The Marriage Mart - Norma Lee Clark

EXCESSIVE EXPECTATIONS

Lovely, auburn-haired Georgina Fitzhardinge knew what was expected of her when the Earl of Trowbridge proposed:

Society expected her to revel in the respectability of this superbly suitable match.

Her family expected her to use the Earl's fortune to give them the help they badly needed and fervently desired.

The Earl himself expected her to be a charming hostess, an efficient household manager, and, in time, to produce an heir to his title and estates.

But when Georgina became the Earl's wife, it soon became dismayingly apparent that this handsome, virile, worldly man wanted far more than she ever expected to give, and Georgina would have only herself to blame if she didn't make it perfectly clear to her lordly husband that she had her own list o expectations--some of which might very well conflict with his...

I had never read Norma Lee Clark before but I am terribly fond of Marriage of Convenience stories so I decided to give this one a try. It was a complete surprise and I mean that in a good way. If, in the beginning, the heroine felt a bit cold and non-engaging in the middle of the story I was completely fascinated and I couldn't stop reading.

Our heroine, Georgina, is about to accept the Earl of Trowbridge's marriage proposal when the story opens. He is marrying for the usual reason, an heir, but also because he felt he could eventually love Georgina if what he senses about her character is true. Georgina, however, although not repelled by him mostly thinks of her duty towards her family. One must marry to have a proper place in society and if one can catch an eligible party and so help the family all the better for it.

Trowbridge has high expectations for his marriage but he is confronted with Georgina's apparent coldness and reserve. Unbeknownst to him she has been sadly neglected has a child, first abandoned by her mother and then not cherished by her father, and she has learned the hard way to always maintain her composure and not display any strong emotions.

This is no light romance novel, Georgina and Trowbridge must first get to know each other before reaching any kind of agreement and although she had thought herself immune to Trowbridge, Georgina can't help feeling hurt and betrayed at thoughts of his infidelity.

The story is told from a feminine view point, there is much made of the fact that all women should aspire to marriage because that is the only fate open to a young lady and that the kind of husband one gets can make or destroy your happiness. While we get to know Georgina - who needs to deal with her past hurts and trust her husband and accept her emotions - we also get to know her three sisters whose expectations and marriages couldn't have been more different. One is the society lady with loose morals, caring only for her happiness and flirtations and that happily cuckolds her husband another is the boring, and sometimes annoying, perfect miss who ends up with a husband that beats her but from whom she can't even run away without being brought back by her father, and the last one is sensible young lady who ends up finding happiness with a vicar despite an early heartache.

Although this is a romance and, naturally, there is a happy ending, there's much to be said about the lot of women in society during that period and I felt that this story reflected just that. In the end Georgina reflects on how happy she is and how lucky she was to get Trowbridge as husband as they really did not know each other in the beginning and instead of growing up and overcoming her fears she might as easily have continued trapped inside herself or abused at the hands of a less worthy man.

Grade: 4.5/5

The Discarded Duke - Nancy Butler

Nearly destitute, Ursula Roarke agrees to sell her late husband's bloodstock to the Duke of Ardsley. But the wily widow has an ulterior motive in visiting the peer's property in Devon: She hopes to entice him into marriage. Never does she imagine that a handsome sheepherder will jeopardize her plan--and win her heart.

William Ridd has spent years breeding the best woolbearing sheep in England for Ardsley. And he blames Ursula alone for the duke's decision to replace the flocks with horses. Still, Ridd cannot long deny the redhead's tempting charms. But the love of a beautiful woman may not be enough to conquer his fear that a secret from long ago will destroy any future happiness.

When I started reading this book I got the feeling that it was going to be a real keeper. The beginning was really promising with our nearly destitute widowed heroine, Ursula, Lady Roarke, trying to sell some of her horses to the Duke of Ardsley, who also happens to be young, good-looking, rich, and a nice guy. All in all very eligible, and Ursula, feels quite confident she can get him to offer for her. They visit together Myrmion, his property in Devon to see if it will be suitable for the horses the Duke will buy from Ursula. William Ridd is the Duke’s bailiff at Myrmion and he has been breeding and raising sheep there, which also produce a superior quality of wool, and the people in the area depend in the wool industry, which in turn depends on William’s sheep. The competing plans of Ursula and the Ardsley (horses), and William’s (sheep) for Myrmion make them adversaries. However Ursula, soon comes to see the advantages to the people of the area in keeping the sheep, so she proposes to have the horses in a nearby unused property. However the Duke is unconvinced.

All characters are very nicely fleshed out, William, Ursula, Ardsley as well as a neighbour, Miss Coltrane who provides a romantic interest for Ardsley (because obviously our heroine is going to end up with William). However parts of the plot where somewhat unrealistic and far-fetched. William seems to have had a troubled childhood, of which he does not remember much. From the hints and clues we are given early on in the book, the reader knows that William is the real Duke of Ardsley, the older brother of the ‘current’ Duke. This is not a spoiler. Even if the reader was not 100% sure, the title of the book “The Discarded Duke” gives it away. How William lost his rightful place as a Duke was a bit far-fetched for me, and the resolution was not realistic either, featuring a very eeevil grandmother. This is my only complaint about the book. All the characters are delightful (apart from the grandmother obviously), William and Ursula are a really great couple, and Ardsley and Miss Coltrane were also very likeable and their romance quite enjoyable.

If I did not find the story of William’s childhood unconvincing, its resolution far-fetched and the grandmother way too evil, this would have been absolutely perfect. As it is, I am deducting 1 mark for this aspect of the plot. Everything else was spot on, and I can highly recommend this book. I really enjoyed it, and if you have no problem suspending disbelief here and there in a romance, you will absolutely love it.

Grade 4/5.

Regency Christmas Wishes - Anthology

The Regency Christmas Wishes is my last entry for the Winter Holiday Reading Challenge. I found these short stories very pleasant reading material and I think this is my favourite Christmas Anthology for this year.

The Lucky Coin by Barbara Metzger

A funny story about a penniless gentleman who is offered a magic coin and all his wishes become real. He falls in love with the niece of his banker and has to win her uncle's approval and his own fortune back by wishing the right things to come true.  Grade: 4/5

Following Yonder Star by Emma Jensen

8 years ago Alice was left behind when the man she loved ran away to make his fortune and see the world. Now he is back and wants her forgiveness... but still has plans to leave again. I thought Alice forgave him a little too soon and while the story was nice I think she deserved better. Grade: 3.5/5

Merry Magpie by Sandra Heath

A couple became estranged after the lady found out the husband had a mistress but now he decides he wants her back and sets out to win her love. There's a very clever magpie in this story and while I don't usually like when animals behave like people I didn't mind what this one did to bring them together. Grade: 4/5

Best Wishes by Edith Layton

This one was a lot of fun to read. The main couple are newlyweds with very different personalities and both want to spend Christmas their own way. They decide to spend half the time with the hero's friends and half the time with the heroine's family but both solutions will have their own problems and maybe they needed to grow up a bit too. Grade: 4/5

Let Nothing You Dismay by Carla Kelly

Another really nice story about a barrister who blames himself for a past tragedy and his niece's teacher who spends Christmas with them and has some fears of her own. I thought this was a lovely story about family, love and forgiveness. Just right for this season. Grade: 4.5/5

Devil's Cub by Georgette Heyer

Intelligent, practical Mary Challoner knew wicked Dominic Alastair, Marquis of Vidal, wouldn't marry her sister, despite her mother's matchmaking schemes. So Mary coolly prepared to protect her sister by deceiving Vidal. But, she certainly hadn't expected the infuriated nobleman to kidnap her! Reluctantly awakening to his responsibility --and realizing just how serious Mary was about her virtue -- Vidal postponed marriage. But after all the carefully laid wedding plots he'd dodged, Vidal had never expected to be refused by a chit! Baffled, bewitched and frustratingly tempted, Vidal swore that Mary would be his wife. Even if it was the last thing either of them ever did.

Quite honestly, I don’t think I can do this book justice. Clever humor pours all through the pages of this wonderful story. I spent last Sunday afternoon with a beatific smile plastered on my face laughing uncontrollably. My cat, who was sleeping right next to me, was awaken several times and made me well aware with some glaring looks that I was disturbing his comfortable nap.

The characters are a true delight, attaching and far from perfect, who made them even more attractive to my eyes. But it’s the dialogues that caught me completely unaware with their delicious wittiness. There are so many memorable moments, that is hard to pick up a favorite.

Vidal is a true rake, not the kind that makes all the show and, at the end, is another misunderstood man who is in great need of talking about his feelings. But he is always honest with his intentions and clearly shows marriage is not in his immediate plans. The pretty and frivolous Miss Challowner caught his eye and is convinced he will maker her his marchioness.

After another scandal, Vidal needs to leave the country and intends to take his current love interest with him. But this is without counting with the young woman’s elder sister, Mary, who always knew the Marquis true intentions. Determined to ruin his plans, she decides to go in her sister’s place.

I enjoyed Mary immensely! There’s sizzling chemistry between her and Vidal right from the beginning, but they both try to ignore it the best they can without many success. The shooting scene is hilarious and one of my many favorites in this book.

The constant interventions of Vidal’s family contributes to many funny moments, especially when his paternal aunt is involved (her complains about Vidal’s behavior and comparisons to her son are higly amusing) or even his mother, Léonie, the heroine of These Old Shades, who has always a peculiar talent to comfort her son.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough! Devil’s Cub is now in my comfort reads shelf forever.

Grade: 5/5

A MATTER OF CLASS - MARY BALOGH

Reginald Mason is wealthy, refined, and, by all accounts, a gentleman. However, he is not a gentleman by title, a factor that pains him and his father within the Regency society that upholds station over all else. That is, until an opportunity for social advancement arises, namely, Lady Annabelle Ashton. Daughter of the Earl of Havercroft, a neighbor and enemy of the Mason family, Annabelle finds herself disgraced by a scandal, one that has left her brandished as damaged goods. Besmirched by shame, the earl is only too happy to marry Annabelle off to anyone willing to have her.

Though Reginald Mason, Senior, wishes to use Annabelle to propel his family up the social ladder, his son does not wish to marry her, preferring instead to live the wild, single life he is accustomed to. With this, Reginald Senior serves his son an ultimatum: marry Annabelle, or make do without family funds. Having no choice, Reginald consents, and enters into a hostile engagement in which the prospective bride and groom are openly antagonistic, each one resenting the other for their current state of affairs while their respective fathers revel in their suffering.

So begins an intoxicating tale rife with dark secrets, deception, and the trials of love - a story in which very little is as it seems.

The new book by Mary Balogh… longer than a novella, but not quite a novel either. Although not a traditional Regency book, it does deserve to be reviewed here, on the blog, because of the theme and also because of Mary Balogh (who will always be a trad writer, even if her stories tend to be a little unconventional)

The difference between the two classes: the very highborn and the industrial class, has been depicted in many books, even Mrs. Balogh has a few more titles with this theme (A Christmas Promise comes to mind), so it’s not easy to come with something new. I confess I was very skeptical about it, and maybe with a good reason, but lucky me (us) I was wrong. This book was quite unique, in writing style and in the way the author managed to twist the theme.

First of all, for anyone who reads this review and hasn’t read the book yet, I want to warn you that there will be spoilers, this being the type of story that will get spoiled by a review no matter how carefully written. Actually, what is best about this book lies in exactly that – the power of surprise and it would be a pity to know in advance about what’s going to happen. My advice is simply to read the book – because it’s well worth it, and only after that to comment upon it…

*** SPOILER ***

That being said, I want to mention that the writing style is a little different than what we’re used to. You get one chapter in the present (after the scandal that ruined Annabelle’s chances of making a good marriage) and the next is in the past, so you get to know how everything came to this happening, glimpses of the past with Reggie and Annabelle meeting, forming a tentative friendship and falling in love...

I have to say that I didn’t have a clue about the secret arrangement between the two characters until I was way into the second part of the book, so I got to enjoy almost fully the double-entendres, the little surprises and the fact that the hero and heroine who remained almost throughout the whole book a mystery...

The book is quite dynamic, it doesn’t dwell much on inner emotions (because it can’t :)), some of the scenes are very funny (one of the best proposal scenes ever!!) and it has one of those rare qualities – it makes you want to start all over again as soon as you finish and it’s even better on a second read.

As for what I didn’t like about this book, then it has to be the scene where the hero and heroine have sex. Okay, Mary Balogh’s sex scenes have never been her forte, so I don’t expect much anyway, but I expect at least that it made sense, that the plot requires it, that is not forced… So to me it felt like the publisher asked for a love scene and the author wrote one, but it wasn’t well done, it didn’t make sense and I just passed through it hoping it wouldn’t last much...

In the end, a very nice read, uncomplicated and funny in parts, the type of book that leaves you with a warm, lovely feeling.

Grade: 4.5/5.

THE DUKE’S WAGER – EDITH LAYTON

BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA

Lovely Regina Berryman was pursued by two men--the two most attractive and infamous bachelors in London.

One was Jason Thomas, Duke of Torquay, whose skill and success in seduction had made him a legend of lordly licentiousness. The other was St. John Basil St. Charles, Marquis of Bessacarr, the devilish duke's only rival as the foremost rake of the realm.

These notorious gentlemen had made Regina fair game in a competition where all was considered legitimate strategy in winning her affection and capturing her virtue. And Regina's only chance of preserving her honor and protecting her heart was to turn the tables on her titled tempters--and change the dallying way Regency London played the game of love ...

The duke’s wager, the book that was published the month I was born – so that makes it as old as I am… :) Okay, except of that, this is also one of my top favorite books ever. And why is that, since the plot written above doesn’t state anything exceptional: 2 rakes trying to win the love of a beautiful innocent and also quite poor little miss … blah, blah. Well, it’s not as simple as that, especially since we’re talking about Edith Layton, who is quite well known for her in-depth character description and for her gift of truly immersing the reader in the world she’s depicting.

The heroine, Regina, begins the book as the very beautiful innocent, with absolutely no relations in the beau-monde, with very high morals, she also becomes destitute quite early in the story. And so, these are the reasons why she is to become the object of a wager between 2 infamous rakes. She is not very interesting at the beginning, quite common in fact, but as the story progresses we see her learn so many things about life, about right and wrong and how these can change so quickly, about what is moral and what is human, she will learn that life has more shades of gray and it’s not simply black or white, on the whole, we see her gain a lot of depth to her character, something that will become surprising to the reader and irresistible to the hero, who is not a simple character either.

The hero is something special too. Maybe it was just me not having read many romances at the time I first read this book, but I have to confess that I did not guess WHO the hero was, between the 2 main characters mentioned in the blurb, until very late in the story. So I won’t say anything about him, just that he really is one of the worst rakes ever, not a fake, misunderstood or exaggerated one. Nope, he is the real deal (even if the reason for it is a little romanticized). Another thing I liked about him is that he doesn’t invite pity, he has a crystal clear view of his life and the choices he made that lead him to what he is now, he accepts himself and doesn’t try to hide behind fancy words. He is honest, he doesn’t lie, to the world, or to the heroine. He is a cynic, but not the “my momma didn’t love me so I must go out and make everyone else to feel as miserable as I do” type, no, he is more refined than that, maybe a little cruel sometimes, but in the end, very human. The flawed character by excellence.

There are some other interesting characters depicted in the story, although I couldn’t say that any of them is a villain. Like always in Layton books, the secondary characters are very well drawn and maybe take too much space from the main ones. On the other hand, as a reader, you get a much better picture of the whole story, so the journey gets very enjoyable.

Pfiew… it seems I did it :) I wrote the review without mentioning anything about the plot! Since I enjoyed it so much, word by word, especially on my first read, I don’t want to spoil it for anyone else…

Grade: 5/5 with congratulations :)

A Father For Christmas - Paula Tanner Girard

A COACH, A CASTLE AND A CATCH -- FOR THE LADY WHO ISN'T LOOKING FOR LOVE...

Widowed Lady Millicent Copley rejoiced at the invitation from the Copleys in Devonshire: Christmas at their magnificent castle on the faraway moors. A visit to the remote estate was sure to distract her mischievous six-year-old son, Rupert, from an impossible yuletide wish. But how to get to Devonshire? The distance was great, the roads were snowy, and a highwayman was kidnapping noblemen for ransom. Then a fellow guest, the Marquis of Wetherby, offered Millicent his coach and company. One of the most sought-after bachelors in London, the rakish Wetherby thought Millicent a perfect...mouse. Millicent though him a handsome...gadabout. And Master Rupert thought the Marquis the answer to his prayers. Now this determined young boy was about to put into action an outrageous scheme to help him get his wish: a new father just in time for Christmas!

Another Christmas read and another new author to me. This was a very light story with the hero and heroine being thrown together because the hero must accompany the heroine and her son to the Christmas party of a relative. On the way they get to know each other better and end up being kidnapped by an outlaw who has been holding noblemen for ransom.

While some of the scenes were actually very funny, like the time they spent with the outlaws or later in the farmer's cottage, I couldn't help feeling the heroine was too naive and too good to be true, she was almost annoying in how she kept seeing the best in everyone even in the rival for the hero's affections... a woman that was actually pretty decent to the heroine when she didn't have to... I'm guessing she will be the heroine of a future book.

The hero was also the usual kind, a rake decided to change his ways, and nothing really stood so I just enjoyed it for the fun romp that it was with being extraordinary.

Grade: 3.5/5