Review: Desert Phoenix

In case anyone is operating under the assumption that long form book reviews delivered via blogging are going the way of the dodo, let me introduce you to only my third A graded read of 2023, Desert Phoenix by Suzette Bruggeman.  I had no idea this book existed, and I'm fairly confident in saying I would have continued on life's journey in such ignorance, if not for this review on AztecLady's blog back in April. Is this a perfect book? Well, no. But while I have quibbles I was a blubbering, sobbing mess by the end - and any book that can leak tears from my cold, black soul nearly always goes to the head of the class.

The best way to describe this book is historical fiction with strong romantic elements. It's a romance, but it doesn't fit neatly into the conventions of the romance genre as we know it today.  AztecLady's review really hits the nail on the head when she wrote: "This is most certainly a love story with a HEA, but there’s too much tragedy and too much loss, and so, while it doesn’t fit within modern genre romance, it would have fit well with the sagas of the 70s and 80s, though– even though there is no purple prose whatsoever."

Content Warnings: Illness, Death, Rape, Murder, Forced sterilization, "frontier justice" (a hanging), violence in general.

At the start of the story we meet a young Lucinda "Lou" Taylor, whose loving parents and brother have just succumbed to yellow fever.  Lou is spared, but now an orphaned child, "rescued" by her older sister and brother-in-law.  They pack her up in their wagon and the whole family heads west to Montana. Of course her sister's no-good husband turns out to be the vilest scum who ever viley-scummed - raping Lou (on more than one occasion) for his trouble and eventually dumping her on the doorstep of an upscale brothel in Butte.  This is when Lou dies and Tempa born from the ashes.

"A sporting girl loses so much of herself, about the only thing she has left that is truly hers is her history, her memories. They are like tiny gems to bring out for a little beauty, a little comfort when life becomes too dreary and hard to bear. I learned early on to never, ever cast my pearls before swine."

I wouldn't say these chapters are graphically written, but there's enough on the page to be upsetting, and one would assume this would turn Tempa into a harden, embittered (let's be blunt here) child whose life wastes away under the blissful escape of alcohol and/or laudanum - but our girl has grit to her, a gumption to hold on to the good even as she deals with so much bad.  Then there's the books.  Our girl has a love of books and the written word that bleeds through the pages and are a constant theme running through this story.

Jumping ahead in the timeline, Tempa and "the sister of her heart" Belle end up in a nothing mining town in Nevada, having fallen on hard times, working in the cribs outside of town. Tempa gets one day of peace (Monday) where she goes to a secluded spot by a lovely creek to read a book from her collection.  That's where she finds him - and she's none to happy about it. Someone has found her secret spot, but before she can dress him down she realizes that the man, little more than a boy really, is near death, having been beaten to within an inch of his life.  And that's how the young German immigrant, Henry, comes into her life.  She nurses him back to health and as Henry settles into life in Stateline, working for one of the big mining outfits, a complicated love blossoms.

There's a lot I appreciated about this story, namely it's easy to get lost in the world-building and the various secondary characters that help prop up the love story.  This isn't a book that neatly fits into the romance genre as it's defined today - chapters go by where Henry and Tempa are not on page together, in each others' pockets. But it's in that space where the yearning builds and the love grows - even though Tempa (a good 12 years older than Henry) knows how impossible a happy-ever-after would be between them.  But Henry, this is a man not willing to give up, so deep are his feelings, no matter the trials that continue to set up roadblocks along the way.  This may make one think that Henry is a dogged Hero In Pursuit - and to a certain extent he is - but how consent is handled in this story! Chef's kiss! Henry is a man besotted, and while he wants Tempa he's not about to take anything from her by force, including her love.

So you're probably wondering, "Wait a minute Wendy - you said this wasn't a perfect book."  Well, yeah, about that - it's not.  The writing transitions between chapters isn't always smooth and the story isn't told in a linear fashion - which means, yes, there are flashbacks to previous events in the characters' lives interspersed at key moments of the story. It drove me nuts for a while that after leaving Butte the next time we see Tempe she's no longer in an upscale brothel environment, but very much in "down and out" working conditions with Belle slipping away in a haze of laudanum addiction. We eventually get that story, but it takes a while.  Also, compounding this issue is that some tell over show does creep in on occasion.

There's also the small matter that this book was "inspired by a true story."  Yes, Henry and Tempa existed in real life.  The author grew up listening to her grandfather tell stories and Henry and Tempa were friends and acquaintances of her great-grandfather (who passed before her birth).  So it's natural that the author would include an author's note and photographs.  Unfortunately the author's note is at the beginning of the book (when the reader doesn't yet give a sh*t pardon my French...) and the photographs interspersed throughout the story.  These would have a much greater impact on the reader (OK, at least this reader) after they've made it through the journey of this sweeping love story to read that author's note then, to view those photographs after the fact having the full weight of context on their side. My advice? If you read this book blow past the front matter, start with Chapter 1, and come back to the Author's Note after the fact.  I was bored by it when I started the book, but the full weight of it hit me after I reread it upon completing the final chapter.

I love the romance genre, but longer timelines and saga-like narratives are in very short supply these days. This story creates a world for the reader to get lost in and delivers a dynamite, hard-scrabble, hard-fought and earned happy ever after that made my heart sing.  It's exceedingly complicated, a woman like Tempa and a man like Henry, they both make choices that you can understand even as you want to throttle them at times. But in the end, it's a love that is true, pure and built on bedrock. Now excuse me while I order a print copy to live in my keeper stash.

Final Grade = A

Note: At the time of this review the digital version is available via Kindle Unlimited.

Review: The Last Invitation

My glom through Darby Kane's backlist finishes with her most recent release, The Last Invitation. I'm now officially tapped out and have to wait for her next book, which doesn't drop until the end of the year.  Like her previous two books, The Last Invitation was a helluva ride and I gulped it down like a thirsty man lost in the desert.  Unfortunately it didn't leave me with the same feeling of afterglow when I wrapped up the final chapter. 

Warning: Spoilers Ahead

Gabby Fielding and her ex-husband, Baines, went through a rather messy divorce, but it's done - well as much as it ever will be. That doesn't mean she doesn't think he's an asshole for summoning her to their former home (now all his) to discuss who will get their daughter, Kennedy, over the winter holidays. She notices something is off right away, for one thing the door is unlocked and security alarm unarmed.  For another?  Baines is lying in a pool of his own blood in his study - dead from an apparent suicide.  At least that's what the cops are telling her and her brother-in-law, Liam.  The fly in the ointment? As much as Gabby wanted to throttle Baines she knows down to her bones that there is no way he'd commit suicide. And once she starts making noise about that?  The real trouble begins. A reporter crawls out of the woodwork blathering on about other powerful, dead men - set up to look like accidents or suicides. It's a conspiracy theory that Gabby doesn't buy into for a minute, until her life gets spectacularly upended.

Jessa Hall is a lawyer at a prestigious DC firm working a particularly messy divorce case with child custody issues.  She's ambitious and vying for partnership, but her latest case goes completely topsy-turvy with the husband making all sorts of accusations that start derailing her life and career.  At her lowest ebb she receives a mysterious invitation to join the work of The Sophie Foundation, an outfit run by her law school mentor. Jessa needs a way out of the mess she's in, the life she has worked so hard for (and by that I mean, the life she's built for herself by being sneaky, taking short-cuts and steamrolling over anyone standing in her way...) is slipping away.  She accepts the invitation, and gets more than she bargained for.

The Foundation is only one thing that connects Jessa and Gabby - they were friends in law school. That is until Gabby realized the type of person Jessa was.  The final nail in the coffin?  Jessa's firm represented Baines in the divorce and Jessa completely screwed Gabby in her drive to get ahead.  Now these two are on a collision course with The Foundation and neither of them is going to come away clean.

After the twisty-turniness of her first two domestic suspense novels, Kane goes straight-up thriller with this book. It's intrigue with a heavy dose of vigilantism - the women behind The Foundation manipulating what they perceive as a flawed justice system to right wrongs perpetrated by men against women.  Even if you understand the means to the end, it's all unraveling at the start of the story when the bodies of innocent bystanders start piling up like cord wood.  How did Baines come to the attention of The Foundation? The divorce was messy, but he wasn't abusing Gabby (and trust me when I say Gabby is no innocent). The reporter that shows up spouting conspiracy theories - what's his story and how did he get involved?  And the most troubling thing of all? Who is involved, how far do The Foundation's tentacles reach, and can Gabby stop the damage before her life is completely shot to hell.

This is a morally ambiguous and ethically messy story featuring characters that aren't easy to "like."  My own loyalties shifted multiple times over the course of the story (early on I liked Jessa - ha ha ha ha!) and for that reason I think this book would make a dynamite book club read.  There's a lot to chew on here and Kane (a lawyer) uses her experience with her former profession to great effect.

So, what's the problem?  Well, the ending.  There really isn't one. There's collateral damage to be sure, but when bodies start hitting the ground I like to know that the people responsible are going to pay the price - and they kinda, sorta do but not to my satisfaction. The Sword of Damocles life that Gabby lives throughout this book isn't really resolved.  Like, to a certain extent, she's going to be looking over her shoulder the rest of her days. A pound of flesh isn't extracted so much as a few ounces. And that's the rub - this lacks finality. A group can justify their "work" as a "means to an end" to achieve justice all they want - it still doesn't necessarily make it right.  I understand crafting an ending with finality is tricky with the story like this one, and again - dynamite recommendation for a book club read - but I like scorched and salted Earth. People are dead, and while some of them were terrible people, I wanted to know someone was going to answer for that - and I'm not convinced that they do.

Yes, I did inhale this story, but I felt a little deflated at the end. 

Final Grade = B-

So Many Books: Unusual Historicals For May 2023

I've been doing these Unusual Historical round-ups for a long time, but it wasn't until 2020 that I wrote something about how I generate these posts which included this gem: "...some months offer more variety, more diversity, and just plain 'more' than others."  Folks, this is a "just plain more" month.  This month I'm featuring 11 books. Yes - 11! Honestly, I can't remember the last time my cup ran this much over.

The Dueling Duchess by Minerva Spencer 

When Cecile Tremblay lost everyone and everything in the French Revolution, she never imagined that she'd earn her living as a markswoman in a London circus. But Farnham's Fantastical Female Fayre has become her home, her family, and her future. Another thing Cecile never imagined was becoming entangled with the man gossip columns call The Darling of the Ton. But mere weeks after her rejection of his insulting carte blanche—and his infuriating engagement to an heiress—Darlington is back, this time to beg Cecile for help. And help him she will, by teaching him about honest work—and the right way to treat a woman. 

Gaius Darlington has always led a charmed life. Until now. Suddenly, a long-lost heir has appeared to claim his title, possessions, and property, Not only that, but Guy's fiancée has jilted him to marry the usurper! Yet there is a silver lining: it's no longer Guy’s duty to marry an heiress to save the dukedom. He’s free to wed the woman he loves—if only he can earn her forgiveness. 

They say hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. But fury is just a step away from passion, and Guy knows just how to arouse Cecile’s...

This is the second book in the author's Wicked Women of Whitechapel series (yes, I still need to read book one - I'm staying on brand over here...) and this description has me moving up book one in my TBR! A hero who has gotten knocked down a few pegs and a scorned heroine who is not about to let him forget it.  Oh, and she's got a haunted past courtesy of the French Revolution and she's a markswoman?  Gimme this now!

Alliance with his Stolen Heiress by Lydia San Andres

He must earn her trust... 

before he wins her heart! 

In distancing himself from his nefarious wealthy family, Julian Fuentes has gained a rebellious reputation. Still, he’s shocked when heiress Amalia Troncoso hires him to stage her kidnapping! Julian doesn’t mind masquerading as a bandit to help Amalia get her inheritance from her tyrannical uncle, or spending time with the bold heiress who’s captured his imagination. But will the truth that ties their families together prevent their alliance from becoming more? 

 

This is San Andres' second book for Harlequin Historical and the second one to be set in early 20th century Dominican Republic. A hero from a notorious family who gets roped into a scheme by the heroine to claim her inheritance.  Another author I need to move up my TBR and not for nothing - the hero on this cover is wearing a hat!  There are too few hat-less dudes on historical romance covers, says me.

The Duchess Takes a Husband by Harper St. George

Despite her illustrious title, Camille, Duchess of Hereford, remains what she has always been—a pariah. Though her title means she’s technically accepted by London Society, the rebellious widow with her burgeoning interest in the suffrage movement and her American ways isn’t exactly high on every hostess’s guest list. But Camille starts to wonder if being an outcast is not without its perks when the tantalizing answer to her secret fear appears in the shape of Jacob Thorne, the illegitimate son of an earl and co-owner of London’s infamous Montague Club. 

Jacob is used to making deals with his club members—he’s just not accustomed to them being beautiful women. Nor have the terms ever been so sweetly seductive as Camille’s shocking proposition. To finally buy his own club and gain the crucial backing of investors, Camille offers Jacob the respectability of a fake engagement with a duchess. In return, the tempting widow has one condition: she wants Jacob to show her if it’s possible for her to experience pleasure in bed. 

The lure of such a bargain proves too delicious to resist, drawing the enterprising rogue and the wallflower duchess into a scandalous game and an even more dangerous gamble of the heart.

St. George is back with this fourth book in her Gilded Age Heiresses series. I'm really intrigued by this one - I've got a thing for social outcast heroines with a rebellious streak and she enters into a devil's bargain with the hero because honestly - whenever there are sexy shenanigans involved, nobody ever comes away unscathed.

The Housekeeper's Forbidden Earl by Laura Martin

A position too good to refuse… 

A desire too strong to deny! 

After being abandoned at the altar, housekeeper Kate Winters has finally found peace working at a grand house. Until her new employer, Lord Henderson, unexpectedly returns, resolved to sell his estate. Determined to remind the brooding earl of the beauty of his home, Kate’s discovering the allure of the man behind the title. Scarred by her past, dare Kate risk her future by surrendering to this forbidden attraction?

I'm a sucker for a good cross-class romance (I'm always curious to see if the author can pull it off in a way that makes me believe it won't be utter disaster-ever-after for the couple) and this one features a housekeeper heroine falling for an Earl.  I read a book by Martin last month and while it didn't wow me, it was pleasant - so I'm going to give this one a whirl.

Marrying Off Morgan McBride by Amy Barry

 As the oldest of the McBride siblings, Morgan had to be protector and shepherd since Ma died and Pa ran off. It hasn't always been easy, especially when his heart longs to roam on the trail. But now that his brother Kit is married and settled, the time is right for Morgan to leave Buck's Creek. Little does he know that his hellcat of a little sister Junebug is dead set on keeping him at home and getting more help around the house – all with one honest advertisement in The Matrimonial News. 

Epiphany Hopgood has always had a gift for doing the exact wrong thing. She’s too tall, too loud, too opinionated, and too contrary for her family and community. Staring down the barrel of spinsterhood, she and her grandmother answer a seemingly straightforward ad for a bride. 

But when Pip shows up to Buck’s Creek, she finds that Morgan McBride is not the husband she expected. In fact, he doesn’t even want to be a husband. But maybe there’s a way to make everyone happy out on the Montana frontier… 

Sigh. Look, I've got a very checkered past with what I call Funny Ha Ha Historical Western Romances. They're normally not my thing.  I like Dark, Angsty, Are They Going to Starve and/or Freeze to Death Come Winter Historical Western Romances. But, historical western romance. I'm only human.  This is the second book in the McBride Brothers series and it's a mail order bride he wasn't expecting story - those are always good for a little fun.

The Heiress Bride by Madeline Hunter 

Now the new Duke of Hollinburgh, Nicholas Radnor has two duties to fulfill: locate the mysterious woman mentioned in his late uncle’s will and acquire a suitable bride. When bedazzling, unconventional Iris Barrington shows up at the estate, Nicholas believes he may have found the missing beneficiary—unless she is a charlatan, or worse. But as for his second duty—he is finding it difficult to think of any other woman while tantalizing thoughts of Iris occupy his mind. He agrees to fulfill the late duke’s promise to her, even as he grows suspicious of both her motives and the danger that seems to surround her. All of which keeps her temptingly close at hand… 

Iris will do anything to restore honor to her beloved grandfather’s name. Even tangle with the likes of Nicholas, a man whose formidable intellect and good looks lure her like no other. But all her years on the continent have not prepared her for the sensual onslaught she discovers in his embrace—or the devastation of almost losing him to malicious intentions. Now Iris’s desire to unearth the scandal behind the dukedom burns ever brighter: for doing so might also protect the man who has stolen her heart...

 

There is nothing remotely "unusual" about this plot description, which would be why when I was browsing May releases I tripped right past this third book in Hunter's Duke's Heiress series. Yet for the second month in a row, AztecLady is looking out for us! She let me know that the heroine is A RARE BOOKS DEALER! Even better? She's posted her review for it!

The Viscount's Daring Miss by Lotte R. James

May the best viscount or miss… 

…Win! 

When her best friend and employer is injured, groom Roberta "Bobby" Kinsley feels compelled to help him. She agrees to step into the saddle and compete in an endurance horse race to help secure his ancestral home. Yet the minute that Bobby comes face-to-face with her opponent—arrogant yet infuriatingly charismatic Lawrence, Viscount Hayes—it’s clear that it won’t just be the competition that has her heart racing! 

When tragedy strikes the heroine steps in to compete in horse race only to get distracted by her competition.  This could be watching my niece compete in an equestrian event last month talking, but dang it all, I'm intrigued.

An Island Princess Starts a Scandal by Adriana Herrera

 One last summer. 

For Manuela del Carmen Caceres Galvan, the invitation to show her paintings at the 1889 Exposition Universelle came at the perfect time. Soon to be trapped in a loveless marriage, Manuela has given herself one last summer of freedom—in Paris, with her two best friends. 

One scandalous encounter. 

Cora Kempf Bristol, Duchess of Sundridge, is known for her ruthlessness in business. It's not money she chases, but power. When she sees the opportunity to secure her position among her rivals, she does not hesitate. How difficult could it be to convince the mercurial Miss Caceres Galvan to part with a parcel of land she’s sworn never to sell? 

One life-changing bargain. 

Tempted by Cora’s offer, Manuela proposes a trade: her beloved land for a summer with the duchess in her corner of Paris. A taste of the wild, carefree world that will soon be out of her reach. What follows thrills and terrifies Cora, igniting desires the duchess long thought dead. As they fill their days indulging in a shared passion for the arts and their nights with dark and delicious deeds, the happiness that seemed impossible moves within reach…though claiming it would cause the greatest scandal Paris has seen in decades. 

The second book in Herrera's Las Leonas series takes the reader back to Paris for the 1889 Exposition Universelle. An artist heroine grabbing her last chance at freedom before marrying a man she doesn't love meets a heroine driven by power who wants her land. A bargain is struck, and as it always goes in Romancelandia, everyone gets more than they bargained for.

A Knight for the Defiant Lady by Carol Townend

Sworn to protect her

But she’s threatening his guarded heart… 

Retrieving Lady Allis from a convent is no easy task, as mercenary knight Sir Leon soon discovers… Brave and beautiful, Allis awakens emotions Leon thought he’d long buried after losing his family. Yet upon their return to her castle, the social gulf between them widens when Allis’s father demands she marry a nobleman. Leon has always believed love is an illusion, but will he be able to watch his defiant lady marry another?

Another cross-class romance, this one featuring a titled heroine retrieved from a convent and the lowly mercenary knight who literally has nothing to offer other than his heart.  Townend is another Harlequin Historical author I don't think I've read before, so I'm curious to try this.

Winnie West Has an Agenda by Kat Sterling (Kindle Unlimited)

It's 1908, and Washington state suffrage is back on the docket. The newest Suffrage Society is sashed, pinned, and ready for action... 

Winnie West is sick of know-it-all men and ready for adventure, so she sets her sights on becoming one of Seattle’s pioneering female journalists. But when her ridiculously sexy and equally obnoxious editor plants himself in the way of her first editorial on the suffrage movement, the games begin. Little does he know, but Winnie plays for keeps. 

Mack Donnelly will do anything to inherit the family newspaper, including following orders he doesn’t believe in. His goal is within sight when the fiery new girl rocks the boat. Mack has nothing against women’s rights, but the redhead with curves for days could cost him everything. So why can’t he stop pining over her? When he hops a ferry and follows Winnie on assignment, their rivalry explodes into passion. Can love survive a little subterfuge? 

Honestly? I know nothing about this book. The cover caught my eye as I was trolling through the Messy AF Amazon Algorithm when I was putting this post together and then I read the description and stopped dead in my tracks. Early 20th century? The Pacific Northwest? A hero and heroine at cross purposes?  Color me intrigued.  Since I stumbled across this book, I caught this brief review from Plot Trysts on their Instagram page and now I'll be downloading a sample to check out.

The Warrior's Touch by Michelle Willingham (Reprint)

When Irish healer Aileen Ó Duinne finds a wounded man on her lands, she will do anything to save his life. But after she sees the broken body of Connor MacEgan, it evokes memories of a stolen night of passion. 

Connor is grateful to the beautiful healer for saving his life, but he nearly died as punishment for another man’s crime. His hands were crushed in a brutal attack, and he fears he may never lift a sword again. 

Aileen fights to help him regain his strength, but as their attraction grows, she’s terrified of losing more than her heart…she fears losing the daughter Connor knows nothing about.

Originally published by Harlequin Historical in 2007 under the same title, this is the fourth book in the author's MacEgan Brothers series, medieval romances set in Ireland. It's also, brace yourselves, a secret baby book!  This is an entry in the series I haven't read yet. I really need to prioritize finally finishing this series this year. The books I've read, I've enjoyed.

Whew! Dear Lord, are y'all as exhausted as I am? That's a mess of books this month. Enjoy them now because who knows when we'll see a cornucopia like this again.

Review: Too Soon For Adios

Too Soon for Adios is Annette Chavez Macias' second women's fiction novel for Amazon Montlake and was the very definition of a second half read for me. Why? Reader foibles. There were authorial choices that set my teeth on edge, but certainly YMMV.  Once our heroine lands in New Mexico is when this book truly started to cook for me.

Warning: Spoilers Ahoy!

Gabby Medina had just realized her dream of being named sous chef at one of LA's hottest restaurants when her Mom got sick. Gabby quits her job, gives up her apartment, and she and Mom move in with one of Mom's oldest friends. The cancer takes more than her Mom's life, the family finances (such as they are) also take a hit. There's no income rolling in and after Mom dies Gabby learns that her mother filled out pre-approved credit card applications that showed up in the mail addressed to Gabby.  Yes, Dear Old Mom, departed her Earthly body leaving her only child, her only unemployed child, mired in debt. 

Then the day of her Mom's funeral, the biological father Gabby never knew shows up - offering her a solution to her problems.  His grandmother passed away over a year ago and she left him her house in Sonrisa, New Mexico. He'll give her the house. She can live there or fix it up, put it on the market, reaping all the profits. Selling a house would solve her debt issues, but Gabby has her pride and this guy - THIS GUY - just shows up out of the blue when her grief is fresh, looking to play Daddy Hero.  After abandoning her and her Mom all those years ago. No thanks.

We all know what happens next - Gabby does go to New Mexico...eventually.  But how does she land on that decision after telling Bio Dad to take a hike? She goes back to the restaurant to beg for her job back, but of course the chef is a Grade A Asshole. He thinks she should be grateful that he's taking her back and tries to rape her after the dinner service is over as payment.  Gabby gets away before he can rape her, but not before he leaves behind bruises.  Gabby, of course, doesn't report it. He's a big deal, she's a nobody. He could ruin her chances of working anywhere in LA ever again. So she runs off to New Mexico to take Bio Dad up on his offer.  She'll get the house ready for market, sell it, pay off her debts, and then figure out what to do after that. 

This book was a struggle for me at first because there were two very key plot points that flat-out didn't work for me.  The first was Gabby's lack of anger towards her mother for racking up debt in Gabby's name and then leaving her daughter holding the bag.  And when I mean lack of anger - I mean, none. Certainly the relationship was complicated - Gabby not always being the "type" of daughter her mom expected, but that's a long way from credit card fraud.  If my own mother is reading this rest assured I would dig you up with my bare hands so I could strangle your corpse.

Then there's the attempted rape. Let me count the ways this was completely traumatic and unnecessary. The Bio Dad you never knew shows up out of the blue - yes, he's obviously an asshole for abandoning you and walking out of your life without a backward glance - but being curious about the man would only make you human. AND, the guy is offering a solution to the debt your mother, who you're not pissed off with for some reason, saddled you with.  Yes, yes - you have your pride - but selling a house is going to get you out of debt WAY FASTER than working for a dismal salary for a rapist chef in LA, with the fantastic (yes, that's sarcasm) cost of living the city affords it's residents.

Issues, I had them.

But then the story shifts to New Mexico and things get better.  Gabby is grieving, finding a way to navigate a "relationship" of sorts with her Bio Dad, starts verbally sparring (and flirting) with the Town Mayor / Local Contractor/Handyman, and strikes up a friendship with her neighbor who is rumored to be a witch. There's plenty of small town color and flavor.  There's even a local real estate agent who you think will be set up to be the Evil Other Woman but the author ends up spinning that in a very refreshing way (after the almost rape "trope" the fact that the Evil Other Woman didn't spin out like I thought it would was rather refreshing).

Where does that leave us?  Calling the first 1/3 a slog is too harsh - but I really did not care for some of the authorial choices laid out there.  But once I landed in New Mexico?  I was ALL in. It's definitely Gabby's story, but the romantic arc is very strong, and the secondary characters add a lot of flavor to the story.  Not perfect, but it ended up being a solid read for me in the end.

Final Grade = B-

#TBRChallenge 2023: Historical Romance Novella Round-Up

I got a spring head cold a few weeks back that turned out to be a bit of a vampire. It was my first cold since before COVID (I know!) and it wiped me out. Lucky me, I got better just in time for My Man to come down with it! So, yeah. My reading mojo got derailed for a bit and this month's TBR Challenge snuck up on me.  My answer to this? Find some novellas, and quick! Which worked out well for this month's Freebie theme. I like to read short, I like novellas, so when authors offer them up as promotional free downloads, I tend to snap up them up.  I ended up devouring three of them late one night and like all things novellas - it was a decidedly mixed bag.

First up was A Sweet Surrender by Lena Hart, which I downloaded back in 2017 and was originally published in the For Love & Liberty anthology that also featured Be Not Afraid by Alyssa Cole.  Set during the American Revolution, this one features a half-Native, half-Black heroine and a British officer dude she nurses back to health after he's wounded in an ambush.  

Here's the problem, it features all the problematic "stuff" readers have come to expect in romances featuring indigenous people and colonizers - and a novella is just too little room to adequately explore that. On top of that there's a heaping dose of dubious consent (she says "no," he convinces her otherwise...) and these two decide they're madly in love with each other at a lightning pace.  It's wildly uneven. In order for a story like this to have a chance of working, it needs to be a doorstopper saga. Multigenerational wouldn't hurt either.  As a novella?  Nope.  Also, the story itself is around 80 pages, but the Kindle edition clocks in at 152, which means you get a rather large excerpt for the second story in the series after this one ends. Not a big deal for me since I downloaded this for free, but I know that kind of thing really irritates some readers.  

Final Grade = D

I don't have a record of downloading The French Maid by Sabrina Jeffries from Big Brother Amazon, which means I'm pretty sure I got this as a free download at (most likely) an RWA conference.  This is a short story that clocks in around 30 pages. The writing is smooth, and I liked the story - but it's also the kind of story that if you look at it for too long it starts to irritate you.  

Our heroine is no raving beauty, but she's smart and well-connected, making her the perfect wife for our hero with ambitions to one day be Prime Minister.  They've been married a year and she's feeling neglected. He's the type of guy who schedules intimacy with his wife (Wednesday nights) and the rest of the time he pays about as much attention to her as a potted plant.  When her lady's maid leaves their employment to marry, he does have the presence of mind to hire his wife a new one (a French one!) but of course doesn't consult her on this matter in the least. 

The moral of this story is that marriage takes work and if you neglect it, it will die on the vine. I liked that Babette basically tells the heroine, "Yeah, he's neglecting you but what exactly have you done about it? (The answer is nothing, the heroine is suffering in silence) You're both being lazy." Of course how do these two start to come together? A makeover of course. It takes the hero seeing the heroine all prettied up to start the process of getting his head out of his ass, and if I think about that too long I'm just annoyed.  Look pretty girls or be doomed to a life of neglect from your husband.

Final Grade = C

Harlequin has about as much luck with novella lines (see: Harlequin Historical Undone, Spice Briefs and Carina Press's Dirty Bits) as they do romantic comedy category romance lines, but I liked Undone. They were quick, short, and typically ran sexier than regular Harlequin Historicals. I thought I had read all the ones I owned, but then I found An Imprudent Lady by Elaine Golden buried on my Kindle, having downloaded it as a freebie back in 2011!

The heroine (a Lady) is in her 30s and officially a dried up old spinster. When she was younger she fell passionately in love with a doctor's son - a mere mister. This was a scandal of epic proportions for her parents, so they pull all the strings and bingo-bango, the hero's exiled to India.  Well, guess what? He's back. Her father may be dead, but her mother has a dang fit of apoplexy.  With the youngest daughter having her first Season and Evil Mama determined to make an excellent match, the scandal reigniting is the last thing they need!  Of course the heroine and hero are still hung up on each other, and as the story moves forward we learn the lengths the heroine's family went to to keep the two star-crossed lovers apart.

If you're a fan of the star-crossed trope, this one really worked for me. There's secrets, there's lies, and it's all in a short enough package (80 pages) that it never wears out it's welcome.  There's also passion and sizzle between the couple, with some well done sexy-times to spice up the proceedings.  It's the first book in a trilogy of novellas, with the youngest daughter and the heroine's older brother getting their own stories.  I can't believe I missed this one the first go around (I read SO many of these Undones back in the day!) but I was glad to find it now.

Final Grade = B

Review: The Replacement Wife

After reading Pretty Little Wife back in February I knew I was going to blow through the rest of Darby Kane's backlist - but I ain't gonna lie - I wasn't exactly looking forward to The Replacement Wife.  Anyone who has read any of my reviews for domestic suspense novels over the past handful of years knows that Wendy, she isn't the biggest fan of the unreliable narrator. The heroine who is gorked out on pills, booze, or more likely a combination of the two and we spend the entire novel trapped in her claustrophobic, paranoid mind.  I like Female Competency Porn in suspense novels and these gals running around half-cocked, not playing the smart hand, I just can't.  And while certainly, there's some of that in this book, Kane puts her own spin on this Trope That Won't Die making this one the most pleasant surprise in my reading year thus far.

Elisa Wright is a wife and mother living a quiet life in a historic home outside of Philadelphia.  There's just one small problem - Elisa is convinced that Josh, her brother-in-law, is a killer.  His wife died in a tragic home accident.  Nothing odd there necessarily, or so Elisa thought at first.  Then she introduced Josh to her good friend, Abby.  They started dating.  They got engaged. And now Abby has disappeared.  Poof! Without a trace.  Josh is playing the victim card. She LEFT him. Just decided she didn't want to be with him, packed up her bags and took off.  Abby is artistic, flighty, she's a grown woman and there's no evidence of foul play.  Except Elisa and Abby were friends - and Abby has dropped out of Elisa's life as well.  Which doesn't smell right to Elisa, especially since Abby knows about the trauma Elisa had recently suffered.  Abby would call to check in.  Abby wouldn't abandon a friend.  Except she does.  Then Elisa finds Abby's laptop hidden in Josh's home that has a string of incriminating chat messages saved on it and Josh announces that he's met someone new. He has a new girlfriend and he's head over heels in love...

Elisa is well on her way to unspooling at the start of the story, having discovered the laptop innocently enough while at Josh's house to bring in a cleaning service. Harris, Elisa's husband and Josh's older brother, took on the defacto parent role after their parents died when they were young. The Josh Needs To Be Taken Care Of party line is well ingrained, and after discovering the laptop, Elisa realizes how she fell into it lockstep. But all this means that there's the very real concern that Harris may side with Josh over his own wife.  Harris who likes calm and order.  Harris who just wants his wife to get better already and instead she has stopped therapy and when she manages to go out it's within a very limited range near home. Now she's convinced that Josh did something to Abby.

Kane sets up her unreliable narrator by having Elisa experience a traumatic event (content warning: work place shooting).  She's on anxiety meds, but as a reader I never got the impression that those meds were being used as an "excuse" for her unspooling (which, thank the Lord because I would have been irritated).  What has Elisa unraveling is the fact that she's not adequately addressing her trauma and that she's found the incriminating laptop in Josh's home.  One dead wife, a missing fiancé, and in a matter of months he's madly in love with a new girlfriend?  AND SHE'S THE ONLY ONE CONCERNED! It smells rotten and Harris, while he agrees it's quick, doesn't share the concerns on the same level as she does.  

Pretty much from the jump the reader knows that something is rotten about Josh. We also know that someone is seriously screwing with Elisa, gaslighting her, and making her come off as completely unreliable and unhinged.  And Elisa struggling is believable to the secondary characters because of the traumatic event she survived.  My main issue here is that Elisa does have all her faculties. She's not mixing multiple meds, she's not mixing her meds with booze.  Honestly I wanted her to be smarter. If someone is gaslighting you and making you look unhinged - Dear Lord don't fall right into their trap.  Pretend that everything is fine. Don't come off sounding unhinged. Don't argue that you're the victim even if you are.  It's just going to make people think you're nutso, and you have the well-being of your young son to think about. Don't give them any rope to hang you with that would put your son in danger.

So yeah, she's not the sharpest knife in the drawer and she frustrated me - but let me tell you that this book is Twisty AF.  Look, Josh is up to no good. We know this.  We don't know the extent of it, but something is definitely off with that guy.  It's the secondary players that send the reader on a ride in this one.  Who can Elisa trust? Does she have allies? Or are the people claiming to be her allies the ones gaslighting the hell out of her?  It's 400 pages of this and yes it is exhausting, but I could not put this down. I had to push forward. I had to find out how it all plays out. I had to find out if Josh was a killer, what happened to Abby, and it did not disappoint.

Were there things about this book that I didn't love? Yes, Elisa not playing things smart annoyed me.  But what did I love? How frickin' twisty this was! It kept me guessing from start to finish and when I came up for air I felt slightly drunk afterward.  A real treat for domestic suspense fans to be sure.

Final Grade = A

Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is May 17!

Hey, hey, hey the fifth #TBRChallenge of 2023 is fast approaching! The magic day is Wednesday, May 17 and this month's (always) optional theme is Freebie.

Another theme suggestion born out of the survey I ran late last year. "Freebie" is one of those themes you can define however you wish, but two options that immediately came to mind for me: 1) free pick on the theme - read where ever your mood takes you! or 2) a book you got for free - maybe as a gift, from a free little library box or free ebook download.

That being said, remember that the themes are completely optional - although if you go with the "free pick" option I suggested there's no way you cannot be "on theme' this month 😉.  The goal of the challenge has been, and always will be, to read something (anything!) that's been languishing in your mountain range of unread books. 

It's never too late to join the Challenge! To learn more about it and to see a list of folks participating head on over to the information page.