eyes.2c Reviews

Booke of the Hidden  (Booke of the Hidden #1)     by Jeri Westerson                              This was so not what I expected. It was a crazy, wild ride and such a departure for Westerson. (And to think she dreamt about the major elements of the story--amazing--ah the subconscious!) A new entry into the urban paranormal genre complete with a mild mannered Wiccan group, a woman escaping a bad relationship who flees from California to Maine. Was she summoned or was it all just coincidence? Right! What do you do when you break down a brick wall in your new abode and find a musty old book. You open it and summon ... things that go beyond the wildest imagination for Kylie Strange. I loved the magical cross bow. I loved the demon (not quite the daemon lover of Scottish fame) or whatever Mr.  Erasmus  Dark might be. The quips  Kylie  directs at him are...

The Scandalous Flirt (Cinderella Sisterhood #6)   by  Olivia Drake                                So continues the exploits of an enchanted pair of shoes helping young women trapped in less than stellar circumstances. Lady Clarissa Milford is keeper of the shoes and  faerie godmother, bestowing these magical ' elegant dancing slippers ... fashioned of rich garnet silk and covered in tiny crystal beads that sparkled in the daylight ,' as she sees fit.  As Lady Milford explains, they must be returned when no longer needed. With half a mind to refuse charity of any sort, Rory tries the shoes on and ' Softness enveloped her feet as if the shoes had been stitched by a master cobbler expressly for her [she is] ... buoyed by an irresistible sense of lightness.' The shoes lure the person in it seems and then mould themselves almost parasitically to the wearer. Magical! Aurora...

The Bride Who Got Lucky ( The Bride Who Got Lucky (The Cavensham Heiresses #2)    by Janna MacGregor Oh my! I loved this. I adored the intelligent, stubborn Lady Emma Cavensham trying to find justice for her dead friend Lady Lena Eaton. I was smitten with the damaged the Earl of Somerton, Nicholas St. Mauer who had been alone and rejected from an early age. It was after a terrible encounter with his father at Eaton, that Alex Pembrooke interfered when Nick was being bullied by other students. This later becomes the doorway into to a relationship with Pembrooke and Emma's family.  Rejection by his father, Drake St. Mauer, the Duke of Renton, has put Nick onto the trajectory of  desiring to surpass his father’s wealth and to isolate himself from the hurt of meaningful relationships.  He has decided to not marry.  Nick focuses all his attention on the acquisition of wealth. He engages in trade to do with merchant ships and their cargoes,...

Belle: An Amish Retelling of Beauty and the Beast (An Amish Fairytale #1)    by Sarah Price                                      A rather fascinating story that explores the idea of love and marriage, duty and faith. Belle's father has driven the family finances into dun territory with his investments in continual failed schemes. At last it seems his 'griller' invention might be a way to break through. Alas his bad luck or serious miscalculation continues. The family is left destitute. Their property is bought by Adam Herschberger, the local recluse who has withdrawn from the Amish society due to people's responses to his scarred face. Many call him The Beast--as Belle notes, hardly the godly action of a faith community.  Belle goes to Adam to see if she can be his housekeeper in exchange for the family being able to continue to live in the house. Inste...

The Right Kind of Rogue (Playful Brides #8)    by Valerie Bowman                                 Really, by now the ladies of the ton should know better than to entertain Lucy Hunt's grand schemes relating to marriage.  'Lucy Hunt. The young, dashing Duchess of Claringdon was a favorite of the ton. She was rich. She was beautiful. She was outspoken. And she was master of planning plots' a lways a near disaster and with a generous helping of agonizing anticipation. Meg has loved her best friend Sarah's brother, Viscount Hart Highgate, since she was sixteen. Hart has decided to marry but his parents' example leaves him cold. There's no way Hart would even consider Meg, especially as they're parents have been at odds for years. With parents like these two have who needs enemies. Although he does have five good reasons to help Sarah find Meg a husband. Lucy H...

The Mongrel Mage (Saga of Recluse #19)   by L. E. Modesitt, Jr. I continue to find Modesitt's thesis on chaos and order absolutely fascinating. I have been a devotee of all of the Recluce series right from the very first release and I have never grown tired of them. Indeed I enjoy every fiction novel Modesitt has written. Truly talented, I am continually enthralled by, and addicted to, his work. As a supposedly White Mage and practitioner of the chaotic arts, and apprentice to his uncle, the White Mage Kaerylt, Beltur struggles to be a good enough magician. It seems he looks at things slightly differently from others. There is an order to his use of chaos, which is contrary to what is the norm. That use of order is hinted to him by the red-haired healer Margrena, a young healer he finds himself attracted to. When Kaerylt and Beltur are called to report before Denardre, Prefect of Gallos, they are attacked as they leave the Prefect's presence  by the Prefect...

The Highlander's Princess Bride  (The Improper Princesses #3)   by Vanessa Kelly What fun! I adored this foray into the life of another regency illegitimate Royal, this time Victoria Knight, daughter to the Prince Regent. Working as a governess for a respectable family should allay any concerns of safety and well being--one would think! However when the brother of your employer attempts to rape you, defending yourself is not only a marvellous idea, but absolutely necessary. The fact that said degenerate tumbled down the stairs and broke his neck doesn't mean you murdered him. Even though your employer's wife absolutely blames you. Well after all the scoundrel is Lady Welgate's brother. Such was the rude awakening from the dream of a fulfilling life, transitioning from respectable governess to setting up her own selective school that Victoria had. This scandal along with her birth would be the death knell to that dream. Sir Dominic Hunter and Aden St. Geor...

The Chilbury Ladies Choir     by Jennifer Ryan.                                                 Capturing the desperate times, the loss and grief that touched every corner of ' this sceptres isle.'   This novel really goes to the heart of things for women on the Homefront in WW2 England. There's the microcosm view of society through village life (as Miss Marple always says) The angry gentry in form of the Brigadier, the women of his household  bullied and fascinating whose lives and secrets are pivotal to the novel. Then there's the village nurse and the midwife, the black marketeers,  the requisite domineering lady of the village and a host of others.  There's the wonderful Miss  Prim who takes the village women from a subservient role of women knowing where their place is to one of active courage. There's spies and...

Bound to a Spy  (All the Queen's Spies #2) by  Sharon Cullen Rose Turner and Will Sheffield are  u nexpected characters. They are thrown together under fateful circumstances. Will, a spy for Queen Elizabeth I, is attending Mary, Queen of Scots' court, befriending the Queen's petulant and self-centered husband Darnley. He is keeping an eye on the various levels of simmering discontent and rumors swirling around the court as Mary and Darnley's son is about to be baptized. He doesn't expect a plot to murder the Earl of Darnley to be on the list of planned activities.  Rose is a reiver's daughter, a wild young lass more akin to the freedom of the outdoors than a stuffy rigid court. Her mother had been an attendant to Mary's mother. That's how Rose finds herself at court attending Mary, bearing her mother's high expectations of finding a husband and station in life. What Rose wants is to be back home with her family and animals. Which in a rou...

Dark Signal: A Kate Fox Novel ( A Kate Fox Mystery #2)   by  Shannon Baker                             There's a new sheriff in town. Kate Fox catches a trying case on the first day of the job. Death by train is not a common murder method but it looks like in this case it just might be so. Mind you she has to convince the railway authorities and the state police that this is more than a railway accident. This is the second in the series but it doesn't lose too much by starting here. Although there are family happenings that I am sure would be clearer if I'd read the first novel. The setting in the Nebraska hills adds to the sense of isolation and small community life. Don't be fooled by small town atmosphere , the 'shucks ma'am' images stepping right up against the 'school of hard knocks older women' are gems. Kate Fox might be new by but she sure isn't going to be fobbed off by the ...

Lady Charlotte's First Love   (The Sutherland Sisters #2)   by  Anna Bradley                             A Shakespearean tragedy if ever there was one. Enmeshed in the emotional harrowing web that pulls at Julian West and  Lady Charlotte Hadley  I found it hard to put this down. West returns from the war a broken man, followed by nightmares, and yet feted as a hero--a sobriquet he detests and knows in his inner being is a lie. Charlotte is a widow with devastating memories of her relationship with West, the blame she carries for her husband's death, and the betrayal she feels West dealt her. Charged by his cousin Cam who is Charlotte's brother-in-law, to to bring Charlotte home to her family, the last thing West wants to do is face down the troublesome, brittle marchioness. A woman who is constantly outraging the ton, cutting a swathe through high society with her equally o...

Caught by the Scot  (Made to Marry #1) by  Karen Hawkins                              Another ultimatum type story where the hero/protagonist must marry in order to secure his fortune. Unfortunately his target bride will not go quietly into the night! Miss Theodora Cumberbatch-Snowe  has always adored her brother's friend  Connor Douglas   but marriage to him would be that of a sometime bride as the dashing Scots privateer hied off on more adventures leaving her behind. Hence the idea to settle for the steadfast squire Lancelot Fox. He has little imagination and great expectations of a wife who knows her womanly place. He has forgotten to tell Theodora all this. Her answer to her Connor problem is an elopement. An elopement with mishaps, where the spurned suitor catches up with them.  Connor is about to have his comeuppance, delivered by that supposedly biddable y...

Duke of Desire (Maiden Lane #12)    by  Elizabeth Hoyt   As always I am in awe of the characters and situations Hoyt has created in the Maiden Lane series. An addictive collage of interweaving stories. The Duke of Desire is at once devastating and delicious, a Beauty and the Beast reflection that calls to the soul. Raphael de Chartres, the Duke of Dyemore carries scars that repel and attract. His emotions are bound by his past. Cynical, dark and damaged--he looms large. He  is a wonderful contrast to the intelligent  and stubborn Iris. Raphael has set out to destroy the Lords of Chaos. He had been introduced to Lords' depravity as a child when his father lead the group. A happenstance that has left him seared to his very being. He fled England and has just now returned. He is pursuing the hunt when fate intervenes and Raphael, having infiltrated the group, finds himself at a hellish  bacchanalia with Lady Iris Jordan  being served up...

A Hunt in Winter (A Joe Swallow Mystery #3)   by Conor Brady 1888 'Detective Sergeant Joe Swallow (now promoted to detective inspector)' is faced with the  murders of three young women sending the residents of Dublin into a frantic state of fear and panic. Are the murders linked or not? Is this a Jack the Ripper copycat or has the Ripper come across the Irish Sea? Swallow is part of the Dublin G-Dividion. 'Fifty-odd detectives investigated crime across the city, and were also the administration’s first and principal bulwark against political subversion. Their responsibilities ran from protecting the chief men who governed Ireland for the Crown to keeping watch on Fenians ... and the ever-multiplying groups that wanted, for one reason or another, to overthrow the established order.' At this moment the G-Men are needed to come up with answers to the murders. Not be diverted by the wishes of the whose sole motivation is to keep tabs on various Irish group...

The Highlander Is All That (Untamed Highlander #4) by Sabrina York                            What a giddy, hilarious bunch of young women are the St Claire sisters. I loved them and their quasi dragon Aunt Esmerelda, a powerful member of the ton. And it's into this household two Scots are sent by the Duke of Caithness to stand in for him and chaperone his cousins during their London season. Well all that 'standing in' doesn't quite go to plan.  Elizabeth St. Claire is enchanted by the idea of all things to do with the Highlands and when Hamish Robb arrives she attracted to him from the very first greeting. The thing is Hamish feels he can't betray the Duke and that he's not wealthy enough for Elizabeth. A conundrum! Elizabeth is not in agreement with Hamish's sentiments. And then of course there's Ann, Victoria and Mary! Each has a storyline that plays out quite delightfully. There ...

Death in St. Petersburg: A Lady Emily Mystery (Lady Emily Mysteries #12)        by Tasha Alexander.    St Petersburg in January 1900 before the Russian Revolution. Alexander's walk through this fabulous city is  charged, exciting and wonderfully descriptive. Lady Emily Hargreaves is once again up to her fur hat in a murder. And no ordinary murder. Right after her sensational debut of Odette/Odile in Swan Lake the soloist, Irusya (Irina Semenova Nemetseva), is found outside the stage door, face down in the snow dead, bejewelled in her own blood. Then there's the mysterious, ghostly dancer who appears dressed as the dead ballerina flaunting a silken red scarf symbolic of the death Nemetseva met, captivating the populace and muddying the waters of Lady Emily's investigations. Because, of course Emily is right in the thick of things, murder, Revolution, threats to Tsar Alexander, all grist for the mill. And then there's the dele...

The Duke of Danger     (The Untouchables #6)     by Darcy Burke                            Not a sentiment to encourage love and romance. But when  Lionel Maitland, Marquess of Axbridge, kills Lady Emmaline Townsend's husband in a duel she finds that her husband has left her nothing but debts. The 'Duke of Danger', an unfair label given  Lionel by  the 'wallflower' young women  before they became more intimate with some of that group. To be fair they do wince when those nicknames are now mentioned in their presence, Lionel has an unfortunate reputation for duelling. His opponents end up dead. Hence his  sobriquet. Those deaths  haunts him . He is a man of honor and each death eats into his soul. His latest victim,  Viscount Geoffrey Townsand,  is the husband of  Lady Emmaline Townsend. Unfortunately Townsend's wound turned septic, he...

The Scotsman Who Saved Me (Seven Brides for Seven Scotsmen #1)   by  Hannah Howell.   The story begins in the Arkansas Ozarks in 1860. The MacEnroy brothers come across a burnt cabin, dead bodies and two survivors Lady Emily Stanton and her nephew Ned, hidden in a tunnel in the root cellar. The events go on from here. There were some amusing parts. Iain's wooing attempts of Emily for one. The 'shagging' discussion was particularly noteable. (I did investigate to see if that word was in use in these times and apparently it was. Check the Merriam-Webster Dictionary) I liked Iain MacEnroy, I Emily Stanton. There's a batch of interesting secondary characters in this story who stand out. I really liked Mrs. O’Neal and Mabel who was happy to shoot a nasty character if Emily wanted her too. There's a dastardly cousin Albert hunting down Emily and her nephew Ned. There's a nefarious Bank Manager trying to take the MacEnroy's dow...

The Rogue's Conquest (The Townsends #2)     by  Lily Maxton.                                Half way through reading Rogue's Conquest I realized I'd been smiling the whole time. How good is that! I was obviously enjoying this light hearted story with an intelligent wallflower heroine, whose interest in beetles surpasses all else and does rather take her into some stuffy, closed-to-women places. Albeit that  Eleanor Townsend ends up in that place  presenting her paper as a man. Whatever, when means must! Of course Eleanor's sister Georgina must take some of the blame. After all she's the one who suggested Eleanor only need disguise herself as a man (one Cecil Townsend) to present her paper on the mating habits of stag beetles to the Natural History Society. When Eleanor asked Georgina why she was helping her, Georgina delightfully threw out the line, 'You know ...

The Scot Beds His Wife  (Victorian Rebels #5)     by Kerrigan Byrne Complex situations, begat by desperation, lies, bad choices, childhood abuse and oh so many other factors dog the pages in this very different story in the Victorian Rebels series. I keep thinking Annie Oakley meets a Scots Celtic god, whose soul holds close hidden horrors a la Dorian Gray. Gavin St. James, Earl of Thorne's emotional burdens weigh him down.  Although there is no painting in the attic, Gavin has suppressed regrets and terrible memories, that he's spent a life time attempting to forget by cutting a path through the bedrooms of the rich and needy using his exceptional charm. Samantha Masters was part of a gang including her husband and his brother who are train robbers. This time the robbery goes awry and in the ensuing confusion and aftermath Sam commits murder and exchanges places with an heiress, Alison Ross, and flees to the Highlands, having taken on Alison's p...