she desperately wants to be with Troy. She feels lonely and disheartened that this will be her life—embroidery, tea, embroidery again. Meanwhile, Troy is surrounded by his boisterous and happy family and cannot hide his anger and resentment that they are finding happiness and he cannot. Luckily for the both of them, Grandmother Edie is a meddler and determined to bring them together. It is revealed to the reader that she had a hand in facilitating the love-based marriages of every one of his sisters, and even his parents. After secretly seeing Nora, Troy wonders if his grandmother might somehow know. “It seemed impossible. And yet Troy knew that with regards to his grandmother, that word held no meaning at all.” And of course, he was right. I only have one complaint about the book and it’s a picky little thing, and might not even be noticed by anyone else, but here it is. The narrator says, “She, too, had been worth waiting for!” I don’t think an omniscient narrator should be sharing their feelings with the reader so emphatically. Had the exclamation point been omitted, it would simply be a statement of fact, but adding the exclamation point made it something that the narrator was excited to share. The only time an exclamation point should be used in fiction is during internal or external dialogue, but I can’t think of any other time it would be appropriate. Overall, I think the book was well-written and the characters were engaging. I’d be happy to read more from this author. April 6, 2022 3 stars I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley and I was excited to read it, thinking it would give me a greater understanding of the Republican party, and perhaps if I’d been able to finish it, it would have. Alas, I will never know. I’m embarrassed to say, I managed to read the first chapter and then decided I could not read the rest without becoming completely disgusted. I think the part that clinched my opinion was when Drucker listed Trump’s accomplishments. I’d always wondered what his supporters considered his “many” accomplishments, but I think finding out is worse than not knowing. “Incidentally, Trump’s accomplishments in the White House, and commitment to his campaign promises, are an underappreciated facet of the fanatical support he has enjoyed inside the party…” He then goes on to list his accomplishments which only served to transport me back to the past and the anger and frustration I felt with each of his “accomplishments.” The tax code, which favors the rich (like himself). The construction of a wall at the Southern border, a border based on fear-mongering, which sometimes ran through peoples’ properties and divided wildlife passages, and was hotly contested by many who live along the border. Moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, effectively giving the middle finger to every religion not Jewish or Christian. Withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal, thereby providing Iran with the opportunity to pursue their nuclear program unimpeded and unobserved. Withdrawing from the Paris climate accords, something that had provided hope to those of us who are extremely concerned about the lack of movement toward developing a solution to the damage we continue to do to the earth. Appointed hundreds of conservatives to the federal judiciary, something which Mitch McConnell’s machinations made possible and which threatens to force us back to a time before equality for women and civil rights. And then there’s Operation Warp Speed, for which I would like to give him credit, except for the fact that he tossed Obama-era pandemic protocols, which could have hampered the initial spread, and did not develop any infrastructure for the distribution of said vaccines. This is not to mention some of the most egregious actions of his administration, including ignoring the potential severity of the disease for fear it would adversely affect his reelection, delegating responsibility to individual states to secure PPE, forcing them to bid against one another to drive up the prices, and allowing his son-in-law, Mr. "The notion of the federal stockpile is that it's supposed to be our stockpile. It's not supposed to be states' stockpiles that they then use," in clear violation of anti-nepotism guidelines, to oversee the distribution of federal resources. Then there was the Covid Relief Fund which Congress specified should be protected from Mr. Trump and his cronies, but which he and his cronies immediately commandeered and raided for their own benefit. I thought this book might help me to understand some of the Republicans in my life, but after reading one chapter, I realize it might be better if I don’t because I want to hold onto what little respect for them that I have left. I’m giving this book three stars because it’s not terribly written, even if the subject matter is repulsive to me and I found it was slightly biased toward the Republican party. It’s better than if it were written by someone opposed to the party, but the positive spin placed on negative actions/beliefs/whatever was too much for me to tolerate. I was expecting more of an expose-style narrative regarding Trump’s influence on the Republican party, but this seemed more like a blueprint for their success in coming elections. It may be well-written, but I cannot read enough to ascertain whether that’s the case. April 2, 2022 5 stars I chose to purchase this book while it was on sale because the plot sounded so unusual. Lady Rebecca Cornish, twice widowed and only twenty-three years old, is dubbed the Black Widow. Her late husband’s family is determined to rescue her young son from her terrible influence and they hire Ludovic Dunne to find evidence of her evil deeds and immoral behavior since the death of her husband. Instead, he finds evidence of her innocence and finds himself falling in love with her. After some initial challenges, like the sense he deceived her by investigating her on behalf of her husband’s family, she also feels a tendre for him. They become friends. At some point, she meets Ludovic’s friend Franciso who hints to Rebecca that Ludovic has feelings for her. He explains that Ludovic looks at her in a way he doesn’t look at other friends, “...as if I am the last cake in the baker’s shop that some cruel fate prevents him from eating.” He then goes on to tell her: “...you are the only woman I have ever seen get under his skin. In plain language, my lady, he is in love with you and will never act upon that before you both are so miserable he finally decides it might be more honorable to speak than to let you suffer. If you love him, show him, or you will waste a lot of precious time on this earth.” Fortunately, she takes his words to heart. Meanwhile, there are evil forces looking to harm both Rebecca and Ludovic, each for different reasons, and they help one another to vanquish their enemies. The story is full of action, unpleasant characters, as well as nice ones, and a plot unlike any I have read before. I really enjoyed it and I recommend it. April 1, 2022 |
Elizabeth J ConnorWriter. Editor. Proofreader. Archives
September 2022
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