TBR Challenge: THE LAST CHANCE CHRISTMAS BALL

The topic of this month is Holiday Themes

Published: Oct-2015

Genre: Historical

My Rating: 5-3-2-2-3-3-4-4 stars

In December we have to choose something related to Holiday. And as it’s December an obvious book was this Christmas anthology.

It was in my TBR pile because, as I have already written here, Joanna Bourne is one of my favourite authors. And I bought it because of her story

As I said last year, I’m not a very Christmas person. I will not repeat myself, but the basic idea is that I cannot stand people feigning to care for me when they have ignored me the whole year. I prefer to spend my time and enjoy my good times with those precious and wonderful people that have shared the bad times I have gone through. And they do not usually belong to my family.

So I bought this Christmas anthology because of Joanna Bourne’s story, but I didn’t find the moment to read it until now. But, of course, the rest of the stories are written by great authors, and it shows. They are the Word Wenches: Mary Jo Putney, Jo Beverley, Joanna Bourne, Patricia Rice, Anne Gracie, Susan King, Cara Elliott, and Nicola Cornick. They are great. Even if they chose such a trite time as a Regency ball, they are so elegant; they still find interesting characters to make us fall in love. There is more talent in each one of these short stories than in the majority of historical novels I’ve recently read.

The interesting thing about this anthology is that it revolves around a Christmas Ball at Holbourne Abbey. It’s called the last chance because some people with no romantic relationship hope to find someone here.

It starts with Joanna Bourne’s My True Love Hath My Heart. Here you have Claire, a jeweller who has been cheated by a client and seeks revenge. In order to achieve that, she works as a maid in Holbourne Abbey. She discovers that Nick Lafford, a man she had a thing with, is a guest, and the sparkle between them has not vanished. I really enjoyed this one. She rejected him because of their different backgrounds, but he is quite an adventurous aristocrat, a diplomat who will live outside the formal English society. She will have her revenge and he will conquer her heart -again. 5 stars.

Then we have the story written by Susan King, A Scottish Carol. I really loved the beginning of this story. Here we have a doctor who teaches in University. Quite an absent-minded scientist, as he does not recognize that his best pupil is the woman he fell in love years ago, disguised as a man, as women were not allowed to study Medicine. Both of them are supposed to go to the ball, but then the snow starts falling and they are in a house all alone. Time to talk about themselves, their past and their future. It is solved in a very simple way, but precisely because of that it sounds so real. 3 stars.

The third one is Christmas Larks, by Patricia Rice. Ivo is a noble man who has fought in the war and likes painting. He goes to his home in town, suffering from nightmares. He does not know that the building has been bequeathed to Sarah, his childhood friend, in order to create an orphanage. They have loved each other forever but have not confessed their feelings, so they keep on pretending they are just friends. Well written, but quite boring, and in the end a little bit cheesy. I’m not very fond of novels ‘with children’. 2 stars.

Then, Mary Jo Putney explores the Beauty & the Beast topic with In the Bleak Midwinter. Kim, again a soldier with scars, lives in a tower and does not want to see anybody. Not even Roxanne, the woman he wanted to marry before the war. But she will not surrender without a fight, and before losing him forever, she wants to see him again and try to convince him that they can have a future together. Well written, nothing special and that uncomfortable view of the Napoleonic wars that is –well a little different from the History we are taught outside Britain 2 stars

Cara Elliott tells the story of people who loved each other a long time ago and now they meet again in the ball. It’s called Old Flames Dance and its main characters are Lily Tremaine, a widow that has lived in India for years and wants to see Edward, the man she loved in her youth, for a last time before settling in the South of England. Quite a lovely story of finding your true love again. 3 stars.

One of the main topics of these anthologies is ‘strangled marriage’. Here, it appears in Nicola Cornick’s A Season for Marriage. Lady Caroline Camden, Kim’s and Edward’s sister has been married for a few months. She loves her husband, but it looks as if he doesn’t love her. The last straw is that he is not going to pay the things she buys. So she decides to fly away and go to the ball. Alone. She expects her husband to react. The problem is that Piers Camden is afraid of love. He thinks that love is what destroyed his parents. Well done. 3 stars.

In Miss Finch and the Angel the late Jo Beverley told the story of a rake, Gabriel –handsome and charming- who falls for a quiet girl with a shady past, Miss Finch. I really enjoyed this one, even knowing how difficult it is to tell a believable love story in such a short format. They meet, they feel attracted to each other, they have some verbal skirmish, but will it last after Christmas? Yes, their happy ending is totally believable. 4 stars.

And last but not least, Anne Gracie and her Mistletoe Kisses. Alice is a woman certainly on the shelf. She has looked after her mother, then her father and the house and tenants... and now she has to leave everything because the house has been inherited by a cousin. She will go to work as a teacher in Bath. While having her last Christmas in her house, she gives refuge to a brother and a sister that have had an accident on the road. They have a happy Christmas time, with Mistletoe Kisses included, of course. I particularly loved the way the author resolved the problem of showing that their love is real and not something that comes with the unreal atmosphere of festivities and will melt with the snow. 4 stars.

I have written about short stories before. That it’s a format that usually works well if the couple knew each other beforehand, with the topic second chance at love in full swing. I still think the same, although, in this case, the two stories of people meeting and falling in love in very few days is convincing and charming.

One last thing, I have been reading quite disappointing historical books lately. Some were not very interesting stories. But other books have the problem of not been well-written. Here, in this anthology, I find stories that can be more or less of your liking and certainly nothing groundbreaking or particularly original, but the authors are great at their jobs, they know how to tell something in a very competent way.

This is the last TBR Challenge of this year. And although my English is not as good as it used to be, I’m ready to keep on doing the TBR Challenge in 2017. Hope to see you next year.

TBR Challenge: ‘IN SEARCH OF SCANDAL’, by Susanne Lord

The topic of this month is Historical

Read in kindle

Published: 2015

Genre: Historical / 1850

My Rating: 2 stars

Part of a series: London Explorers #1

This month I had a lot of books in which I could chose, there are so many historical novels on my Kindle! I decided this would be a good moment to give this book a try. It was in my TBR pile because Courtney Milan recommended it and it had a good price the moment I bought it.

Charlotte Baker is a young and accomplished girl in search of a husband in the Victorian society. Her parlour is always full of young men who want to be the chosen one. But she has to be careful, so she makes them tests in order to discover the one she can love and respect.

She’s got this crush on an explorer she has never met and whose adventures she follows on the papers. And suddenly, it comes a day when that man, Will Repton, appears at her house. It’s not another beau; he’s looking for her brother-in-law. He has come from Tibet and is ready to go back on a kind of rescue mission. He’s not interested in loving or marrying anyone. Even though Charlotte is very attractive and it’s lust at first sight.

Charlotte decides she wants to Will. So she persecutes him, relentless. Will resists her advances as the important thing for him is this new expedition. All this happens in a trite atmosphere of dances and social events you’ve seen many times.

It is not a plot-driven book but a character-driven story. It focuses on the characters -what they think, what they feel, what they say and they do not say.

The truth is that these two young people are nice and you kind of feel affection for them. But I must admit that around 20 % of the book I did not care too much what was happening to them. If I were one of those who usually DNF books, I would have left this one at that point. There were too many details about things I didn’t care. You could have told the same story in half the pages.

I’ve read other books recommended or mentioned by Courtney Milan, and it usually the experience is the same ‑ I can see what’s good in it, what they have in common with Milan’s work, but they lack her intensity or elegant style, so it’s not enough to maintain my interest.

Or maybe the problem is not in the book but me. These days I’m reading other kind of books and less romantic novels. When I pick up a romance I want it to be so special that I cannot stop reading it.

Or, at least, something different I haven’t seen before.

And here the scheme is something we’ve seen so many times! An adventurous man that has had a terrible experience and has nightmares, and walks through London houses in a broody mood. And then, the virginal girl who redeems him comes forward and, of course, she’s beautiful, charming, and very joyful. The only thing she wants is a good marriage, to help her family and at the same time she wants to marry for love. I’ve seen it many times and –that’s the thing- better done.

There’s quite a silly subplot of someone who turns to be a bad person and does something despicable, but it comes all of a sudden and it’s swiftly resolved and you ask yourself if that was just another way of having more pages in the book.

About the secondary characters, I had this feeling that they were the main characters in other novels, as if this one was the second or the third of a series. But I discovered that it’s not only the first of a series but also the first book published by the author. As a first novel, it’s surprisingly well written. The problem is that it didn’t left me wanting to keep on reading more books about this author.

It wants to be a deeply emotional book. And there are intense feelings and moving scenes, yes, but they are lost in a sea of irrelevant minutiae and details that make this, in the end, quite a boring novel. For me, this is.

This has been my experience and perhaps it’s because of the reading moment I’m living right now and there’s nothing wrong with the book. What’s that expression you use in the US? Your mileage may vary.

TBR Challenge: ‘DROP DEAD GORGEOUS, by Linda Howard

The topic of this month is Paranormal or Romantic Suspense

Published: 2006

Genre: Suspense

My Rating: 3 stars

Part of a series: Blair Mallory #2

This month I had to choose either a paranormal romance novel or a romantic suspense one. I bought this Linda Howard’s novel in a very interesting offer last summer, and it looked like a good option. Before reading it, I re-read To Die For, the first Blair Mallory book. And what happened was surprising - I liked it more the second time. I think it was because I knew now what to expect - more romantic comedy than suspense. Thanks to that, I could continue with this Drop Dead Gorgeous in a very natural way. I think if I had not done so, I would have been disappointed, as this does not look like anything else written by Linda Howard. It was as if she had decided to give chick lit a try.

Blair Mallory has to organize her wedding. This is a very difficult task to do if you want it to be perfect and with all the family around. Tired of waiting and wanting to start living together and have children just-now, Wyatt Bloodsworth gives her an ultimatum: they have to marry in a month or otherwise, they’ll marry as he says. This means that they could end in a tacky chapel in Las Vegas

But, of course, he is not going to give a hand. Everything has to be done by Blair.

So now she is quickly trying to organize decoration, flowers, shoes, clothing, catering, and wedding cake. Bridezilla at full speed!

To make matters worse, a crazy woman tries to hit her in the parking lot of a shopping center. And Blair receives disturbing calls. She thinks that someone is stalking her. Wyatt starts to think that Blair is a paranoid who just wants to get his attention. This causes another row between them. Again. The umpteenth.

That's basically the story,

... Blair as a victim of a stalker, Wyatt half believing her;

... A crazy Blair organizing the wedding, Wyatt indifferent to her efforts;

... Constant bickering between the two of them that will produce in the reader that guilty pleasure of seeing how funny is seeing other people angry with each other at the same time that they are crazy for each other.

I have to add that this book is pure sexism in the most literal sense. The underlying ideology is that men and women belong to different species. We do not speak the same language, nor value the same things, not even the food is the same to boys and girls!

I'm the opposite kind of person. I do not think that a woman has to love makeup, or wear high heels, or be obsessed with your appearance ... I do not see marriage as a struggle but as an adventure in which we are together, I’m not crazy for shoes (although I recognize some of them are real pieces of art) and I don’t give a damn about furniture or decoration ... and all those things about "weddings" I just find them absolutely ridiculous ... Therefore, for me, spending this time at the head of such a woman (yes she is the one from another species) I found it highly entertaining.

They are arguing all the time, and then reconciling with spectacular sex. But of course, there comes a time when her boyfriend is just too disrespectful and that makes her think. She demands a lot of attention from her partner; that’s something that Wyatt knew beforehand, and the reason why he didn’t want to be with her two years ago. However, Blair is still the same person, equally intense, does Wyatt realize it?

As she is a very clever woman, Blair begins to wonder if the marriage could work. Because love alone is not enough. There must be other things, such as liking and respect. She had thought that Wyatt was a person strong enough to endure everything that she does. But, what if he was really not ready to endure everything she does?

So, in the midst of trying to survive attacks on her life, Blair must find out if they can really have a future together.

I usually don’t like a first person novel. But in this case it worked for me because it seems funny to see things through the eyes of so bizarre a woman, she’s so funny and so different to me and to my world!

The general tone of the novel is romantic comedy with a touch of suspense. As I say, the prevailing idea is the battle of the sexes, so if you really think that women are from Venus and men from Mars, then you will be laughing all the time and all your prejudices will be confirmed.

My opinion, as I have said, is different. It has not been proved that we are psychologically different, and this “war of the sexes” sounds more to the invention of patriarchy to makes us not to require men to change their traditional gender role.

So you have to read this book with your feminist sensibility off, because if you cannot do that, you will end up throwing the book against the wall.

That’s the way this book is. Even from the first scene, when the discussion revolves around whether Blair has to change her name or not to marry him. I’ll never understand why women of other cultures accept to change their names name when they married. I have two surnames, one from each parent, and they are mine, this is who I am, and I don't change it if I marry. BTW, this has nothing to do with the book, but I think that our love for our own surnames is why we Spaniards usually know not only two family names but up to eight names! For me this obsession comes from the time when you had to prove you were an old Christian. Now it's something just plain fun, to realize the variety of sites from which you proceed. Of course, unless you're one of those obsessed with the purity of blood, they seek and scavenge to show that none of their eight family names comes from beyond the limes.

I read this book on paper, in a Spanish translation that was quite good, although the title had little to do with the original.