One Burning Heart is the fourth, and I hope not the last, book in Elizabeth Kingston’s Welsh Blades series. I’ve loved this series since reading the first book nearly 10 years ago, so I was beyond excited when it was out. It is also the first book by Kingston since 2019 – and that’s “the before times” so it feels extra long! I reviewed Desire Lines that year. I one-clicked it and started reading this … Continue reading One Burning Heart by Elizabeth Kingston →
I don’t recall exactly how this trilogy came to my attention. Strangely, it may have been their long titles, which may have signaled to me an Austen-esque voice, one that at the same time did not take itself too seriously. In any case, I was very happy I picked up the first novella, In Which Margo Halifax Earns Her Shocking Reputation, and from then on I waited impatiently for weeks and weeks before the second … Continue reading In Which Winnie Halifax is Utterly Ruined by Alexandra Vasti →
Trigger warning for on-page suicide attempt Claudia and I (CarrieS) are suckers for good historical fiction, good historical romance, and Beauty and the Beast retellings. So we were excited about At Summer’s End, in which an artist (Bertie, short for Alberta) takes a job at an English estate following WWI and meets an isolated, traumatized, and scarred survivor named Julian. While this book did a decent job with the tricky themes of PTSD and disfigurement … Continue reading At Summer’s End by Courtney Ellis →
Claudia and Shana both love historical romances, but Shana loves Milan’s prickly heroines and puns, while Claudia’s catnip is the cozy charm of Balogh’s love stories, the fewer puns the better. Shana convinced Claudia that To Love and To Loathe’s “enemies to hookup to lovers” storyline would pull us out of our reading slump. She now owes Claudia a million lemon bars because this book was a tropeopcalypse. So much potential, but so poorly executed. … Continue reading To Love and To Loathe by Martha Waters →
This is a painful, difficult review to write, as I have to face the uncomfortable truth that I was initially too focused on the book’s glittery bits (amplified by my own excitement around the history of the women’s suffrage movement) to question, deeply or fast enough, its many hurtful messages. A Rogue of One’s Own held my attention, and that is to say a lot these days. I was happy to return to the early … Continue reading A Rogue of One’s Own by Evie Dunmore →
After reading a slew of perfectly adequate but largely forgettable romances lately, reading The Lord I Left was a nice, trope-tastic surprise. Granted, I’d sign up for pretty much any story featuring a snowy road trip, but I got a lot more than that by the end of this book. Henry Evesham, Methodist preacher, former editor of a “evangelical news rag,” and a Lord Lieutenant tasked with investigating London’s sex trade, is saying his goodbyes … Continue reading The Lord I Left by Scarlett Peckham →
Susan “Sukey” Lazarus has been a favorite character of mine since I first met her as the sharp-eyed 12-year-old “medium” apprentice in An Unnatural Vice, the second book in the author’s Sins of the Cities series. Adult Susan, who is bisexual, reappeared nearly two decades later as the friend of one of the heroes in Any Old Diamonds, bent on revenge and just as perceptive. Susan was the engine of the riveting plot twist in … Continue reading Gilded Cage by K.J. Charles →
It’s meet-disaster for Laura Hayes and Alex Archer: Fascinated by water, Laura is at the local pond practicing her diving skills. Alex thinks she’s drowning and tries to “save” her, much to her indignation. Little does Laura know that wading into the pond to save her was an act of sheer courage on Alex’s part, connected to a past he’d rather forget. A Convenient Fiction is the third book in the author’s Parish Orphans of … Continue reading A Convenient Fiction by Mimi Matthews →
Vapid, vacuous, and verbose — a waste of ink. These are the words swirling in Amalia Truitt’s head as we first meet her. It’s 1871, and Amalia is a beauty columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer. She thinks the scathing criticism, part of a complaint to her editor, comes from a reader, but in reality that’s the opening salvo of a larger threat. The words also play straight into Amalia’s insecurities. In her mid-20s, Amalia already … Continue reading Dalliances and Devotion by Felicia Grossman →
This guest review comes from Claudia. Thanks, Claudia! At sixteen, Claudia found her older cousin’s stash of Barbara Cartlands and assorted Harlequin-type romance housed in an old sewing cabinet and life was never the same! She loves history, so she mostly reads historical romance. Favorite authors include Meredith Duran, Mary Balogh, Miranda Neville, Elizabeth Kingston, and Rose Lerner. … CW/TW for attempted rape First off, the cover! To me, it pays homage to some of … Continue reading Guest Review: Rebel by Beverly Jenkins →
This guest review comes from Claudia. Thanks, Claudia! At sixteen, Claudia found her older cousin’s stash of Barbara Cartlands and assorted Harlequin-type romance housed in an old sewing cabinet and life was never the same! She loves history, so she mostly reads historical romance. Favorite authors include Meredith Duran, Mary Balogh, Miranda Neville, Elizabeth Kingston, and Rose Lerner. … Katherine Wright’s family has been in the free-trade business, otherwise known as smuggling, for generations. She … Continue reading Guest Review: A Rogue by Night by Kelly Bowen →
