Nov 22, 2020
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These 2 weeks got me reading 3 historical romances by Stella Riley. Actually I heard of her from trying to find books that was inspired by the Lymond chronicles. And that one of hers was the Marigold chain. But I found I'd like to read her other books first and the time period interest me. Starting from the English Civil Wars to ending at the Restoration of monarchy. So I read on according to the time line.
First, the Black Madonna. I got interested in the historical background of this enough to get myself some preliminary info from wikipedia. The plot at first was interesting. I was intrigued by the" falsely accused father got hanged in the past. The family fled peniless and the the son grew up determined to find the way And the means to prove his innocence and ger some revenge" trope. And then the Lymondness feels kept reemerging I thought I was mistaken. Wasn't it suppose to be the other book? Then reading on I started to get Lymond x Kate Civil War AUs vibe which irritates me not that I mind the pairing but because of the way it was written.
Then A Splendid Defiance which was a joy to read. Love it. I love the setting, the main characters. Even secondary character are done well. And the historical details was incorporated in the storyline seamlessly. There was just a tangible feels of lymond but not too obvious.
Then, the Marigold Chain which was such a tribute to the Lymond chronicles that almost every ten pages a direct quote from the LC had to be uttered in the dialogue. Even the main plot of marriage on paper. I'm not irritated with this one but laughed myself to silly at the blatant efforts. The Hero's background didn't even have the gravity to behave like Lymond at all and that Marigold thing was supposed to remind us of Will but it was used as an endearment for the "Philippa". The Hotel de vill banquet scene reenactment was painful to read down to the post banquet scene. Thank go there's no Marthe counter part in this. There's only "Jerott" counter part to muse over with the addition that he's also has a feeling for "Philippa"!!?? So I read this just to get some laugh out of the ridiculousness of Lymond tropes in a whole new setting.
Book rant
It’s amazing that Wintercombe/Herald of Joy were so good and A Fallen Star/Treason’s Gift so not.
Oh, the writing is still wonderful but my mind boggles how Pamela Belle could have created such relatable, loveable protagonists and such an amazing OTP in Silence and Nick in the former and such unpleasant, unrelatable protagonists and terrible OTP in Alex and Louise in the latter.
Like - I dislike Louise, who is shallow and self-absorbed and has about 1/10th of spine or maturity of Silence, but she is a paragon compared to Alex, who is a cruel, thoughtless, shallow, violent borderline alcoholic. When I am rooting for the bad guy to do him in, you are writing a romance wrong, Ms. Belle. Oh, and did I mention that in Treason’s Gift, Alex violently rapes Louise? Yeah, he beats and assaults his wife because he’s drunk and angry that she’s mad because he’s been having an affair with some random woman while she’s been depressed and slowly recovering from the death of their baby. YEAH, THAT’S THE HERO, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!
Did I mention she eventually forgives him and takes him back despite him doing precious little (though what would be enough?) to earn that?
I wanted to barf.
The fact that Belle killed off two of her wonderful characters from the previous duology (Nat and Patience) just to give Alex a backstory that still excuses nothing, is the cherry on top of the hideous sundae.
I think the contrast was made worst to me because I’ve been recently rereading Stella Riley’s The King’s Falcon, set roughly in the same time period, and having a similar violent terrifying rape of heroine in it, but there it is portrayed as a scene of utter horror done by a monster and is portrayed as such and the heroine does him in with a poker and the aftermath is portrayed as her slowly recovering from this unforgivable, monstrous event, not a little happening between main couple that can be overcome as a matter of course. It would no more occur to the hero of that novel to do something like that than it would to fly to the moon. Which is how it should be. UGH UGH UGH PAMELA BELLE I AM SO DISAPPOINTED IN YOU!!!!
Quote from "The Parfit Knight (Rockliffe Book 1)" by Stella Riley -
"when Lady Linton rose to go, she smiled absently upon her and said, ‘Dear child – I shall so enjoy chaperoning you! For with so much beauty – and not to mention the money – you are bound to be a success. I don’t suppose,’ she asked hopefully, ‘that you would like to marry Robert?’ And then, without waiting for Rosalind to reply, ‘But of course you wouldn’t. I am quite sure you have too much sense – and Lord Philip too, I expect. No one with sense would take Robert. I wouldn’t myself."
What a loving mother lol. Robert is a little shit though.
I decided to try to cleanse my palate in between courses of angsty fantasy doorstoppers by reading Stella Riley’s 18th century romance The Shadow Earl.
Hmmm.
Hmmmmmm.
It was neither particularly angsty nor in any way fantasy (except for so many hot aristocratic men in one place) or a door stopper. Unfortunately it was not particularly engaging either. It actually was my least favorite of all Riley novels.
I tend to strongly prefer her historical novels to her romances (there is a reason why I can tell you in detail about all her historicals but I barely remember most of her romances except for The Parfit Knight.) But even leaving that aside, this was just…adequate.
In fact, “adequate” is a perfect one word summary of this book - the plot, the characters, the romance.
The set up is simple. Christian Earl of Whatever disappeared on his Grand Tour and how he’s back years too late, to the shock of everyone including his loyal fiancée Sophia. He’s quite different now tho - woe, what befell him?
That set up could actually be delicious - ML processing trauma, FL processing whether she still loves this new iteration etc. But instead it’s adequate. Adequate adequate adequate.
Both Christian and Sophia are people it would be nice to chit chat with at a party. They would make lovely parents of your kid’s friend. But the problem is what is nice in RL is, more often than not, not particularly compelling in fiction. I would not want most of my favorite characters within five miles of me but god, I love reading about them. I mean I would pay any money not to have Francis Crawford of Lymond attend any event I am at but he’s my favorite fictional protagonist of all time.
Some of the issues are issues of my preferences for what I like to call “hothouse of emotion.” I can see how with a different writing style and different descriptions exactly the same characters and the same backstory would grab me. But while I love Riley’s restrained style in other books, in this story it doesn’t work to draw me in.
Some of the issues are my personal preferences about OTPs in general or how trauma is handled. It is frankly completely reasonable for Christian to react the way he did to what he went through and it’s perfectly reasonable for him to wonder if he even loves Sophia any more. But not only is my default when ML goes “I am not sure I love FL any longer” to go “well if you don’t ship yourself why would I?” (I need my MLs obsessive and codependent) but I am also under the disadvantage of coming to this pretty much straight after my Shatter Me reread and so I am going "oh, so you got to be a captive of some Turkish governor and made to teach his fam English and you never knew if you'd get to leave and also they gave you a tattoo you didn't want. That totally sucks. But you know, if Warner managed to not fall apart and never waiver in his love for Juliette after repeated mindwipes, non-stop abuse, her shooting him, her picking Adam over him, her breaking up with him, her being programmed to kill him etc etc, you can fucking BUCK UP!" I realize that's an insane standard but it is what it is.
Honestly, I don't really GET why FL is so into ML because we don't have enough of them for me to be invested. He's perfectly fine but nothing has demonstrated to me why he's worth five years of devotion (with majority of those years he's gone/believed dead) or never-ending patience when he comes back barely interested in chasing her. I love a good grovel or breakdown and this novel has neither.
All in all, if you want to read a good "traumatized ML and FL that is there/drags him out/blah blah," you are MUCH better off reading Anna Campbell's Captive of Sin or Grace Burrowes' The Captive or Suzanne Enoch's England's Perfect Hero or Meredith Duran's The Sins of Lord Lockwood or Duke of Shadows or Liz Carlyle's The Devil You Know or Judith James' Libertine's Kiss or half dozen other romances I can recommend. Hell, Riley's own The Player is a much better take on that trope.
Oh well, back to angsty fantasy doorstoppers.
I'm delighted to welcome Stella Riley and her new book, The Shadow Earl to the blog. HistoricalRomance #HistoricalMystery #BlogTour #The CoffeePotBookClub
I'm delighted to welcome Stella Riley and her new book, The Shadow Earl to the blog. HistoricalRomance #HistoricalMystery #BlogTour #The CoffeePotBookClub @RileyStella @cathiedunn @stellarileybooks @thecoffeepotbookclub
I’m delighted to welcome Stella Riley and her new book, The Shadow Earl to the blog. Read on for an excerpt. An incident between Messrs Selwyn & Shelbourne at the Cocoa Tree Club Daniel immediately noticed two things. Basil Selwyn and his idiotic friends sitting near the Hazard table … and a footman about to serve them a steaming bowl of punch. Opportunity and temptation coincided. One very…
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I'm delighted to welcome Stella Riley and her book, The Black Madonna, to the blog, where I'm sharing an excerpt TheBlackMadonna #EnglishCivilWar #Blog Tour #TheCoffeePotBookClub
I'm delighted to welcome Stella Riley and her book, The Black Madonna, to the blog, TheBlackMadonna #EnglishCivilWar #Blog Tour #TheCoffeePotBookClub #Historical Fiction #Historical Romance @RileyStella @cathiedunn @stellariley
Today, I’m sharing an excerpt from The Black Madonna, an English Civil War, historical romance. Kate and Eden visit Luciano del Santi … trailed by their younger brother who makes an unexpected discovery Giacomo beamed. ‘I tell Signor Luciano you are ’ere. ’E is in ’is workshop but for you ’e will come out. Scusi – momento!’ ‘Workshop?’ said Toby, on just the right note of appeal. Giacomo…
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Under a Dark Moon Virtual Book Tour
Under a Dark Moon Virtual Book Tour
Brandon Brothers, Book 1 Historical Romance, Historical Fiction Date Published: April 2021 Meet Adam Brandon … acutely intelligent and master-swordsman but gradually realising that he isn’t yet ready for the future he had previously planned. Victim of a cruel deception, Camilla Edgerton-Foxe has a jaundiced view of the male sex and a tongue as sharp as her wits … but she also possesses…
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