January 31st, 2010 — 4 Stars, Book Review, Cinderella, Comedy of Manners, Counts, Marquis, Viscounts, Estranged, Gambling, Georgette Heyer, Great Britain, Heiress, Regency, Virgin Heroine
The second Georgette Heyer novel that I read was a lot easier to get through. It helped that there was few if any references to my lord or my lady in the narrative. The diction used is as exacting and up there as Devil’s Cub. This novel was longer but I read it in less time devouring it with enthusiasm. I do have one question, when did the term Tom, Dick, and Harry first get used? Heyer used it in the novel and I thought it was a modern term not one that dated back to the Regency period.
In a single sentence Friday’s Child is a fantastic tale of a poor besotted girl and a rich spoiled Viscount. Lord Anthony Sherington, Sherry to his friends, is in a pickle. He has a few years left on his trust until he can access his money in full. Worse, both of the two uncles managing his estate are not doing so in his best interest; one is negligent and the other is pulling money aside to feather his cap. Sherry has gambling debts to pay and refuses to get another loan from loan sharks. His idea is to marry.
Of course Sherry goes after the Incomparable Beauty of the season, a girl from his past that he has known all his life who also happens to be an heiress. Sherry is just one of the men that float around the Incomparable, others vying for her affections include a Duke, a nasty man who disguises his true face underneath a mask of charm, and a volatile soul who also happens to be Sherry’s friend George. (George for his part loves Isabella, the Incomparable Beauty and tries his hardest to gain her affections throughout the book.)
When the Incomparable turns him down flat, Sherry in a fit of pique vows to marry the first girl he sees. That girl is the penniless Miss Hero Wantage. Hero has also known Sherry all her life and when she was younger she used to follow Sherry around and be his fetch and go girl. They marry in London through a special license with Sherry’s friends as witnesses. Sherry nicknames Hero and everyone starts to call her Kitten by this point.
Well Kitten gets into scrape after scrape not meaning to do so but unable to stop herself. She doesn’t know the rules of society having been bred as the poor relation in her cousin’s home with the idea she would become a governess. All of Sherry’s friends are sympathetic and watch out for her the best they can – Sherry too when he pays attention. Unfortunately for Kitten one scrape gets to be one too many and Sherry explodes causing her to run away. Will spoiled Sherry realize his mistake? Will he realize he loves having her in his life? Will he find her? Will his friends help him or Kitten, whom they adore?
In short I find Heyer’s Regency set tales quite unique – we should start a Heyer Book Club! She after all has written over fifty novels, it could be fun!
Rating: 4 Stars
Buy: Friday's Child
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Originally posted 2008-09-08 05:07:11. Republished by Blog Post Promoter
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December 29th, 2009 — 3.5 Stars, 4 Stars, Book Review, Comedy of Manners, Great Britain, Jane Austen, P-R, Regency
Abigail Reynolds writes Pemberley Variations. For the uninitiated this means that she takes the classic story of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice
and plays a what-if scenario. For instance in From Lambton to Longbourn the what-if is what if Darcy and Elizabeth disclosed their feelings before parting ways after Lydia’s fall from grace? The characters in this what-if scenario all bear the same names, and read fairly familiar, but ultimately are recreated and reintroduced. Attraction is played up and scenes Jane Austen would never write appear involving kissing – great kissing, but a staunch Austen fan will probably feel that even this small break in propriety is too much.
Elizabeth finds out to her dismay how deeply in love with Mr. Darcy she is when the news of Lydia’s foolishness breaks. How could she in all good consciousness expose his sister to her family? She worries a lot about Darcy’s good opinion of her and how the current affairs will certainly provide him with enough ammunition to dislike her from hereafter. To her surprise, Darcy is not at all inclined to think ill of her. He wants her to keep correspondence with his sister, Georgiana, as it his only way to communicate with her. He would marry her tomorrow, no today, if only he could be certain of her regard.
Some provocation on both their parts leads to them sharing their first kiss, part comfort, part passion. One kiss melds into the next and then the worst happens – Elizabeth’s aunt and uncle discover them! Elizabeth does not want to trick Darcy into a connection with her family and he is once again unsure of himself in her affections. This happens a lot actually throughout the novel as they go along their tangent journey toward love and ultimate happiness.
Their insecurities are a little over the top, but ultimately are not distracting from the tale. Reynolds has a way with words and I look forward to reading another Pemberley Variation soon.
Rating: 3.5-4 Stars
Buy: From Lambton to Longbourn: A Pride & Prejudice Variation
Originally posted 2008-12-04 09:22:49. Republished by Blog Post Promoter
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November 10th, 2009 — 4 Stars, Big Misunderstanding, Category, Comedy of Manners, Contemporary, G-I, Greece, Love Triangle, Mistaken Identity, Science, Teacher, Writer
This category romance would make a great farcical romantic comedy movie. Just keep reading and you’ll know what I mean.
The Bryants – Jane (heroine), Guy (brother)
The Dysons – Stuart (fiancé), Pauline (future sister-in-law)
Two pairs of brother and sister pretend to be married to each other in order to land a job on an archaeological site in Greece. The heroine is engaged to the brother of the other pair. Her future sister-in-law crushes hard on the site’s leading archaeologist. The dig boss and hero fights falling in love with the heroine. The only supposedly single man on the site falls hard for the future sister-in-law. The only one not romantically inclined is the brother of the heroine.
Sounds crazy? It was!
The hero, Dr. Nikolas Vallas, hates adulterers. He rides hard on the heroine, Jane Bryant, who he sees as the worse of the lot. Guy is either clueless to his wife’s behavior or doesn’t have the masculinity to reign her in or divorce her. Pauline is a creature to pity as she’s utterly clueless to her husband and best friend’s deception. Stuart is a cheating bastard. But Jane--- she takes the cake. She cheats on her husband, with her best friend’s husband, and the son of his long time friend, Tim.
Tim figures out the deception and what Nikolas perceives as more acts of adultery is in fact very innocent. Tim is using Jane as a sounding board for his attempts to win Pauline’s affections. Pauline however is mooning over Nikolas and doesn’t like Tim’s attention one bit. Jane meanwhile is reeling from something Tim said about love. He said something along the lines of “If you’re really in love, you couldn’t wait to be married.” Jane finds herself falling in love with a man who hates everything about her and seems to be falling in love with Pauline.
Petals Drifting is a very erroneous title for the plot. They’re there in the off season for tourists. It’s not fall. It’s more like spring. Anyway, the story is very tense, very quick, and solid. I devoured it.
Rating: 4 Stars
Buy: Petals Drifting
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October 2nd, 2009 — 3.5 Stars, Movie Reviews
I thought to start something new at RRN. I love romantic comedies and I have an entire collection of them so why not add movie reviews to the blog over the weekends as a refreshing break from novel reviews. Feel free to submit your own movie reviews at reviewromancenovel[@]yahoo[.]com.
The movie I've chosen to start us out recently came out on DVD. When I saw it in theaters I thought my best friend would just die! The heroine's name was her own and she had two beaus one a sexy NYC devil and the other a true Highlander, bagpipes and all. I was right!
Patrick Dempsey plays Tom Bailey the lovable schmoozer, who when in college invented the coffee collar and got into bed with the wrong girl. Hannah, played by Michelle Monaghan, is full of sass and her first act on finding Tom in her bed is to spray him with perfume right in the eyes. She follows the act by telling Tom that he's ugly in artistic terms and leaves him to her very drunk roommate.
After that it seems they were inseparable and the story picks up again at the start of a typical (Sun)day for them. Coffee, art, walk in central park, desserts at the best bakery in the city, oh and of course shopping for a wedding gift for another one of Tom's father's weddings... he's on five, six, seven? Both Tom and his father are very wealthy.
At the end of the wedding montage, Hannah announces the job offer to acquire paintings from Scotland. Tom urges her to accept and discovers that it'll be six Sundays before he'll see her again. We watch him bungle through them in mindless and sometimes desperate acts until he comes to the conclusion we as watchers have always known - he loves Hannah.
Unfortunately for Tom, he finds out the night he plans to tell her of his affections that she's going to marry someone else. This someone she met in Scotland and he's as perfect as any male can be. Poor Tom, how can he compete? To make matters worse Hannah asks Tom to be her maid of honor and that's when the story really kicks off and we discover if Tom is made of honor or selfishness. Can he love her enough to fight for her? Does he love her enough to let her go?
There were a few moments of ridiculousness that were over the top, the sex humor was funny and only a little gregarious, there was the obligatory bathroom scene in the male locker room but I laughed at it instead of thinking 'oh jeez, another one?' The chemistry between Dempsey and Monaghan was terrific and the whole cast was excellent. So pop the popcorn and kick up your heels to a Scottish tune and enjoy a night of tomfoolery - pun intended.
Rating: 3.5 Stars
Originally posted 2008-09-21 17:22:06. Republished by Blog Post Promoter
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August 10th, 2009 — 2.5 Stars, 3 Stars, Book Review, Gentry, Great Britain, Jane Austen, P-R, Regency, Virgin Heroine, Working with Land
I love the title of this book. It rolls off the tongue because of the alliteration and reminds me of Sense & Sensibility
by Jane Austen.
This Austen variation however is not about the lovely Misses Dashwoods, it is about Mr. Darcy and Miss Bennet from Pride and Prejudice.
As is the tradition of Reynold’s Pemberley Variations, Impulse and Initiative is seeded from one major difference between Austen’s original and this new telling. For Impulse and Initiative this difference is Mr. Darcy and his decision not to take Elizabeth’s rejection lying down.
He reveals early to Charles Bingley his mistakes regarding Jane Bennet and together they head off to Hertfordshire to win back the affections of their respective Misses Bennets. As is expected, Charles lands immediately back into the good graces of the Bennet family.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth battles her feelings throughout Darcy’s renewed and more obvious courtship. She constantly wavers between falling in love with him and worrying that she’s allowing his attentions for all the wrong reasons: gratitude, pleasure in being desired, and the vanity of winning such a man do not make for a good relationship (to which I agree with completely).
I confess her constant waffling during the first half of the novel grated on my nerves. Abigail Reynolds carefully brings the two together ensuring its relative believability, though I and my grinding teeth would have preferred one or two or ten different tactics throughout the course of the telling.
Truly I must be a glutton for agony because frankly I missed the pain of their separation and surety that both were lost to the other. It was another something that I&I lacked in my opinion. Of course they argued and had mini ‘Big Misunderstandings’ and fretted about and over each but it wasn’t the same.
I end with saying that I closed the book fairly satisfied despite my misgivings and that I&I filled my Jane Austen craving.
Rating: 2.5-3 Stars
Buy: Impulse & Initiative
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