In a picturesque French château…
A battle of wills is about to ignite!
Julien Archambeau, Comte de Rocroi, has dedicated his life to reclaiming his family’s lands. Only Lady Emma Greyville-Luce now stands in his way. The British heiress is the new owner of the vineyard that’s the final piece of his plan. Much to Julien’s frustration, Emma won’t relinquish what’s now hers, and soon it’s not just champagne corks that start to fly, but sparks…of desire!
This is the first book in Scott's Enterprising Widows series and y'all it is chock-full of Unusual Historical catnip! Victorian era set, each book in the trilogy follows a widow rebuilding her life after losing their husbands in the 1852 Holmfirth Flood. In Book One, the hero wants to reclaim his ancestral lands, only to have a British widow standing in his way. It's France post-Revolution, post-Napoleon, set against the backdrop of the champagne industry. I'm really looking forward to this whole series!
The year is 1921, and America is burning. A fire of vice and virtue rages on every shore, and Chicago is its beating heart.
Nelly Sawyer is the daughter of the “wealthiest Negro in America,” whose affluence catapulted his family to the heights of Black society. After the unexpected death of her only brother, Nelly becomes the premier debutante overnight. But Nelly has aspirations beyond society influence and marriage. For the past year, she has worked undercover as an investigative journalist, sharing the achievements and tribulations of everyday Black people living in the shadow of Jim Crow. Her latest assignment thrusts her into the den of a dangerous vice lord: the so-called Mayor of Maxwell Street.
Born in rural Alabama to a murdered biracial couple, Jay Shorey knows firsthand what it means to be denied a chance at the American dream. When a tragic turn of fate gave Jay a rare path out, he took it without question. He washed up on Chicago’s storied shores and forged his own way to the top of the city’s underworld, running Chicago's swankiest speakeasy, where the rich and famous rub elbows with gangsters and politicians alike.
When Nelly’s and Jay’s paths cross, she recruits him to help expose the Mayor and bring about lasting change in a corrupt city. But Jay also introduces a whole new world to Nelly, one where her horizons can extend beyond the confines of her ivory tower. Trapped between the monolith of Jim Crow, the inflexible world of the Black upper class, and the violence of Prohibition-era Chicago, Jay and Nelly work together and stoke the flames of a love worth fighting for.
This debut is published by Disney's Hyperion Avenue imprint ("commercial fiction and nonfiction for adults") which is to say that this book might be more historical fiction / romance adjacent than genre romance - but honestly y'all, I don't care. Chicago! Prohibition! A debutante turned investigative journalist! A speakeasy owner! This sounds fantastic!
A wicked game of seduction turns into insatiable desire.
The last surviving member of his family after the Revolution, Guy de Cazal leads a life of decadent pleasure in Paris. But his past catches up with him when he agrees to a wicked wager with a notorious beauty—she will take him as a lover if he can seduce the innocent young lady his parents intended him to marry many years before.
Antonia Saint Yves dreams of overcoming her reserved nature and leaving the family nest before she well and truly becomes the spinster aunt. An invitation to attend a fashionable house party seems like the perfect opportunity, until she comes face to face with Guy, the object of her adolescent infatuation. Guy never even looked her way when she was a shy, awkward girl, but now the heat in his gaze is unmistakable... and impossible to resist.
A hero who lost his entire family in the Revolution enters into a wicked wager to seduce an innocent only to have the tables turned on him. Complicating matters? The innocent was, at one point, the young woman his parents wanted him to marry. Another book set in France.
Romance and scandal ignite in the Palace of Versailles…
A Cinderella governess…
With a royal secret!
Reeling from the discovery that everything she knew about her life was a lie, Isadora is forced to take up a position as a governess in the brooding Marquis de Lyonnais’s household. As she helps the marquis bond with his orphaned nephew, Isadora can’t help but be drawn to the man behind the title. But can she trust him to protect her secret…one that’s so explosive it could rock the court of King Louis XV!
Apparently January is the month for historical romances set in France? Who knew! Cole's second book for Harlequin Historical is set in 1750, so a few years before the fun and games of the Seven Years' War. A heroine of diminished circumstances with a Big Secret, takes a governess position only to fall in love with a marquis. All this against the backdrop of Louis XV court? What could possibly go wrong?
London, 1879. The city’s most notorious pickpocket is about to become the jewel of high society…
Della Rose learned her trade as a pickpocket on the vice-ridden streets of the notorious Seven Dials. But when the handsome Cole Winthrop offers her a huge sum of money to steal from his arch nemesis, the nefarious Duke of Salisbury, it seems Della’s days of deceit and thievery could soon be behind her.
To do the job she must go undercover as a member of high society, learning to walk, talk, ride and flirt like a lady. Which also means pretending to be Cole’s cousin…
As an undeniable attraction grows between them, Della must fight to stay focused. Succeeding in her mission could be her ticket to a new life. And this thief won’t let the small matter of falling in love get in her way…
A pickpocket heroine hired by our hero to steal from a Duke finds herself preparing for the job by getting schooled in the ways of being a lady. A Pygmalion story featuring a pickpocket heroine in the late Victorian era? It's enough to get me to overlook the illustrated cover.
Can he abandon a life of opulence to follow his heart to be with someone who possesses nothing but the richness of love?
Grant Murray’s extravagant lifestyle is maintained by his string of lovers. Upon an opportunity to make his own wealth, Grant uses every charm in his arsenal to convince an older lover to gift him the money. The luster of his lifestyle dulls upon meeting a beautiful woman, who although a servant, her life is richer in ways his can never be. Grant comes to the realization that he can never actually be a free man unless he breaks the ties that bind him to his extravagant lifestyle. Will he make the sacrifice?
Wren Darrow is thankful for a place to live and work as a servant at a grand estate. When a handsome gentleman pursues her, she is wary of his intentions. Although he is kind to her, she is more than aware of the difference in their stations. Just as she begins to consider his courtship, she learns the horrible truth about his lifestyle. Her shattered heart demands she walk away but what about love?
This is a late December release I missed last month but who cares about that? OMG THE HERO IS KEPT MAN!!!!!! Captivated by a mere servant, what will happen after he falls hopelessly in love and she learns of the true nature of his lifestyle?
Stranded in the Arctic
With a lone-wolf Viking!
Lost in the remote wilderness in a snowstorm, Embla is rescued by local “Wildman” Runar and taken to his cabin—with just one bed! But as he warms her icy body with his, passion inflames them both… She’s been warned against this man her entire life—but as she realizes she could be stranded with him for weeks, it seems her only option is to trust him…and their intense attraction!
Morris' latest stand-alone is a Viking romance with an Artic twist. They're snowed in! Trapped in his cabin! With only one bed! And naturally he has a "reputation" that the heroine has been warned away from. This sounds fantastic and I'm sucker for survivalist storylines in romance.
The utterly charming Emily Leverton has a dark past and is determined to leave it behind in her respectable new role as a governess. But when she is recruited by a secret network of governesses who spy on the ton, it may just be a way to redeem the dark secrets of her past.
Straddling the worlds of the ton and the working class, as an ex-solider turned railroad magnate, Zach hunts killers for the Metropolitan Police by day and dutifully attends balls at night. In neither world has he met a woman with the brazenness to mock him. So when a saucy governess blows him a kiss he is determined to catch her, never expecting that when he does he will find an intelligent, quirky woman hiding more than her true name. As Zach peels back the layers of Emily’s lies, he falls for the street-wise woman who handles a dagger like a pro and kisses like a mistress. But when his affair with Emily intertwines with his hunt for a killer, he discovers Emily is hiding an explosive secret—one that could destroy them both.
Lovise's debut is the first in a new series about governesses who spy on the ton - which includes the heroine of this first book. The hero is an ex-solider (swoon) and railroad magnate (double swoon!) working for the Metropolitan Police to apprehend villains - which is how he crosses paths with the heroine.
Step into Harley Street’s world of medical miracles, where Dr. Phil Rosen excels in surgery but struggles to mend his broken heart. Could the Black Widow lead a brave nurse to his rescue?
Meet Nurse Shira, a woman of courage who dared to defy societal norms by choosing a career over reputation. Her journey leads her to the bustling clinic on Harley Street, where destiny intertwines her path with the dashing surgeon who saved her friend’s life. In his presence, she discovers that her passion for medicine has guided her straight into the arms of love.
In a story where the lines mustn’t be crossed between a surgeon and his nurse, Mrs. Dove-Lyon teaches a lesson on embracing taboos to find love. Join the story that unveils the drive of London’s most notorious matchmaker and witness the love match she forges like no other.
Part of the larger connected Lyon's Den world, this is Adrien's second book to feature doctors on Harley Street. Folks, I am trash for nurse heroines and what we have here is a historical doctor / nurse romance and OMG get this in my eyeballs right now!
A cold heart meets blazing passion . . . can it be love?
Stifled by the rigid confines of Mayfair society, Lady Carenza Castlebury lives a secret life. One full of passion and color in the heart of London’s rookery, where she sings in a tavern as the infamous Masked Meadowlark. Coveted by many, claimed by none, Carenza refuses to conform to a life dictated to her by her controlling father, the powerful Earl of Castlebury. She will run away from his every attempt to quell her freedom, regardless of what her father believes—and regardless of any man he sends to bring her home. Or so she thinks, until she encounters the one man who stops her—and her heart—dead in her tracks.
Commoner Damon Crowe has made a lucrative living digging through the secrets of the rich and titled. In the recovery business, Damon thinks nothing of assisting the Earl of Castlebury in retrieving his spoiled daughter from her covert nighttime escapades before her ruse is discovered. Damon sees only a hefty payout on an easy assignment. Truly, how big a problem can one nobleman’s bored and pampered daughter be?
Turns out, she’s a rather large one. But when Carenza’s brazen nature puts her directly into the path of the Revivalists—a group of murdering noblemen rampaging London—Damon can no longer deny his feelings for the passionate hellion.
A Lady with a desire to preform, hemmed in by societal restrictions falls for a private investigator-like hero hired by her Daddy to bring her to heel. Oh these historical romance fathers, will they never learn?
She’s about to face her biggest challenge yet…
Since she was a girl, Miss Kitty Beckett has been adept at finding trouble: sneaking brandy, running away, and getting under the skin of the boy who, like her, was an apprentice to an architect. Now Kitty’s a talented heiress who can take a dry building plan and breathe life into it with her pencils and paints. Also? She can spot a rake at a hundred yards—and she won’t be tricked or charmed into marriage. Certainly not by a man who might interfere with her dreams. When Bellehaven Bay announces its first ever architectural design contest, she vows to win—with a little help from her childhood rival.
Turning her buttoned-up nemesis into a certified rake.
Leo Lockland, a hardworking architect with a gift for numbers, has returned home after a few years in London, and he has secrets. The biggest? He’s been in love with Kitty since they were both apprentices. She refuses to give her heart to any man, but Leo’s determined to beat the odds—even if it means learning how to be a rake. Fortunately, Kitty’s willing to tutor him in the nuances of fashion, flirtation, and seduction in exchange for his help with the contest. But the whole plan would fall apart if she knew how he felt, so he’ll have to be very convincing.
Let the lessons begin…
Leo proves to be a surprisingly quick study in the ballroom, on the beach, and in the bedchamber. Before long, he’s softening Kitty’s hard edges with his wicked words and kissing his way past all her defenses. Perhaps she’s a bit too skilled at teaching, because her lessons are threatening to backfire, putting her closely guarded heart in grave danger…
The third book in Bennett's Rogues to Lovers series gives us our second Pygmalion theme of the month, but this one is a role reversal with the hero (carrying a torch for the heroine, because of course he is...) getting made over in all the ways of rakedom. Oh and just a small minor detail that THEY'RE BOTH ARCHITECTS OMG!
When newly graduated medical doctor Charlotte Duvall receives word that her father has died, she immediately leaves America and returns home to see to her family’s estate. Among her father’s possessions is a box of her late mother’s letters, which feels like a balm to Charlotte’s grief-stricken heart. But the letters contain some inconsistencies that suggest there was more to her mother’s death than Charlotte had been told. She turns to the one man she trusts more than anyone—her treasured friend and director of London’s police force, John Ellis.
John Ellis has harbored feelings for Charlotte ever since he first met her. Tucked into his heart are thoughts of her sharp mind, quick wit, and remarkable beauty. Though he has not yet found the courage to share his feelings with the young doctor, he is eager to help her in her hour of need.
Investigating the details of a death was not how Charlotte imagined she would find love, but as she and John work to unravel a dark web of secrets and lies, she finds herself relying on him more and more—and opening her heart to him in the process.
As the danger draws ever closer, John vows to do everything in his power to protect Charlotte from harm. But he fears protecting her heart might come at the cost of breaking his own.
A doctor heroine comes home only to stumble across family secrets. To solve the mystery, she needs to investigate her mother's death and for that she needs the hero's help, a man who is carrying a torch for her (because of course he is...). This is late Victorian, and published by Shadow Mountain Publishing, so readers should expect chaste and/or just kisses.
Can two wounded hearts find peace in a time of war?
1944. Widow Poppy Guilford is fighting to save her farm, the one thing tethering her to her husband - and the legacy promised for their young son. But a devastating secret from her husband's past threatens to derail her struggle to save the property and keep her son by her side.
Former soldier JB Beaton's wartime injuries and personal losses have left him with scars, both inside and out. Believing he's too damaged to be the father his son deserves, he leaves him with his sister and takes on a job as a farmhand, far away from the city and his failures.
Poppy, battling the elements and the heartache of her husband's secret, finds the new farmhand is never far from her thoughts, and JB's world is thrown into disarray by one of the most beautiful and capable women he has ever met. Neither can battle the surge of attraction they both feel.
In a small town where gossip reigns, will they surrender to duty or follow their hearts?
This debut novel from Australian author Cunningham has garnered a few awards Down Under - including the Romance Writers of Australia Valerie Parv Award (for unpublished manuscripts). A former soldier who abandons his son to the care of his sister (oof!) and accepts a job on the widowed heroine's farm. This sounds right in my wheelhouse.
Whew! I feel the need to suddenly go lie down. What a way to kick off the new year! What Unusual Historicals are you looking forward to in the new year?
6 comments:
A champagne book!? Must have.
Disney's Hyperion Avenue imprint
I'm nervous
But as he warms her icy body with his, passion inflames them both…
The bodice ripper part of my soul just woke up
Never Blow a Kiss
I'm so curious about this one! I've felt burned by historical debuts the last year, so I didn't accept the arc on this but I Need a trusted friend to read and tell me all about it asap
Mayfair Misfits
private investigator-like hero hired by her Daddy to bring her to heel
Why does this have me instant clicking??
Whiskey: I'm cautiously optimistic about the Disney / Avery Cunningham book since the blurb reads fairly romance-y - but we've all been burned before 😫. We've got it on order at work, so I've already put a request in for it.
The nice thing about the books available via KU this month - right now they're both only 99 cents, so a great price to "take a chance" on a new author even if you don't subscribe to KU.
My eyes just about popped out of my skull at all these choices. France definitely sounds like an intriguing setting. I feel like it featured in romances more back in the past and then it faded away as a setting. I'm also loving that there's Viking books coming out.
I'm not looking forward to any particular historical romance, but I'm definitely looking forward to THE MAN IN THE ASYLUM, the latest in the World's End Detective Bureau, a historical mystery series by Alyce Clare. I find these books uneven but somehow compulsively readable. I like the two main characters (there's a hint of future romance between them) and some of the returning side characters. It's set in Victorian London and the main characters are middle class (the heroine born to it, her male sidekick has 'come down in the world'), which is kind of refreshing b/c they interact with both the working class and the "toffs."
Jill: I know! 13 books is just crazy. And 3 set in France?! Amazing.
Oooh, that series sounds intriguing. I need to look that up. Thanks for the rec!
Wow, Wendy, way to blow my book budget! I only just saw that you had a juicy list, and now I'm about to spend all of my March book money on stuff you posted about in January. Yeah, I'm going to need a lie down,
SonomaLass: LOL! Well I tried reading the Nancy Campbell Allen and it didn't survive the put-down-pick-up test for me. I think I might have all the HH titles waiting for me, and I need to get to The Mayor of Maxwell Street. That one in particular intrigues me.
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