#TBRChallenge 2021: The Secret Wife

The Book: The Secret Wife by Carrie Weaver

The Particulars: Contemporary romance, Book 1 in duet, Harlequin SuperRomance #1274, 2005, out of print, available digitally

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: It's a SuperRomance (I loved that line before Harlequin killed it) and the back cover blurb intrigued.  Other than that, I got nothing. While I have autobuy authors in my Harlequin TBR it's also chock-full of impulse grabs from conferences, used bookstores etc.

The Review: So it turns out that I read the second book in this duet for the 2012 TBR Challenge, a little factoid I had completely forgotten about until GoodReads reminded me. How time flies...and the memory fades.  Both books were published in 2005 - so it's only taken me 16 years to complete the series. Go Team Wendy!

Maggie McGuire is desperate. Her religious family disowned her when she moved in with Eric and even though they're married, they put the cart before the horse when son David was born. Eric is a race car driver working the circuit and Maggie is pinching pennies to raise their son and stay in school (to become a mortician - she has ambition to be a funeral home director some day....).  Worse still, Eric has been incommunicado. So Maggie does something rash - she packs her close-to-death Toyota and drives from Arizona to Arkansas with little David in tow. She's going to confront (OK, reunite) with Eric at a planned family reunion.

This book is honestly worth reading for the moment when Maggie charges into the family reunion.  Of course Eric isn't there (he's at the race track).  Instead it's his grandmother Edna, his half-brother, J.D. and....wait for it....Eric's wife, Nancy.  Yeah.  Turns out Eric is a bigamist.

J.D. is a fixer. He's not a McGuire by blood. His father died young and his mother ended up marrying Edna's son.  Eric was a product of that union.  For complicated reasons J.D. has been cleaning up after Eric since the kid was old enough to cause trouble.  Maggie isn't the first Other Woman to show up.  But she's so not Eric's usual type and she seems so....honest.  All J.D. knows is he has to defuse the situation until they can bring Eric to heel and sort out the mess.  Too bad Eric is found murdered before he can be confronted with his crimes.  Naturally Maggie is a prime suspect.

While there is a suspense thread moving the story forward, I wouldn't necessarily categorize this as  romantic suspense.  The focus on the crime isn't as dominant as the focus on the internal character baggage and the fallout of Eric's bigamy.  While Maggie was definitely naïve, falling for a silver-tongued devil, you can understand how it happened given her upbringing and past.  Nancy kind of gets the shaft early on in the story, but eventually the author brings her on page a bit more during the second half to pave the way for her future romance.

This story features a lot of things that can annoy me in contemporary romance, but somehow Weaver makes it work.  It's definitely a Biology Above All story - with J.D. feeling "less than" because he's "not a true McGuire."  Edna helped raise him, but she never reassures him, nor does she allow him to forget that Eric is the golden boy - never mind he's a colossal screw-up.  Honestly where Weaver dropped the ball a bit for me was the lack of scorched Earth on the part of J.D., Nancy and Maggie when it comes to Eric.  I get that being murdered is pretty final and the ultimate punishment but they were still way too forgiving in my opinion.  I'd be digging up his body to murder him all over again - but that's me.

Also, David is, of course, a miracle baby.  The question of paternity comes into play because it was believed Eric could not, medically speaking, father a child. As the reader, of course, we know Eric is the Daddy. Like, it's never a question. Maggie doesn't have it in her to lie about something like that!  Certainly it's a different spin on the typical Miracle Baby nonsense (it doesn't involve the perceived inability of the hero or heroine) but it's still a frackin' Miracle Baby.

The suspense thread is pretty decent until Weaver makes the mistake of tipping her hand too early.  As the reader we know Maggie and J.D. are innocent - so that leaves the list of suspects to about 3 people, or a random jilted lover / irate husband/boyfriend to do the deed.  But once that hand is tipped?  It's all over.  It was up to the romance to keep me invested - which, for the most part, it does.  Maggie grows a lot during this story, having had the wool pulled from her eyes, and having to reluctantly accept charity from J.D. with her pride in tatters. She's hung-up on making everyone see she's a good mother stemming from a niece who landed in the social services system and a troubled older sister who committed suicide.  This aspect of her past definitely could have been fleshed out more and feels more like a prop to explain Maggie's reaction to drama that comes into play later in the story than anything else.  J.D. has a White Knight Complex, but he's a good guy at heart who wants to do the right thing, and is conflicted over his attraction to Maggie.

It's been a while since I've unearthed a SuperRomance from my stash and while this one wasn't great, it was a good, solid read that kept me entertained.  I'm even half-tempted to go back and reread Nancy's story....

Final Grade = B-

Beat the Heat: Unusual Historical Highlights for July 2021

Somehow it's mid-July and I'm recently back from a trip to my home state where I saw my parents for the first time in two years and my sisters since January 2020 (a trip to Napa to celebrate my older sister's 50th birthday was the last hurrah before COVID shut us all down). The universe told me I really needed this time off when my work laptop decided to brick itself (a Windows loading failure!) and on the day this post will go live I'll be extremely busy back at the office (June and July are the literal worst for me at The Day Job).  I foresee a lot of caffeine and collapsing in my bed every night in my very near future.  But let's not think about work now. Let's focus on some unusual historicals landing on shelves this month!  Here's what is catching my eye for July:

 

Devil in Disguise by Lisa Kleypas 

“The devil never tries to make people do the wrong thing by scaring them. He does it by tempting them.” 

Lady Merritt Sterling, a strong-willed young widow who’s running her late husband’s shipping company, knows London society is dying to catch her in a scandal. So far, she’s been too smart to provide them with one. But then she meets Keir MacRae, a rough-and-rugged Scottish whisky distiller, and all her sensible plans vanish like smoke. They couldn’t be more different, but their attraction is powerful, raw and irresistible. 

From the moment Keir MacRae arrives in London, he has two goals. One: don’t fall in love with the dazzling Lady Merritt Sterling. Two: avoid being killed. 

So far, neither of those is going well. 

Keir doesn’t know why someone wants him dead until fate reveals the secret of his mysterious past. His world is thrown into upheaval, and the only one he trusts is Merritt. 

Their passion blazes with an intensity Merritt has never known before, making her long for the one thing she can’t have from Keir MacRae: forever. As danger draws closer, she’ll do whatever it takes to save the man she loves . . . even knowing he might be the devil in disguise. 

I have not kept up with Kleypas' Ravenels series, but this blurb ticks a lot of boxes for me.  A heroine running a shipping company and a rough around the edges outsider hero who owns a distillery!  An inconvenient attraction and a hero that someone wants dead.  I notoriously will skip around when it comes to romance series - do I care that this is book 7 and I've only read book 1?  No. No I do not.

The Viscount Made Me Do It by Diana Quincy 

A seduction that could ruin everything... 

Hanna Zaydan has fought to become London’s finest bonesetter, but her darkly appealing new patient threatens to destroy everything she’s worked so hard for. The daughter of Arab merchants is slowly seduced by the former soldier — even though she’s smart enough to know Griff is after more than he’ll reveal. Whatever it is, the bonesetter’s growing desire for the man just might tempt her to give it to him. 

An attraction that cannot be denied... 

Rumors that he killed his own parents have followed Thomas Ellis, Viscount Griffin, practically since he was a boy. More than a decade after the tragedy, Griff receives a tip about his parents’ killer… one that takes him straight to a captivating bonesetter. Griff is convinced Hanna is a fraud, but the dark-eyed beauty stirs deep feelings in him that he thought had perished along with his family. 

Hanna has a gift for fixing fractured people, but can she also mend a broken heart? More importantly, will Griff let her?

So here's the thing about unusual historicals: if you want to see more of them you need to take chances. They won't all be winners.  Among the corner of Romancelandia I follow I saw mixed reviews for the first book in this series, but Quincy (and Avon's editorial team) drop a lot of Wendy catnip in this back cover blurb.  The heroine is a bonesetter! Oh sure, the hero is a Viscount, but he's a former soldier determined to find his parents' killer.  This one is already locked and loaded on my Kindle.

Her Lady's Fortune by Renee Dahlia 

Together they could help thousands of people, if only they can trust each other. 

Philanthropist Priya Howick isn’t the same person she was before WWI. Only one thing remains true—she has always been defined by her relationship with her brother. Ashwin is the heir to both Lord Dalhinge, and the Carlingford shipbuilding fortune, and that makes her a natural target for those who wish to have the family wealth for themselves. She’s been taught to be wary of outsiders and their motives, which means all her friends are from her family’s close circle. Once, before the war, she stepped outside those boundaries, and met Rosalie, a beautiful older woman. But what happened next only proved her family correct. Now the war is over and Priya has created a charity to build houses for war widows, but her brother sets it up as a joint venture with the bank, Sanderson and Sons. She has to work with Rosalie, and the same sparks fly. Priya must decide if she is brave enough to risk everything. Not just her money and therefore her independence, but also her heart. 

Assertive bank manager Rosalie Sanderson is the only damned serious person in her family. She’s forty-two, the manager of Sanderson and Sons bank, and tired of having to continually prove that she is capable of making a profit and running the family business successfully. Very few people accept her as she is, and it stings that young Priya Howick is one of them. They had one incredible evening together before the war, and then it went sour for no apparent reason, and Priya has been distant in their few business meetings. The rejection shouldn’t nag at her like this, like rubbing salt in a papercut. All the old wounds and passions need to be confronted when Priya arrives at the bank with an incredible work proposal. Rosalie must decide if the opportunity to help thousands of people is worth the heart ache of being close to Priya again. 

A heroine who can never trust that people like her for her (and not the fortune she's destined to inherit) is reunited with a one night stand (an older woman!) who turns out to be a bank manager.  Post WWI was an extremely interesting time for women, and Dahlia continues to mine that with this third book in her Great War series.

A Marriage Made in Secret by Jenni Fletcher

She must choose… 

…her queen—or love! 

As the queen’s new lady-in-waiting, Mathilde Gosselin tumbles straight into Parisian palace intrigue when she meets courtier Henry Wright, who she discovers is a spy! Mathilde’s loyalties are now divided—between this enigmatic, courageous man and her queen. And amid the turmoil, her falling for the unsuitable, illegitimate Henry means they’ve no choice but to hide their new love from the world… 

This new medieval from Fletcher appears to be a stand-alone and this back cover blurb hits on a lot of elements that draw me towards medievals.  Namely, the question of divided loyalties and courtly intrigue - both of which got a lot of people very dead back in the day. It adds tension and ups the stakes to any romance set among that kind of backdrop.  As an added bonus, this one is set in Paris!

How to Wed a Courtesan by Madeline Martin 

  

From courtesan …to society wife? 

When Evander, Earl of Westix, returns from the continent to claim his bride, he is shocked that the innocent vicar’s daughter he once loved has become a notorious courtesan. But Lottie is so much more than the insult society hurls at her. She is resourceful and strong—after all, she’s had to be to survive. Her charms are undeniable, but her heart is beyond his grasp. To win it will mean taking her from bedroom to ballroom… 

Be still my heart! An Earl coming home to finally marry the girl next door discovers she's become a notorious courtesan. I've got a thing for strong heroines bent on survival and if they thumb their nose at society along the way?  All the better.

The Return of Her Lost Knight by Melissa Oliver 

Her second chance 

With her lost love… 

To avoid a forced marriage, Lady Gwenllian plans to escape to a convent. She couldn’t possibly honor another when her heart still belongs to Ralph de Kinnerton, the man she had to betray to save his life—only to hear of his death shortly after. So how is it possible he’s here at this knight’s tournament? Now the pull of their unfinished past forces Gwen to question the choice she’d made for her future…

Another series I'm officially behind on. I enjoyed the first book in Oliver's Notorious Knights series and here we are already on Book #3. Another medieval (yeah!) featuring a heroine who betrayed the hero in order to save his life only to find out later he was killed.  Um, except apparently he wasn't.  A heroine who runs away from the convent and a mess of unfinished romantic business sounds delicious.

Whew!  Another solid month for unusual historicals this month. What are you looking forward to reading?

Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is July 21

Hey, hey - it's that time again! Time for the monthly #TBRChallenge!  Whether you are participating or just following along, #TBRChallenge Day is Wednesday, July 21. This month's (always optional) theme is Secrets and Lies.

This is a new theme for the Challenge, suggested by someone when I ran a poll late last year.  On the surface this may seem like a difficult theme to unearth from the TBR - but honestly? How many romances are out there that feature a character either keeping a secret and/or lying - be it a huge whopper, a little white lie or by omission?

But remember, the themes are always optional.  If the thought of scrutinizing your TBR to find a book that fits this theme is more bandwidth than can currently be mustered - hey, no problem!  The goal of this challenge is always to pull something, any book!, out of your neglected TBR pile.

To learn more about the challenge and links to the participants blogs, check out the 2021 TBR Challenge Information Page.

Review: Runner

I discovered Tracy Clark's Cass Raines series as 2020 gave way to 2021 and was immediately hooked on the smart, savvy, competent as hell, former Chicago police officer turned private eye. I caught the series early, which means after plowing through the first three books I had to wait for book four, Runner, like a regular chump.  Well, it's finally here and it was a riveting read.

It's shortly after Thanksgiving and the Chicago weather has turned bitter cold. Winter is here and Cass is paying the price for most of this book. You can tell Clark knows Chicago. She nails the weather.  Anyway, Cass is seeking shelter in that most Chicago of places - a White Castle. Certainly the sliders are a draw but she's also there to meet a perspective client.  Leesa Evans is a recovering addict looking for her missing daughter, Ramona.  Ramona is 15-years-old and in the foster care system. By all accounts she was in a good situation, living with a former actress, Deloris Poole, who was giving the girl structure, and slowly getting her to open up.  And then one day, poof! Ramona runs away. No word, no warning, in the dead of winter.  The cops are on the case, but Leesa doesn't trust the cops. She wants someone working for her - which is where Cass comes in.  Cass hears the words "15-year-old girl" and knows she'll be taking on Leesa as a client.

What follows is Cass covering a lot of ground and backtracking through territory that the police have already covered (to start at any rate). But it's definitely odd. For one thing the lead detective on the case is downright cooperative and is fine with a PI sniffing around. Given the previous three books in this series, Cass finds that odd (she's used to rubbing Chicago's finest in all the wrong ways, never mind she used to be one of them).  Ramona has zero friends and didn't seem to confide in a single person, anywhere and she's not part of the city's social services system. Ramona is in foster care through a private organization. Cass talks to the obvious players, hits a lot of dead ends, but eventually hits pay dirt when she uncovers a lead through Ramona's part-time job.  Unfortunately that lead brings up more questions than answers.

Clark rounds out her story by populating it with the many "found family" secondary characters that have been introduced over the course of the series.  The police detective she's been dating wants her to finally meet his teenage daughter (it goes about as well as you'd expect), the childhood friends, a nun who helps her with the case by introducing her to some street kids, the ex-con turned short order cook who is hiding something (plot bunny for Book #5!) and the local diner where Cass regularly eats has a new waitress who has her out-of-sorts (Cass doesn't do well with change).  

The mystery is engaging and solid and Cass continues to be a dynamite character, smart and savvy. Series, at a certain point, can be tricky to write - needing to engage both newcomers and fans alike, but this book stands alone very well, and won't lose newcomers despite being book #4. Clark also avoids info-dumping that would cause an already-fan's eyes to glaze over.

Clark has won an award named after Sue Grafton, and for readers who loved the "feel" of the Kinsey Millhone series, you need to drop your life and try this series.  The recurring cast of secondary characters, the strong neighborhood feel of the setting, the competent as hell female PI - this series hits all those beats.  Clark is definitely my favorite author discovery in recent memory and I am ready for another book tomorrow.  Instead, like a chump, I patiently wait.

Final Grade = B+

Review: A Song of Secrets

Sometimes a book falls into my lap by happenstance, which was the case for A Song of Secrets by Robyn Chalmers. Billed as a "sweet Regency," this debut, self-published novel finalled in two categories for RWA's inaugural Vivian Award (Best First Novel and Best Historical Mid-Length).  It's not a perfect read but like any good debut novel there's quite a bit on the page that excited me. To the point where I immediately went looking to see what the author's publishing schedule was.

Sarah Hayworth is La Luminosa, a talented and shockingly beautiful opera singer who has captivated audiences in Italy and England.  Adding to her mystique is that she rarely takes lovers, and you're flat out of luck if you're betrothed or married.  La Liminosa does not dally with men in (supposed) committed relationships and word is she's looking to snag a husband.  The problem being that an opera singer seems to attract a very specific kind of man - those that have no interest in marrying an opera singer.  However, she thinks she's finally bagged herself a single, titled gentleman only to find out on the night of her latest performance that he's engaged to someone "proper." Phooey!

Drama unfolds early on in this book during the performance and riding to Sarah's rescue is Evander Ambrose, a vicar and widowed second son of a earl. He and his father are at the opera because Dear Old Dad (who has been ill and slowly dying) wants La Luminosa to appear at his annual holiday musicale at their country home. Sarah agrees to appear mostly because she needs the money. The season is concluding, and she's strapped for cash thanks to a bad investment and sending what funds she has left to the parents who disowned her. She's desperate for funds, but still wants to land a husband - so can't come off as desperate.  Further complicating things is that while Sarah can usually play men like a fiddle, Evander can see right through her. Even worse? He seems immune to her charms.  But he's the second son, and not the one Sarah is interested in.  She's hoping his older brother Marcus is a different story.

Sarah sounds positively mercenary if you're just going by the back cover blurb, but in reality she's a women at a crossroads. What nobody knows, other than her best friend, is that while in Italy Sarah had an ill-advised affair that resulted in a daughter, now 5-years-old. Her parents did disown her, but given that Sarah kept the pregnancy hushed up they agree to raise her child as their own - as their child. Sarah is neither treasured aunt, cousin nor older sister. No, Sarah's parents have declared her "dead" to their circle.  Sarah knows the only way to get her daughter back is to marry a respectable, titled gentleman.  Instead she finds herself sparring with a vicar.

There is great chemistry in this romance between the hero and heroine and every time they are on page together (which is a lot) it is a joy to read.  The adversarial sparring early on has a slight enemies-to-lovers tinge to it, although there's no shared past between then.  A better description would be it's what happens when two very smart people get together, there's an inconvenient spark of attraction, their motives are at cross purposes, and they rub each other slightly the wrong way.  It's positively delicious.

Evander is a vicar who is having a career crisis.  The death of his young wife has rocked his faith, he's frustrated, at times, with tending to his flock, and he's got three rambunctious (read: handful) young sons who are sweet, but spend most of the novel being the kinds of terrorists that young boys are experts at.  His attraction to Sarah is not terribly practical given what his life is.

Unfortunately there are some bumps in the road.  This is a debut, and while it's great in many ways, there's some sharp turns that could have been smoothed out, especially in the final third of the story. A good illustration of this is Evander's brother Marcus (the heir) who "doesn't want to get married" and finally drops the bomb of WHY towards the end.  It was a ham-fisted way to set up a sequel - except the future books in this series don't feature Marcus as a hero (!).  Instead it appears the author has turned Marcus's story into a short story for her newsletter subscribers. Like, why? He drops the bomb on dear old Dad and Evander and then it's completely dismissed.  

Finally, there's the issue of the sex.  This is a "sweet Regency" so while there's some steamy kisses, there is no sex. It's not even fade to black - it's chapter ends, next chapter starts the very next morning and we, as the reader, know they "did it" but that's it.  Obviously if you've listened to me beat (ha!) this dead horse to death you know I am a reader who firmly (ha!) believes that romance novels do not require sex scenes.  They don't.  But this one?  Kinda does.  It's the tone of the story, the baggage (especially Sarah's past and current lifestyle), I wanted a sex scene to seal their commitment to each other.  Because a vicar and an opera singer?  There's going to continue to be mountains to climb even after the happy-ever-after is declared.

Given the no sex thing and the vicar with a crisis of faith thing, some readers may want to put this in the inspirational romance box.  It certainly has cross-subgenre appeal, for more open-minded inspirational readers.  Honestly some of the kisses are pretty steamy and Sarah's illegitimate child was born out of love, at least from Sarah's perspective. The "father?" Not so much (typical).  For me the religious aspects fit very well within the confines of secular historical romance (honestly, it annoys me no end when historical romances set in towns/villages completely ignore regular church attendance which was often the only "social" activity people had back in the day) and this is written in such a way that it didn't have the "feel" of an inspirational romance. And yes, I'm well aware that sounds vague as hell, but it's what I've got.  Inspirational romance is like porn. I know it when I see it. This, technically speaking, isn't an inspirational romance (says Wendy).

While there are many great things about this book, chief among them being the interplay between Sarah and Evander, it wasn't a seamless read for me. But while it does have some rough edges that I attribute to being a debut novel, there's a lot of promise and "good" on the page. I was excited to keep reading this book, impressed with what the author had created and happy to find a new voice in what is, and likely always will be, my favorite romance subgenre.

Final Grade = B

Review: The Soldier's Dark Secret

I have a pretty good handle on my print TBR. Even as mammoth as it is, I have a rough idea of what's languishing there.  My Kindle? Another matter entirely. I have an endless pile of eBooks and while they're roughly organized into collections - Lord knows what I'll find when I open up a random folder. I took it into my head that I wanted to read a Harlequin Historical so I opened that folder, scrolled way, way (way....) back and landed on The Soldier's Dark Secret by Marguerite Kaye. A book that's been hanging around for me since 2015 (sigh).

A second son, officer Jack Trestain is home after Waterloo, having resigned his commission as Wellington's top code breaker. As is the way with war, Jack comes home a changed man - haunted and not quite himself. He's staying in the country with his older brother, sister-in-law and a young, pestering nephew who wants to hear glorious war stories from his hero Uncle Jack. This goes over about as well as you'd expect from Jack, a man who came home "troubled" (and what we would now diagnose as PTSD).

Celeste Marimon is a lovely French artist hired by Jack's brother to immortalize the family estate's grounds and gardens before they do an extensive remodeling. Celeste is part English, in country for the first time ever after the tragic death of her mother (by suicide).  They had a strained relationship and were estranged for several years.  Her mother, having left behind a letter, leaves Celeste with more questions than answers. She takes the commission with the Trestains not only for the work, but also hoping to find some answers in her mother's home country.  Jack, with his various military connections, decides to help her out.

There's plenty of angst in the book, but I also found this to be a very quiet romance.  Jack and Celeste are immediately drawn to each other, both having been celibate, and not terribly interested in changing that status, for a while prior to locking eyes on each other.  Celeste, an artist stationed in Paris, has taken more than one lover in her time, but none of whom ignited a passionate fervor in her the way Jack seems to.  Even prior to the experiences that haunt him post-Waterloo, Jack was not sowing a mess of wild oats with French women and/or camp followers.  Feeling anything other than dead inside comes as quite a shock once that first passionate kiss ignites things between him and Celeste.

Moving the book forward is the slow revealing of the war experiences that are haunting Jack and the mystery of Celeste's background, the secrets her mother kept firmly locked away.  Celeste has a few clues to go on, some hazy childhood memories, a man's signet ring, and the letter her mother left behind, half written in riddles.  This mystery eventually takes our couple to a dinner party honoring Wellington, to London and to Paris.  I was engrossed in this part of the story and really loved the outcome of the mystery.

There's not a lot of flash and histrionics to this romance, which honestly is just fine and fits this particular story quite well.  There's a lot of baggage between Celeste and Jack, but Kaye keeps it quiet and doesn't fall into the trap of overblown drama (which I sometimes like, but in this story would have been a disaster).  A lovely Regency era romance with compelling conflict and the only Duke in sight being Wellington.

Final Grade = B