Despite some tried and true cliches that normally annoy me, I enjoyed A Reckless Beauty, the latest installment of the Romney Marsh series. The majority of the story takes place in one of my favorite settings for romance novels: Belgium, right before the Battle of Waterloo. Fanny Becket, one of Ainsley Becket’s many adopted children,…
After reading a string of light romances, it was a definite turn in the opposite direction to read The Code of Love, a somber story of intrigue set in both France and England. The Napoleonic conflict is its central theme, with Napoleon as an actual character and the unease and misery of the French as…
His Majesty’s Dragon is straight fantasy, no romance whatsoever, but it does have, at its heart, a very lovely and emotionally rich relationship between a man and his newly hatched dragon. Captain Will Laurence and his naval crew capture a French frigate in what Laurence assumes to be a routine skirmish. What’s hardly routine is…
This book tied to win as Best Series Novel in AAR’s 2005 reader poll, and got much buzz last year, so I looked forward to reading it. But it’s much the same fare as found in most historical romances, even if the set-up is more novel. The story starts out with Madeleine, a very young…
Like many new writers, Diane Gaston suffered years of rejection before Harlequin’s Mills & Boon published her first novel, The Mysterious Miss M, for the U.K. market in 2004. What is remarkable about that is Gaston isn’t a British romance writer; she’s an American living in Virginia (who now writes under the name Diane Perkins…
There are some key adjectives to describe this book: Dark, very dark, and did I mention dark? Seriously, anyone with an aversion to rape, torture, blood, violence and evil will need to avoid this book. I have a pretty high tolerance for violence, etc., and even I was a bit taken aback by some of…
Connie Brockway brings her Rose Hunters trilogy to a close with My Surrender. Readers grumbling about the dearth of serious historical romances – grumble no more. This is an intense and very satisfying book. Charlotte Nash is the last of the sisters whose father gave his life in a French prison. Charlotte acts as companion…
To a casual browser, The Naked Duke looks like a light Regency-era historical romance, and it does have its share of witty banter and eccentric characters. But it also hearkens back to the old fashioned bodice-ripper, especially when it comes to the villain, who is a skanky piece of evilness with rape and murder on…
Master of Temptation’s intriguing premise made up for quite a few of its shortcomings. What if a handful of the remaining Knights of the Round Table carried on King Arthur’s ideals by forming their own secret society, and championed just causes and protected those who needed it? The Guardians of the Sword have remained secreted…
Slightly Tempted is the fourth book in the Slightly series that follows the fortunes of the Bedwyn family. Eighteen year old Morgan Bedwyn, sister of the Duke of Bewcastle, is with friends in Brussels on the eve of the battle of Waterloo. Gervase Ashford, the Earl of Rosthorn, an ex-patriot unjustly banished by his father…