I’m usually not a big fan of marriage of convenience stories. Unless there is a very, very good reason given as to why the two participants in the scheme can’t be together for real, I end up shaking my head much of the time, over the drama that plays out when the couple falls in…
Publisher’s note: This book, an AAR top 100 romance from our last poll, has been re-released with extra bonus content. This review was originally published on August 12, 2018. One of my favorite things about the Top 100 Romances reader poll is all of the suggestions that come in. When I first started reading romance…
Martha Waters continues her Regency Vows series with To Swoon and to Spar, the story of Penvale and his uncle’s ward, Jane Spencer. There are a few moments of clunky writing that pulled me out of the story, but they were small; this is Waters’ best romance yet, and quite a cracking read. Peter, Viscount…
Marguerite Kaye consistently produces well-written, well-researched historical romances featuring characters and situations that are often quite different to those found in most other books in the genre. She’s as likely to write about non-aristocratic characters as otherwise, and although His Runaway Marchioness Returns does feature a titled hero, his situation in life – coming into…
It’s pretty much impossible for me to not love Scarlett Peckham. Her original plots and strong characters are my catnip, my raison d’être as a romance reader. Thus, The Portrait of a Duchess pleased me to no end. There are a few hinky spots here, but it’s still a great read. Cornelia Ludgate is an…
In Alyssa Everett’s Ruined by Rumor, Roxana Langley has been unofficially engaged to Major George Wyatt for five years. Her parents insisted the couple delay their wedding rather than Roxana following the drum, but the long wait is finally over. Roxana looks forward to George’s return and the official announcement of their betrothal, because she’s…
Mimi Matthews’ excellent The Belle of Belgrave Square is a romantic, well-researched and intriguing novel that adds a feather to the writer’s cap. Book-loving horsewoman Julia Wychwood prefers her solitude and horse riding to gossip and tea dates. Suffering from social anxiety which leaves her feeling frozen with fear, she doesn’t like the whirl of…
Well-known contemporary romance writer Adriana Herrera pens her first historical romance with A Caribbean Heiress in Paris, the story of an marriage of convenience between two ambitious, strong-willed people seeking to gain control of their lives. Caribbean-based Dominican/Scottish heiress Luz Alana Heith-Benzan is headed to the Exposition Universelle of 1889 in the hope of selling…
This third instalment in Martha Waters’ Regency Vows series is, I think, my favourite so far. It’s a charming marriage-of-convenience romance between two characters we’ve already met – the rakishly charming and somewhat scandalous Lord Julian Belfry and the very proper Lady Emily Turner. It’s a delightful read; the prose flows effortlessly, the characterisation is…
The final instalment of Vanessa Riley’s Rogues and Remarkable Women series, A Duke, the Spy, an Artist and a Lie suffers from and yet thrives upon the one thing that pushes the story forward: the utter inability of the hero and heroine to sit down and tell each other the truth. It’s the weakest of…
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