Category Archives: Romance

This is the first book (albeit a shorter one) that I have read by author Manda Collins. I was impressed with her ability to convey the characters depth in a shorter form book as well as laying out a plot that made sense.

The story is set at Christmas time and Merry Parks has just left the deathbed of her best friend Charlotte. Charlotte has tasked Merry with uniting Lotte (her newborn and now motherless daughter) with the William, the husband who abandoned her months before.

(more…)

I so enjoy reading a Debbie Macomber novel and her Christmas oriented ones are some of the best. “Merry and Bright” warmed my heart and gave me some chuckles and laughs along the way.

Merry Knight is a young woman who has set most of her dreams aside while she struggles to help out at home. She has a wonderful mother and a younger (though adult) brother with Down’s Syndrome to help support.

At work, she has a semi-tyrant of a boss (thank goodness the job is a temporary one that is coming to a close following Christmas.) What she doesn’t have is a social life. Her mother and brother decide, much to her initial dismay, to give her an early gift by signing her up for a dating site.

(more…)

I generally don’t read this period of historical romantic fiction (late 1700’s) but the blurb on this book was compelling for me. Jenna Cartwright Kestle is the daughter and sister of well-known Cartwright family of thieves and scoundrels. She, on the other hand, has been able to keep herself from becoming a criminal.

The story begins with a prologue into her childhood and very rapidly moves to her present time with a shocking scene when a poacher is hung for his crimes. We come to find out Jenna’s relationship to the poacher and how she ends up destitute and homeless.

(more…)

“The Bad Luck Bride” is the start of a new series with another book on its way in November. This book is the story of Claire and Alex.

Claire has suffered traumatic events in her early life that have left her with some serious emotional issues. She is deathly afraid of crossing over rivers in a coach and even more so of thunderstorms.

(more…)

This is the second book in Suzanne Enoch’s No Ordinary Hero series. While I loved the first book, the second book started off with a kidnap scenario. Whenever I see that in a book, the book has a stiff hill to climb to have me enjoy it. While the story recovered itself somewhat, I found that the kidnap still rankled.

Lady Marjorie Forrester is the sister of the Duke of Lattimer. She decides on the spur of the moment to travel to Scotland to visit her brother and be present for his wedding. Because she is doing this off-the-cuff, she and her companion are traveling without guards. It is not much of a surprise that Marjorie is kidnapped but the individuals who do so and why they do so present a funny scenario.

(more…)

This is the first book I have read by Anna Bennett though it is the second book in her series of romances involving three sisters (The Wayward Wallflowers.) The series title is based on a nickname that the sisters had picked up in society as The Wilting Wallflowers. Based on the actions of Miss Elizabeth Lacey (the second sister and the center of attention in this book), Wayward is the more apt title.

Beth (as she prefers to be called) has agreed to become the temporary companion to the Dowager Duchess of Blackshire. The Duke, Alexander Savage is the grandson who is rarely to be seen at the London residence where Beth is now residing.

(more…)

This is the first in a new series of historical romance novels by Amelia Grey. There is a set-up of three young Dukes, known in their youth as The Rakes of St. James. The three men are older and wiser and in this story, the Duke of Griffin has hired a youngish woman to chaperone his twin sisters as they make their come-out.

Griffin has to deal with the potential of harm to his sisters based on his earlier wild ways. While there is a big lead-up to this potential, the book fails to deliver on it. I either wish there had been less talk of the possibility or a stronger result. As it is, it is a bit of a let-down.

(more…)

Jane Aiken Hodge was an author whose books I read when they were first published years ago. Most of her books have a more gothic feel, but this one is a Regency romance without any the dark brooding characters.

As a Regency romance of the period when it was written, it was a good one. That spanned the range of someone like Barbara Cartland to the master of Regencies (and who, I believe created the genre), Georgette Heyer. Some would try to put Jane Austen in this list but remember that she was writing stories during the Regency period itself and about her contemporaries rather than a made-up world of balls, intrigue, dashing heroes, and plucky heroines.

(more…)

I enjoyed reading this book as a Historical Romance; however, I was definitely disturbed by the violence which the heroine suffers and also the speed by which her soon-to-be love is willing to “ruin” her. It is a little too casually done for me. I know that women were not highly regarded at the time but in today’s world, a light-hearted romance seems to be the wrong place for a woman to suffer.

(more…)

I started reading Karin Gillepsie’s novels with her series, The Bottom Dollar. I found myself alternating from tearing up to laughing from the beginning to end of each book and began to actively start searching for her books. While “Love Literary Style” is a stand-along book and has nothing to do with the series, it is every bit as fun and touching as her previous works.

In this book, Laurie Lee, is a fairly recent widow who is a sweetheart of a young woman. She has moved to Atlanta from her small town to attend nail school but her heart is really in writing romantic comedies. After all, she has read so many and watched so many rom-com movies, that it must be a snap. When she wins a scholarship to a writing camp, she knows that she must pursue her talent.

(more…)