#TBRChallenge 2025: Theme Poll Now Open!

The older I get the more I say this, but seriously, where did this year go? I mean, shouldn't it only be March?  All of us have a lot on our plates the final two months of 2024, and hopefully not all of it will suck (please and thank you to all the deities out there), so I wanted to get a jump now on next year's (2025!) #TBRChallenge Theme Poll.

I took over hosting duties in 2011 and the smartest thing I ever did was get burnt-out (OK, maybe not?) and start asking for all y'alls help in coming up with monthly optional themes (definitely). I like to think some of you enjoy this too because the last several years you've come up with some great themes. In fact, every single theme for 2024 came out of last year's poll. None of those came from yours truly.

The 2025 poll is now open via a Google Form. I will likely close it November 30, which will give me time to select winning themes and get a post ready in early December to give folks plenty of time to sign up before we kick things off in January. Enter early, enter often.

Tricks and Treats: October 2024 Unusual Historicals

I'm squeaking in during the 11th hour to finally bring y'all October's crop of Unusual Historicals. What can I say, a brutal reading slump, work being work, and a trip home to see the family had me distracted. However there's nothing quite like Airplane Reading (I do my best reading on airplanes...) and a week of sitting around my parents' house quite literally doing nothing to revive a girl. So without further ado...

Much Ado About Margaret by Madeleine Roux

Margaret Arden yearns to live like the passionate and daring women in her novel. The idyllic life at Mosely Cottage with her two younger sisters and mother is fine, but Margaret wants more than the demure and dainty existence she’s known. After a particularly brutal rejection from an annoyingly attractive publisher, Margaret fears being forced into marriage to protect her family if their financial situation doesn’t improve—until her cousin’s glamorous wedding masquerade brings her onto a collision course with scandal, notoriety, and even love. 

Captain Bridger Darrow is starting over after fighting for his country. Now home, he is struggling to save his family from destitution and succeed in a new venture of passion: book publishing. It’s all going rather poorly, until he stumbles upon loose pages of an astonishing novel while in attendance at his dearest friend’s wedding. Bridger knows he must publish it. But upon meeting the author, Bridger is stunned to discover that he—she—is a woman, and he has already told her off in grand fashion.

While Bridger is keen to gain her trust and rescind the initial rejection, Margaret can’t help but be skeptical of his intentions. Sparks fly between the two, just as the wedding of the season starts to descend into chaos when a masked dance leads to a case of mistaken identities.

This back cover blurb has Regency romcom written all over it. She wants a bold (re: not dull as dishwater) life and he wants to make a success as a book publisher - only to realize that the book he accidentally discovers that is sure to make his reputation is written by the woman (gasp!) that he's just told off.  The mention of a case of mistaken identity seals the deal.  

The Electrician and the Seamstress by Monica Granlove

Germany, 1936. Bruno, an electrician, and Karla, a seamstress, forge a powerful love amid the rise of the Nazi Party and Hitler’s ascent to power. Staunch opponents of the Nazi ideology, they live in perpetual apprehension as they risk being labeled dissidents, navigating a complex negotiation between moral principles and self-preservation. As World War II breaks out, Bruno faces a profound internal struggle when he is drafted into service, and he is eventually captured by the Russians and imprisoned in Siberia. His nearly two-year journey back to war-ravaged Germany reveals the devastating aftermath, with his city in ruins and family displaced.

Meanwhile, Karla, at home facing nightly bombings, struggles to raise their two young children and is forced into helping the Nazis. Through these tumultuous times, Karla and Bruno’s unwavering love becomes a testament to human strength and endurance amid adversity. 

Dissidents in 1936 Germany fall in love, only to face countless struggles as he's drafted, then hauled off to Siberia, and she's faced with hard choices to ensure the survival of herself and her children. This one is based on the true story of the author's grandparents. 

Love and the Downfall of Society by Melinda Copp

After turning society upside down with her debut story, provincial Charlotte Deveraux arrives in Paris poised for literary stardom. She’s not sure where her next rent payment will come from, but she’s determined to make a name for herself as a respected writer in the cultural capital of the world.

Antoine de Larminet is the last surviving son of an aristocratic family. In line to inherit a title, he has promised his parents that he’ll marry a peer and carry on the centuries-old tradition. He was raised in an antiquated world where love was often found outside of arranged society marriages. Even as the French aristocracy is losing relevance to modernity, Antoine never questioned this commitment to this family legacy--until his chance meeting with clever and beautiful Charlotte.

Their attraction is immediate, and the more they bump into each other at the clubs and salons of Paris, the stronger their attachment grows. But Antoine can’t marry Charlotte because she’s as proletarian as they come. And Charlotte will lose all credibility as a writer and social critic if she becomes the mistress of an aristocrat.

The world around them is changing, but if love is to win, one of them will have to give up everything they stand for.

Old world (him) clashes with new world (her). It's a relationship spelling certain doom for both of them: oh, only her credibility and his very way of life. High stakes conflict set against the backdrop of Belle Époque Paris.

A Lady's Lesson in Scandal by Darcy McGuire

Wallflower at risk of ruin…

Secret femme-fatale in training Millicent Whittenburg needs to escape her unpleasant betrothal. Taking matters into her own hands, she plans her eventual ruin! Then she can disappear from society to carry out the Queen’s deadly missions. Step 1: seduce the one man who despises marriage more than her!

However, she hugely underestimates her target. Major General Beaufort Drake. Fearsome private investigator, he’s notoriously cold and visibly battle scarred. But Millie’s scandalously public kiss awakens a deeply suppressed desire in Drake. Instead of allowing them both to succumb to shame he does the unthinkable, and offers for her hand in a convenient marriage.

Nothing prepares them for the fireworks when a fearless damsel collides with a dangerous Major General! And as their secret missions align they face their hardest test on the glittering battlefield – a week long wedding house party where there is nowhere to escape…only new and wicked lessons to be learnt!

Book two in The Queen's Deadly Damsels series features a heroine desperate to escape a betrothal in order to carry out deadly missions for Queen and Country. To that end, she picks our hero, a Major General and a private investigator to be the object of her ruination - except the man does the unthinkable and actually proposes marriage!

Tempted by Her Forbidden Warrior by Michelle Styles

The warrior she shouldn’t want

But can’t resist!

Viking Sibba has traveled to a Scottish island to attend a king’s wedding and maintain the fragile truce between their opposing clans. Not to engage in an impromptu archery contest with his son, Cal, with a kiss at stake if he wins…

The Celtic warrior should remain forbidden, so Sibba’s shocked by how much she wants to kiss him. She ought to stay away, but when the king’s bride is kidnapped, Sibba must join forces with Cal to retrieve her before unrest rages through their kingdoms…and their dangerous desire overwhelms them both!

Heroine attends a King's wedding as a goodwill "see we're really friends now!" gesture, only to find herself in an archery contest with the King's son, with a kiss on the line should he win and she "lose." They're soon thrown further together when the King's bride is kidnapped and they join forces before war erupts between their clans.

Mademoiselle from Armentières by Daniel Hall

In the ruins of war-torn Europe, upper-class officer Reginald Greaves finds more than just the enemy at his doorstep; he discovers Renée, a young woman navigating World War One by working at the Red Lamp, a place of refuge for those with no other options.

Amidst the chaos that the war brings, Reginald leaves Renée with an unpaid debt. Chasing him across Belgium, Renée becomes Reginald’s unwilling nurse, tending to his injuries. As they spend more time together, their initial animosity slowly shifts into a love neither saw coming.

Their relationship faces an unexpected threat when Elizabeth, the well-bred woman Reginald is expected to marry, arrives in France. With Elizabeth's arrival, a complex love triangle ensues, complicating their already tumultuous bond. As they battle their own demons and the advancing front lines, their lives intersect in ways they never imagined.

Against the backdrop of duty, Renée and Reginald grapple with choices that could change everything—choices about family, loyalty, and the future they dare to dream of, even if it seems impossible.

Look, I have issues with love triangles (as a general rule) but World War I and a prostitute heroine - I'm only human. Also, this promises the kind of high stakes conflict I'm kind of desperate for right now in romance. 

The Cornish Inheritance by Fil Reid

After her father’s suicide, Caroline Fairfield is left practically destitute and needing to find herself employment in a hurry. Her old friend, Ysella Beauchamp, now living in Cornwall, assures her that a family she knows is looking for a governess for nine-year-old Yves, the orphaned heir to his grandfather’s title and fortune, after the previous governess left under a cloud.

He’s described as weak and delicate, but turns out to be anything but, and Caroline soon discovers that Mrs Treloar, Yves’s formidable aunt, has a distinct lack of concern for his welfare. To the point of seeming to want to put him in danger. And then she discovers he’s being dosed every night, on his aunt’s orders, with something that could prove fatal.

Major Nathaniel Treloar, disfigured in battle and returning from Europe now Bonaparte is in captivity, travels down to Cornwall to recuperate at his grandfather’s estate while he decides what to do with his life. He’s touchy about his damaged looks and, although he seems friendly enough, and she’s strongly attracted to him, Caroline can’t get out of her head the fact that he would be the one to benefit if anything were to happen to Yves.

This, more than likely, isn't a Gothic, but c'mon. Cornwall, a father's suicide, a destitute heroine turned governess, her young charge whose life is in peril and a disfigured, battle-scarred hero. It might not be a duck, but it certainly seems to be quacking. This is the third book in the author's Cornish Ladies series.

Regency Glad Tidings by Carla Kelly

"Holly and Ivy"- The Napoleonic Wars are over. Troops are returning home to a joyous Christmas, except for Surgeon Jake Frost, who must escort a hypochondriac captain, barely wounded at Waterloo. Jake prepares to hate every minute of the ordeal, until he meets the hypochondriac's fiancé.

"Yours Sincerely" - Madeline and her widowed mother live in genteel poverty, at the mercy of overbearing in-laws. Despite this, they have managed well. Years earlier, they befriended an older gentleman who has since passed away. To their surprise, an American sea captain arrives, summoned for a reading of the will of that quiet gentleman. Kindness triumphs in ways unimaginable, except, perhaps, during the season of glad tidings.

"Picture a Christmas" - To avoid the poorhouse, Mary Cooper finds employment in a notions shop belonging to a grouchy old dame. Coming into her life to upend this pleasant arrangement is Luke Wainwright, nephew of Mary's employer. He's a widower and shipbuilder with no time for anything except business. To Luke, Mary is an interloper in his aunt's affairs, until he sees someone else: a person as determined as he is to improve the hand dealt them. Together, perhaps?

Kelly's Christmas stories are fan favorites and this is copied and pasted directly from her website: So here you have Regency Glad Tidings, three Christmas stories that I wrote last year in summer’s heat, when most Christmas fiction is written. May your days be merry and bright!  You know what this means? BRAND NEW CARLA KELLY CHRISTMAS STORIES, NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED!!!!!!!

A Brush with Scandal by Allison Grey

1882. An artist from the notorious Seven Dials will paint her way into London‘s heart…

Violet Latimer longs to escape her scandalous origins in the rookery of Seven Dials and finally make a name for herself as a painter. But her past is never far behind her, and nor is the notorious criminal, Archie Neville. Fresh out of prison, he's determined to make her his wife – and catch whoever put him away in the first place.

Calling on her high society friends for help, Violet finds herself in an unlikely alliance with the last man a girl from the rookeries should ever approach, undercover detective, John Barrow. A man from her side of the tracks – and dangerously handsome too – John offers Violet a bargain: he’ll help her escape from Archie if she’ll help him collect the information he needs to bring Archie down for good.

But neither Violet nor John have counted on the attraction that ignites between them. As their dangerous arrangement progresses, Violet feels all her plans for the future unravelling in the heat from John’s eyes. Can she dare to trust this man, despite the secrets she senses he’s keeping? Will surrendering to her heart be Violet’s salvation, or her downfall?

OMG, I am trash for everything about this blurb. Artist heroine who quite literally pulls herself out of the muck, only to have a dangerous man from her past slither his way back into her life. It's time to call in some favors with her new high society friends, and that gets her the hero, an undercover detective. She's a woman who can't not afford to lose her heart and he's a man who is obviously hiding secrets. 

Outlaw Hearts by Lori G. Matthews

Outlaw Elle Barstow spends her days robbing stagecoaches and her nights bedding women—all while keeping her heart safely locked away.

But everything changes when Isabella “Izzy” Collins enters her life. Banished by her family, the fiery suffragette from Boston is reluctantly traveling west to marry a man much older than herself.

When Elle rescues Izzy during a stagecoach robbery gone wrong, she plans to ransom Izzy for a hefty reward. But Elle soon finds herself drawn to the captivating woman who challenges her every instinct.

As Izzy insists on learning how to survive in the wild, Elle’s plan begins to unravel, and she faces a new peril—the growing attraction that threatens to melt her hardened heart.

Lesbians in the Old West. Even better? One of them is an outlaw and the other is a Boston suffragette whose family has deep pockets. What should be a simple ransoming a hostage scheme gets complicated by attraction and ugh, "feelings." Isn't that alway the way?

Another bumper crop of unusual historical options to peruse and sample. What are you looking forward to reading?

Review: Hard Deal

Hard Deal by Stefanie London was another already-downloaded book on my Kindle that I randomly picked to read while traveling thanks to the airplane's flaky wifi. Harlequin Dare only ended up lasting three years, but London released two books in the Melbourne After Dark duet in the first year (2018), of which this is the second title. It stands alone just fine.

Imogen Hargrove is an executive assistant wound so tight she's practically pooping out diamonds. She's smart, efficient, and dresses in monochrome colors. Three years ago she found out her husband, whom she married after a whirlwind courtship, was a serial cheater to the point where she got a full STD-screening work-up. She's trying to dip her toes back into the dating pool but it's been hard. Nobody sees her. Nobody makes her feel desirable. Well, except for Caleb Allbrook, her boss's black sheep son. But while she will drool over him behind his back, he's strictly off limits. Besides being her boss's son, he's a major player. Imogen is not about to get fooled again.

It's Imogen's trust issues that have her sneaking into a high society masquerade ball. Her younger sister is engaged and Imogen saw Daniel in a bar recently with an attractive woman. She's convinced he's cheating. He's going to this masquerade ball while her sister sits at home (another red flag!) so she decides to gate crash.  Unfortunately through a series of misadventures she misses her sister's fiancé and lands in the crosshairs of Caleb (it's pretty funny actually). Anyway turns out he knows her sister's fiancé and in exchange for helping Imogen dig up dirt he wants a date, one date, with her. 

This started a little slow for me but it picks up steam quickly and there was plenty of emotional heft to keep me engaged.  I tend to be more of a heroine-centric reader, but Caleb is who ultimately sold this story for me. His baggage is really fantastic.  He's his father's second, and unwanted, child. Caleb's Mom is Wife #2, the "trophy wife," his father's first wife and his older brother's mother died due to illness (I can't remember now if the author discloses what - cancer? A mysterious Romance Malady?).  Anyway, his older brother is the heir apparent being groomed for greatness, while Caleb is seen as the screw up even as his father and brother take credit for his ideas. One of the best aspects of this book for me was Caleb learning to stand on his own two feet and breaking out of his toxic family's shadow. 

Unfortunately there's Imogen who is one of those heroines who doesn't swear. Seriously, she says "smurfing."  SMURFING!!!!! I understood why she was wound so tight, the betrayal of her first marriage would certainly do that to anyone, but SMURFING!!!!!  Ugh. The only thing that really saves me from hating her entirely is that the Black Moment is great. She has major trust issues which eventually becomes a breaking point for Caleb. That moment when he verbally smacks her and confronts her with her trust issues - whoa boy. Good stuff. In the end Imogen does take a good, long look in the mirror and for that I was willing to put up with smurfing. Seriously, smurfing. 

I never got heavy into the Dare line, but this one has interesting emotional baggage and some nice steamy love scenes that lean in on vanilla kink (voyeurism). It's more hot contemporary than erotic romance, but it was a spicy, quick read that kind ripped my heart out a bit at the end. 

Final Grade = B

Review: Cinderella's Royal Seduction

Cinderella's Royal Seduction by Dani Collins was not the book I had on tap to read next. I'm currently traveling, and like a dodo, I didn't download the book I was planning to read and couldn't get the airplane wifi to work. So, I went trolling through my Kindle for a book that was already downloaded and here we are. For a completely random pick out of my digital TBR, this one was pretty good.

Cassiopeia “Sopi” (seriously) Brodeur oversees the Lonely Lake Spa tucked away in the Canadian Rockies. She's been running the property since her father's death, as it was something he purchased for Sopi's mom.  Unfortunately, her stepmother Maude, and her two vacuous stepsisters have decided they're bored with Europe and have come back to Lonely Lake. Even worse? They've cancelled all their bookings because Prince Rhys Charlemaine from one of those tiny made-up principalities that exist in Presents Land, has decided to visit. As a getaway. Except, of course, it's really not. Maude plans on shoving her daughters in his face thinking he'll want to marry one of them.

Rhys is a very eligible bachelor, so it doesn't take long for the spa to fill back up with single women vying for his attention. He's learned to expect this type of behavior, even as he's bored by it. The only reason he's visiting the spa is because Maude approached him about selling, and having an already impressive real estate portfolio, he's naturally curious. Also, even though he was in no rush, he knows it's time to find a wife. He's the spare, but his brother, who is blissfully married to the love his life, just found out he has testicular cancer. The chances of them producing an heir is slim to none, which means in order to keep the line of succession intact, it's falling on Rhys. Royals are obsessed with this kind of thing normally, but it's a heightened concern for Rhys. His parents died in a military coup, his brother and him struggled in exile for years, and only recently returned to the country to reclaim the throne. A sign of weakness, such as a failure to secure the line of succession, is something that cannot happen.

Before we know it Rhys and Sopi cross paths, sparks fly before he even knows her name, and once he finds out who she really is, he realizes that Maude is trying to swindle her inheritance out from under her. He also knows he's found the woman he wants to marry, but he's royal and she's a nobody - which, you guessed it, isn't going to fly given the precarious situation in his country. 

This story leans hard into the Cinderella trope to the point that the only thing missing are seamstress rodents. Sopi is at the beck and call of her intolerable step-family and a jack-of-all-trades at the spa, doing everything from housekeeping, waitressing, to stepping in to help out with spa services. However she's not a saccharine doormat, there's fire and backbone in her.  

Rhys baggage is really interesting, a man haunted by what happened to his parents and to him and his brother when they were mere children. As far as Presents go, this one is definitely kinder and gentler. The setting is unique and the hero isn't a raging Alphahole you want to take a baseball bat to upside the head.

But, c'mon, it's still a Presents.  The story loses it's footing for me around the halfway point when the marriage of convenience plot heats up and there's pretty icky broodmare overtones. Yes, Rhys is royal. Yes, getting married and getting a woman knocked up is a big deal. Doesn't make it any less icky. He has an attraction to Sopi and certainly his sense of justice to thwart her stepmother kicks in, but it's not like he's declaring his love right away. The importance on getting pregnant, quite frankly, turned me off. Maybe because it's the 21st century and I like to think of women as more than their uteruses. Look, I understand WHY Rhys wants kids right away. The author sells that very well. Doesn't mean I still didn't find it icky.

Things end on a high note with a suitably emotional ending and Rhys having to reconcile with his past trauma.  This is a really good example of what Presents can do so well, which is sell readers on a heightened, intense fairy tale - which this one does in spades.

Final Grade = B-

Mini-Reviews: Darling Girls and Wild Women

Two books that couldn't be more different, other than I liked them both and don't have a ton to say about them - so it's time for another round of mini-reviews!

First up is Wild Women and the Blues by Denny S. Bryce, a dual timeline historical fiction, with romantic elements, novel set in 1925 and 2015. 1925 Chicago is flowing with bootleg liquor, mobsters, and hot jazz clubs. Honoree Dalcour is a former sharecropper's daughter from Louisiana, having been in Chicago since she was a child. Her parents are both now gone (father dead, mother basically took off) which means Honoree has been left to make her own way in the world, as a dancer. Her life's ambition, to work at the classiest black-and-tan club in town, The Dreamland Café, is about to come true - until a ghost from her past waltzes through the door at her current job. The boy she desperately loved and coughed up her virginity to. The boy from a respectable wealthy Black family. The boy who ghosted her three-years ago and she assumed was dead.

In 2015 Chicago, film student Sawyer Hayes is hoping to finally finish his overdue doctoral thesis. He discovered a hidden box in his grandmother's attic containing photographs and a film cannister he thinks contains a long-lost film by the legendary Black filmmaker, Oscar Micheaux. He needs to get the film restored and talk to the last living link to Micheaux, a former dancer who appears in some of his grandmother's found photographs, Honoree Dalcour. Yes, she's over 100, still alive, and living in a nursing home in Chicago. Unfortunately she's stubborn and extracting her secrets is taking precious time Sawyer doesn't have.

This was an entertaining story with a lot of good historical color and flavor. The 1925 portion of the story is more richly drawn and while the book cover is bright and vibrant, the story itself is a bit darker around the edges with the plot leaning heavily on bootlegging, mobsters and the numbers racket. It's one of those plots where something good happens, immediately followed by something bad - so it definitely kept the pages turning. The 2015 storyline was interesting because it's chock-full of family secrets waiting to be uncovered, although I felt like Sawyer's personal baggage is largely left adrift. Also, while I'm a sucker for secrets, Honoree's Big Secret was a bit of a head scratcher for me - I mean why?! What was the point exactly? I'm not sure it entirely works. That being said, I did like the story overall and will read more of Bryce.

Grade = B

Sally Hepworth writes the type of suspense that's great for folks who like suspense but don't want to wade through a bunch of violence. She also knows her way around writing tension. The kind of tension that suffocates the reader from the first page to the last. Darling Girls tells the story of Jessica, Norah and Alicia, three women who were rescued from family tragedies and raised in foster care by Miss Fairchild, who owns an idyllic farm out in the country. Things, of course, are not what they seem. The girls, now grown, are called back "home" when construction workers, tearing down the house to build a new development, uncover the skeletal remains of a small child.  The "sisters" are now called back as potential witnesses (or possibly suspects) and none of them are all that ready or willing to revisit the past.

Out of the gate, all the trigger warnings for childhood trauma and abuse (psychological and emotional).  Miss Fairchild is one of those evil adult characters whose milk and cookies image is hiding a monster underneath. It's very hard to read and unsurprisingly all that childhood trauma has manifested itself in unhealthy ways now that the girls are adults. 

Told in a dual timeline between past and present, the suspense is very slow burn (hence that suffocating feeling) and doesn't truly begin to cook until the final third, when I could not tear myself away.  There's a twist at the end that had me gasping out loud, but also took off a bit of shine. It moves this book firmly from suspense to the thriller category - meaning it leaves a door open more than a crack and I'm not convinced the person how needs to be punished (mightily!) truly will be. However, all three women do end up in a better place by the end of the story, which goes a long way in making me feel less annoyed. While I'm assigning this the same grade, The Soulmate edges this one out for me, but it sure as heck is still plenty riveting.

Final Grade = B+

#TBRChallenge 2024: The Perfect Bride

The Books: The Perfect Bride by Kerry Connor

The Particulars: Gothic romantic suspense, 2013, Harlequin Intrigue #1421, First book in duet, out of print, available in digital

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: Seriously? Look at the cover. Also, I've read and liked books by Connor in the past.

The Review: There was a brief stretch of time when the Intrigue line would slip in the occasional Gothic or Gothic-adjacent story. There's definitely some Gothic vibes here, what with a dead bride and a mysterious old manor house, but this struck me more as Gothic homage. The Scooby Doo version of Gothic. Which hey, nothing wrong with that. Honestly this book was a lot of fun until the end when things kind of ran off the rails for me.

Jillian Jones is at Sutton Hall for two reasons: to solve her best friend's murder and guilt. Guilt because Courtney was the only "family" that Jillian had and Jillian made excuses to avoid making the trip to help plan Courtney's wedding at Sutton Hall because, ugh - she'd rather be boiled in oil than deal with planning a wedding. Now Courtney is dead. Having fallen off the balcony attached to her room. It was windy that night, dark, Courtney got too close to the ledge. At least that's what the official report says since the cops found no evidence to suggest it was anything other than a tragic accident. However, Jillian knows better. Courtney was deathly afraid of heights. No way in hell would she have opened the doors to that balcony let alone go outside on it! She has no choice in the matter. She's going to travel to Sutton Hall herself, pose as a prospective bride, and find out what happened to her friend.

Adam Sutton inherited the hall with his sister, Meredith, whose dream it was to start a wedding planning business and venue. Adam let his sister down before so he is determined to help her realize her dream. That said, he doesn't trust Jillian Jones as far as he could throw her. Their first bridal client died tragically on-site a month ago and suddenly here comes Jillian with no reservations about holding her wedding in a venue where another bride just died. She's also asking a lot of "innocent" and "I'm just curious" questions and oh look, there she is snooping around again. To aggravate him even further? He's attracted to her. Yes, even though he doesn't trust her and even though she's "engaged." 

The plot and suspense are confined to Sutton Hall and the cast of characters who work and live there. Adam, Meredith, a handyman, cook, housekeeper, gardener, and the gardener's 20-something son.  The author does a good job of casting suspicion on all of them, even though yes, this is a romance so of course Adam didn't do it.  Jillian is typical amateur sleuth, being sneaky, thinking on her feet when it comes to lying, and bungling a few things along the way. She reads very Every Woman and you can't help but admire her tenacity and determination with wanting to do right by her friend.

This is a romance though that doesn't stand up to too much scrutiny. The elephant in the room is that Jillian is supposedly engaged, everyone thinks she's engaged, and yet there's this chemistry pinging off of her and Adam.  However while there's some "standing too close" moments, they don't actually succumb to any of their mutual lust until after the truth comes out.  Which is one element that really works here - when it's time for Jillian to come clean, she comes clean. It makes sense within the framework of the story when that actually happens. Also, while I'm not entirely sure the sex scene fits in the narrative (I would have leaned more towards hot n' heavy just kisses here I think), the author doesn't try to do too much with the HEA. No snap marriage proposal, no sweeping declarations of true love. It leans more on the Let's See Where This Goes Happy For Now spectrum than full-blown Happy Ever After with Wedding Proposal and Heroine Pregnant with Triplets in the Epilogue (in fact, there is no epilogue....)

The Sutton Hall setting is great, I'm a sucker for the whole Gothic house vibe and this is a pretty fun and nostalgic ride until the ending when it all kind of falls apart. Of course our killer is unstable. Of course there's a history of mental illness.  And how our bad guy is dispatched? It's exciting, but if Adam and Meredith thought their business might not survive Dead Courtney, I'm not sure how they're going to spin things after the ending here.  Although obviously they figure it out because Meredith is the heroine of Book 2, although after reading that plot description it sounds like she's got bodies dropping left and right.  And before you ask, of course I'm curious enough to read it. Which as far as unearthing books from my TBR, I'm counting this one as a success.

Final Grade = C+

Review: The Scandalous Spinster

I love historical romances featuring unconventional heroines. What I don't love are historical romance heroines who flaunt the rules, get caught with their hand in the cookie jar, and then are shocked (SHOCKED!) when the consequences of their actions bite them in the butt. Look, history is obviously littered with women who flaunted convention and broke the rules - but that didn't make them stupid. They knew the world they were living in, knew what the societal mores of the time were, and they understood that being unconventional could have very real consequences. Which means they either had to not care or be very sneaky about it. Romance heroines who don't know this are just stupid. Blessedly that is not the type of heroine we have in The Scandalous Spinster by Alyxandra Harvey. She's very well aware of the rules and is very sneaky about circumventing them.

Lady Clara Prescott is a woman who contains multitudes. She's a very proper, downright prudish, spinster. Firmly on the shelf. And that's all she wants you to see. Lady Clara's real talent is being invisible. Dismissed. Wholly ignored.  It's the perfect disguise for her and her work with The Spinster Society, a group of women who help women by making known the names of men who are not what they seem. Fortune hunters, cads, privileged louts who think nothing of defiling innocents and robbing heiresses blind, among other things. 

Clara's disguise is perfect. She's 29, firmly on the shelf, and attends society events mainly out of pity. She's the type of woman who blends into the wallpaper. Nobody notices her other than to hurl the occasional snide remark her way, and her painfully proper no-fun reputation (butter wouldn't melt in her mouth) provides the perfect cover to be sneaky, gather information and eavesdrop. Unfortunately this disguise is so good that even her comrades in The Spinster Society underestimate and under-utilize her. She's desperate for some excitement. She gets her chance when a colleague, working to protect and rescue an heiress being held captive by her guardian, goes missing.

Clara's job is to infiltrate a notorious country house party. Much debauching, much gambling, the kind of place you wouldn't expect Lady Clara to be. Coming with her on this mission is Captain Bram Thorn, a former scarred, tattooed, Navy man who works for the Spinsters mainly out of gratitude for helping his sister out of a spot of trouble. The fly in the ointment? These two are painfully attracted to each other. But Bram, a low born Scottish former sailor, on the other side of forty, knows that any attraction to the very proper, well above his station, and frankly too young for him, Clara Prescott is madness.

What happens next is that these two get to the house party, which is stuffed to the gills. Thrown into the Dower House on the property, they begin snooping around, only to discover a series of baffling clues left behind by the missing Spinster, Sybil. There's also rumors flying around that the heiress, ward to the man hosting the house party, is not the first girl to go missing at the manor. 

This is one of the better historical romances I've read this year, and Clara is a sneaky, conniving delight. Bram is a hero in protector mode, there to keep her safe but who doesn't hold her back. He's not one of those heroes who wants her to step aside, hide in a corner, while he takes on all comers. Yes, she goes off snooping and yes he gets irritated (he can't protect her if he's not there), but these are two characters who don't want to hold each other back.

My only quibble with the book is that the plot is too busy. Clara, Bram, the missing Sybil, heiress and two other girls (it turns out) is more than enough - especially for a book that only clocks in around 250 pages. Instead, we get a kitchen sink tossed in.  Clara, among her other talents, writes salacious novels under a pen name.  Someone has uncovered her true identity and is now blackmailing her. This blackmail plot truly is an afterthought, tossed in on occasion, and while Clara is concerned (being unmasked would blow her cover sky-high, not to mention the real consequences to her reputation) it's not like she's sitting around, wringing her hands over it. The missing Sybil and heiress are the main driving force here. I suspect the blackmailer, who is unmasked at the end, is mainly tossed in to sow seeds for a future installment in this series, but that's a guess. Regardless, if felt wholly unnecessary to this story.

Quibble aside, I enjoyed this story and have plans to not only keep up with this series but read more by Harvey. It was a lot of fun, with good romantic chemistry, a compelling plot, and some light mystery elements tossed in for flavor. 

Final Grade = B

Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is October 16!

We're down to the last three months of 2024 (!) and our next #TBRChallenge Day is Wednesday, October 16.  This month's optional theme is Spooky (Gothic)

Gothic has been a suggestion on the last couple of annual theme polls and this year I decided to pull the trigger...sort of. I like the themes to be as expansive as possible to give participants a lot of options, so along with Gothic, I threw in the descriptor of "spooky."  Certain breeds (ha!) of paranormals, urban fantasy, romantic suspense, and yes, Gothic - let your Spooky Season flag fly this month! 

However, remember that the themes are totally optional. Life is hard enough as it is, maybe you just want some brain candy fluff this month. That's fine! Remember the themes are always optional. The goal is to read something, anything, out of your TBR.

It is certainly not too late to join the Challenge (to be honest it's never too late).  You can get more details and get links to the current list of participants on the #TBRChallenge 2024 Information Page.