Blame it on Bath: The Truth about the Duke

The second in Caroline Linden's new Truth about the Duke series, Blame it on Bath is the story of Lord Captain Gerard de Lacey, the youngest offspring of the late Duke of Durham. All three ducal sons  are entangled in what has come to be known as the Durham Dilemma, a situation which may find all three declared bastards and destitute. Each brother sets off on a mission to find and dismiss the rumor that their parents' marriage was illegal and their father was a bigamist.  Edward, the middle de Lacey, had his story told in the recently reviewed, One Night in London. 

Gerard is home on bereavement leave from the Peninsula Wars, and is determined to use his time to track down the blackmailer threatening his family and his livelihood. He finds himself propositioned into marriage by the widow Lady Katherine Howe. A merchant's daughter who married a viscount, Katherine is starved for attention and affection and finds herself still in love with Gerard, years after a chance encounter on a rainy country road.  She needs this marriage in order to extricate herself from the expectation of a match to her dead husband's heir. Lacking any self-confidence, Kate sees Gerard as her ticket out of the quandary heavily promoted by her formidable mother. Fortunately for her, Gerard needs an heiress to marry in order to guarantee his income should the Durham Dilemma resolve itself against the De Lacey's. And so, after much thought, he agrees to the marriage.

I loved this book because Gerard himself is so very lovable. He's the quintessential romance hero. Despite an arranged marriage, he tries to make a go of it and when faced with Kate's insecurity complex, he takes his time to coax her (both in bed and out) from her shell. She begins to truly believe in herself for the first time in her life and in return, earns Gerard's love for herself as well.  The blackmail story becomes the backdrop for this beautiful love story set in Bath.

Blame it on Bath is out on February 28, 2011. I look forward to reading elder brother and heir, Charles' story. I've found that this novel is incrementally better than the previous one. If that continues to be the case,  the last in this series will surely not disappoint, especially since Charles has the furthest to go to redemption.

The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae by Stephanie Laurens

Congratulations are in order. I am the owner of a brand new Kindle Touch. And to christen my latest bundle of technological joy, I immediately downloaded an advanced readers’ copy of Stephanie Laurens’ The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae. This is the third novel in the Cynster Sisters Triology and, as usual, Ms. Laurens delivers. Get ready, romance lovers. We have another winner.

The fun begins at a ton ball where a split second decision to act by the desperate Dominic Lachlan Guisachan, eighth Earl of Glencrae, changes the course of Angelica Cynster’s privileged, if somewhat mundane life. But the Scottish earl’s reputation as a dastardly villain does not accurately reflect this gentleman’s true nature; there is more to the story than meets the eye, for Angelica’s mother and Dominic’s father share a history – a history that the current Countess of Glencrae is none too happy about.  Irrationally jealous, Dominic’s mother steals a precious artifact – a goblet earmarked to be the financial salvation of the clan – and sets a ransom for its return. Dominic must deliver to her a Cynster, specifically a ruined Cynster. Then and only then will she hand over the goblet.  Dominic’s first two attempts at abduction (In Pursuit of Eliza Cynster and Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue) end in failure, but the third is the charm as Angelica turns out to be more cooperative than Dominic could have hoped. But Angelica has her own motives for assisting. She’s convinced Dominic is her hero, her one and only true love, and it’s just a matter of time before he reciprocates in kind.

Every book in Ms. Laurens’ Cynster series is well written with engaging protagonists in truly sigh-worthy romances.  The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae, the latest and perhaps my favorite of all, does the franchise proud.

The American Heiress, by Daisy Goodwin

Just before the beginning of the 20th century- The Gilded Age-when machines were installed into cotton mills, and the railroads made a trip take a quarter of the time it would have in a horse-drawn carriage, American heiresses were sought after by the English aristocracy to shore up their long suffering estates.  The American Heiress is the story of Cora Cash, daughter of a multi-millionaire, whose mother has but one goal in mind- a title for her daughter.  Cora was raised surrounded by the finer things in life, and with the knowledge that her mother would stop at nothing to gain the social standing she craved.  After a fiery spectacle at Cora's coming out ball in New York, she and her mother make the trip across the Atlantic on their own steamer to find Cora a husband.  Mrs. Cash, relentless in her pursuit, but knowing no one in England, pays for the services of a well to do woman to introduce them into ton society.

Cora is not the typical heiress; for while being raised in luxury, the one thing she wants the most is to be out from under her mother's rule.  An accomplished horsewoman, Cora is riding the hunt with her host and becomes lost in the woods.  After a run in with a branch, where she is knocked unconscious, our heroine is rescued by Ivo, the Duke of Wareham.  For her mother, a more perfect suitor could not be found, and within two days of her stay at Lulworth, Cora is engaged to Ivo.  It's no secret the Wareham dukedom is in need of funds, as the run down state of Lulworth suggests.  Old English aristocracy and new American money collide as Ivo and his mother (a double duchess to boot) make the trip to New York for the wedding.  Ivo is repulsed by everything in American society: the vulgarity, the money, the excesses that define American society during the latter 1800's.  Upon Cora and Ivo's return to England, Cora, the novice of ton society, is basically left to the wolves to fend for herself.  Ivo, while loving, is preoccupied with taking his seat in the Lords, and fighting off a lover from his past.  Cora's missteps are celebrated by her mother-in-law, and instead of helping, Ivo and his mother make matters worse for Cora.  Banished to Lulworth due to her pregnancy, Cora spends months and months alone at an estate she does not truly have control over, while Ivo is off accompanying Prince Eddy in India, and shaking off his embarrassment caused by his wife.

Ivo is not a hero that is easy to like, and indeed, I hated him at many points in the book.  On the surface, Cora seems to be a spoiled heiress, but you quickly realize there is more to her than money.  She married Ivo for love, and despite his faults, in the end, he becomes likable.  The entire book is a wonderful example of the Gilded Age, where excess was the way of society in America.  Goodwin does an excellent job at getting each and every detail of this excess perfect, and you get a true feel for what it must have been like during this time in American history.  A wonderful read about a time long past.

Trouble at the Wedding: Abandoned at the Altar by Laura Lee Guhrke

At the turn of the last century, it seemed American heiresses with money to burn and British peers with a burning need for that money, married. Ms. Annabel Wheaton, a Southern heiress whose fortune originated in her daddy's gold strikes, finds herself in this situation. But to her, marriage to a peer is a way to finally be accepted after a hardscrabble upbringing in the backwaters of Mississippi. As the novel opens, she is set to marry Bernard Alastair, the fourth Earl of Rumsford. But as fate (and historical romances) would have it, a monkey wrench in the form of Christian Du Quesne (pronounced DuCane, thank you very much), the Duke of Scarborough, appears. The ensuing love story is typical of Laura Lee Guhrke's writing. That is to say, it's full of romance, reforming rakes and hot nights in interesting locations. Trouble at the Wedding, another offering in the Abandoned at the Altar series, does not disappoint.

Christian, dead set against remarrying and a confirmed rake to boot, is asked by Annabel's Uncle Arthur to put a stop to her shipboard wedding to the Earl. Christian complies as a way to earn a good deal of money and assuage his guilty conscience over the death of his own American heiress wife 15 years before. The doubts Christian plants in Annabel's mind regarding life as a member of the British ton are  far-fetched, but they begin to take hold. Annabel starts to have serious doubts about her impending marriage. After a scene innocently reminiscent of that famous cargo hold scene in Titanic, The Movie, Christian stands up at Annabel's wedding and declares (loudly) that he knows why these two cannot be joined together. When the entire wedding guest list assumes Christian has compromised the bride before her wedding to another man, Annabel hatches a plot to save her reputation and to avoid marrying a very reluctant Christian. She appoints him to be one of her guardians and a trustee of her fortune, thereby explaining his performance at the wedding in an entirely different way.  The plot then moves to London, where the two of them become closer than any guardian and ward should be.

Trouble at the Wedding is a fun romp through Edwardian England seen through a Southern belle's eyes. The requisite rake is reformed and redeemed through an unexpected love, and a girl looking for acceptance finally finds it in the arms of a man who she never expected could love her back. All in all, like all of Laura Lee Guhrke's novels, it's a wonderful ending to an utterly endearing story. Due out on January 1, 2012.

How The Marquess Was Won, by Julie Anne Long

It makes sense that as a huge fan of historical romances, there are a few novelists I gravitate to naturally. But there are only two authors in that genre who I’m willing to bet will never disappoint.  One is Grace Burrowes and the other is Julie Anne Long. Ms. Long’s newest novel, How the Marquess Was Won: Pennyroyal Green Series, proves my point yet again. Her voice is unique, sophisticated and polished - consistently so. So when opportunity knocked, I answered with alacrity and found an advanced reader’s copy of Marquess in my hands.  Sometimes, things just cannot get any better.

Ms. Long starts the story almost at the end – an intriguing way to begin. We find Julian Spenser, Marquess Dryden, bleeding from a gunshot wound and professing a most uncharacteristic and unfortunately for him, unrequited love as Colin and Chase Eversea (of the infamous Eversea family, subjects of the author’s other Pennyroyal books) tend to his wound.  This scene does exactly what it is intended to do – we are now insatiably curious and want to know with whom Lord Ice (as this particular haughty member of the aristocracy is also known) has fallen in love and why he sounds as if his world has ended (bullet hole in his shoulder notwithstanding).  Chapter Two takes us to a time six weeks earlier, before he's even aware of the woman responsible for his current heartache.

But Phoebe Vale is certainly aware of him. Marquess Dryden is a frequent topic of the London broadsheets Phoebe devours when she isn’t teaching Latin, Greek and French history to potentially problematic young ladies in Miss Marietta Endicott’s Academy. Through the spectacular stories in the broadsheets, Phoebe knows Lord Ice is the current trendsetter – the man everyone emulates – a cool, calculating customer and a very wealthy member of the aristocracy. And it seems he is now in the market for a wife.  His life, and the comings and goings of others like him, fascinate Phoebe, but she understands her place in the world. Once a charity student at the academy, Phoebe is in an entirely different social sphere. She is also alone, but for Miss Endicott and her students, and has recently made a life changing decision that will take her far from Pennyroyal Green. 

But before Phoebe can pack her bags, a series of events throws her in the path of Lord Ice. This string of circumstance provides the framework for an enticing tug of war between a reluctant Phoebe and an extremely determined Julian.  Eventually, we are led to an astonishingly satisfying ending (the continuation of the first chapter). But I will leave the delicious particulars of this journey for you to discover for yourself.  As in What I Did for a Duke (reviewed February 22, 2011), Ms. Long infuses this solid story with crisp narrative, lovely dialog, subtle humor and plenty of heart. Her track record with me remains unbroken. How the Marquess Was Won is a clear winner.