eyes.2c Reviews

Rules for Engaging the Earl (Widow Rukes #2) by   Janna MacGregor  ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Marriage of convenience trope given an interesting twist. Childhood friends reunite under strained circumstances. Constance Lysander had married a scoundrel who committed not bigamy but trigamy. Pregnant Constance needs a husband and friend Jonathan, Earl of Sykeston, agrees to marry her to legitimise her child. A decorated sharpshooter in the Napoleonic wars, Jonathan was  badly  injured and is very much a recluse. Alongside that he’s been unjustly accused, at this stage by the rumour mill, of action unbecoming a gentleman, very much against the military’s rules of conduct. Jonathan is loathe to marry but this is the friend he’s loved forever. Constance operates a ship building company and has her own worries. Neither is able to confide in the other. Unbeknownst to each  they’re facing a common enemy, and that plays havoc with the restoration of their relationship.  Their comin...

Highland Justice ( Sons   of Sinclair #3)   by Heather McCollum   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ All the right requirements here for a scintillating Highlands Historical Romance. 1550 Northern Coastlands o a Scotland. Brawny brother of the Sinclair highland chieftain, Gideon Sinclair, is one of four brothers, all trained by an unforgiving, maddened father, to be the Scottish equivalent of the four Horseman of the Apocalypse. Gideon is Justice. As their Aunt Merida tells them, ‘“You we’re all raised engulfed in his madness.”’ Only when Gideon’s unyielding exterior meets a fierce, feisty woman is he softened, and softened, and softened then some. And with the orphans Gideon fosters his heart slips a little more into buttery whimsey. Mind you Cait Mackay is no pushover, and the many talents she has are eye watering. I’m not even going to mention the fate of the bed! (Oops, I just did!) Oh! And these two might have to contend with King James, with treason and murder, and finding love. Enemy into L...

Crying Wolfe  (Goode Girls #5) by Kerrigan Byrne ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ A self made man, Elijah Wolfe, honed in the harsh Nevada desert and mining camps, travels to England to find something stolen from him. Rosalind Goode is a retiring young lady enamoured by the stars. Astronomical forays are her delight. However when she’s discovered in the American’s home it’s wedding bells for these two very reluctant parties. Each comes to appreciate the other, but it’s a merry chase and twisty battle. Wallflower meets conqueror in this timeless tale, only who is the conqueror is up for grabs. A lovely and lively romance as only Kerrigan Byrne can produce. An Xpresso Books ARC via NetGalley  (Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.)

A Perilous Perspective (Lady Darby Mystery #19) by Anna Lee Huber  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Gage and Kiera! How can I not be as equally as entranced with this 10th volume as I was with the beginning . Sebastian Gage and his wife Lady Kiera, along with their recently born daughter Emma, travel to Argyle, Scotland to be present for Kiera’s cousin Rye Mallory’s marriage to her friend Charlotte, Lady Stratford. The wedding is to take place at Kiera’s uncle’s estate,  Barbreck Manor on the shores of  Loch Craignish. It’s here that Kiera wi ll discover more about her mother, and her relatives from that side of her family in general. Kiera is entranced by the idea of spending time with her uncle, the Marquess of Barbrek’s reputable and vast collection of art works. Unsettlingly, she discovers some of the revered works in the Manor’s long galley are forgeries; capped off by finding the body of a maid in the gallery underneath a false Van Dyke.  (I was fascinated by the discussion of b...

The Good Wife of Bath   by  Karen Brooks  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ How could I not want to pursue this title? I love Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and the Wife of Bath was a particular favorite. Dare I say a post modern look at the Wife? Probably not, but this raucous tale  hits all the right notes, exploring the roles and expectations of and for women in the Middle Ages, and giving us an alternative story that fills in the “who” of the Wife of Bath. The Good Wife, Mistress Eleanor Cornfed is the protagonist. We see her story from her perspective, complete with five husbands. A keen wit keeps the novel moving along. Randomness and playfulness present opportunities. I kept thinking about previous novels I’ve read where women at these times have similar struggles and stories. I remember well Brooks’ The Lady Brewer of London. If you liked that, you will also like this. Yes, this is bawdy and the language is earthy, but the Anglo Saxon language has always had short four letter words. T...

Fierce Poison (Baker & Llewellyn #13) by  Will Thomas          ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Well the unrelenting action here had me on the edge of my seat and scratching my head. Truly a mind boggling maze that became even more complicated as I flipped each page. This time the two Victorian private investigators, Cyrus Baker and  Thomas Llewellyn  have become involved in a deadly game of cat and mouse with a clever and unscrupulous killer. When a potential client drops dead in their office from poisoning, and his last words to Baker are ‘Help me!’ Well you know that’s just what Baker and his partner Llewellyn will do, even if the great man Gladstone hadn’t subsequently asked them to investigate. Cyrus and Thomas, indeed their household and office employees become targets for this cold blooded maniac who had little regard for the collateral damage they inflicted. Finding the poisoner will challenge the pair in ways that cut to the quick. When the poisoner wa...

Shadow Fallen (Dream-Hunter #5) by  Sherrilyn Kenyon          ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I’m not sure if this is a Medieval historical romance wrapped in the banner of Fantasy o r an historical fantasy novel.  The gods at play in the human world with archangels and fallen angels, demons and their ilk running riot, and attempting to change the balance of power. It’s been sometime since I’ve read a fantasy where the pantheon of gods infect and infiltrate the historical world. The time is that of William the Conqueror. Valteri the Godless, is William’s half brother, a fearsome warrior, more berserker, and a tormented soul. Tormented as a child by the clerics in charge of him who saw his mismatched eyes as a sign of the demonic. Valteri has a dream of a blond woman in a battlefield. Prophetic. Ariel, is a daughter of the archangel Saint Michael and  “a Naşāru—a resolute warrior whose calling was to stay far from the mortal realm, where their licentiousness could ...

Three Debts Paid (Daniel Pitt #5)   by Anne Perry           ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Twitchy, very twitchy! Thrust and counter thrust deaths, with three victims! What do the deaths have in common? Daniel Pitt’s friend Ian Frobisher is investing the “Rainy-day Slasher” murders. (I do like Frobisher) Miriam fford Croft is the pathologist, Daniel is working on a completey different case. One sent to him via Frobisher. Wheels within wheels. So many question marks, and yet small somethings tinkle, and strike a slight discordant note, in the back of the mind as I read on. We start to see the events of the story from three sides. The plot lines are mostly seperate and any convergence is doubtful. Daniel, Miriam and Frobisher present aspects of the cases they are working on. Daniel is defending the actions of a Cambridge professor brought to trial over assault, connected to a grievance of plagiarism. Nicholas Wolford is gifted historian and orator whom Daniel admires. Danie...

One Last Chance (Chief Inspector Kalisz #12) by Jeffrey Siger  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ A tale of murder, deceit and drug company perfidy set in the Greek Isles, more particularly Ikaria. Maggie Sikestis, whizz assistant to Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis returns to the island of her birth for her grandmother’s funeral. Something is off. Maggie discovers that more than is probable of the island’s elderly, some over one hundred years old, have died, despite surviving Covid. All appear to have strange bruises. Something’s very wrong and Maggie is determined to discover what, despite a near death experience. Links will form from corrupt drug enforcement agents to international players. I wasn’t surprised by the revelation of the culprits. Despite that, this still made for a sturdy read.  A Poisoned Pen ARC via NetGalley 

Reputation: A Novel   by  Lex Croucher  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I puzzled over what sort of Regency romance I’d wandered into, but the life of Georgiana Ellers goes from a throughly uninspiring season sponsored by her aunt, to rackety doings with bored young things in a nanosecond. This was a delight. Austen like observations combine with commentary that both terrifies and stimulate. I kept waiting for George to come to her senses. I was both shocked and enamoured by her need to be more, her unusualness being led down a potentially ruinous path. Talk about  the “walk of shame”. This has it all. Like the Lost Boys, the lost wealthy children playing often vicious games come as a shock to Georgiana. The daring Frances Campbell—a style setter, both daring, friendly and vicious, hiding unhappiness by attacking. But then when you so want to be part of the “in” crowd, to move in these incandescent heights of society, you join in and dampen your conscience. Which is just what Georgiana d...

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ What a genius story! I laughed, I raged, I cringed, I teared up, I cheered, and I fell in love with Elizabeth Zott, truth seeker and brilliant research chemist at a time when women were given the proverbial pat on the head, or bottom, and sent to make coffee. Leaning towards being somewhat on the spectrum, Elizabeth is so focused on her research that she misses the social cues that if she gave them a thought, would cause her to be less.  I adored her daughter Mad and I can’t even begin to relate how I feel about the family dog Six-Thirty, a failed bomb sniffer canine, who is protective, intelligent and wise.  Elizabeth always expects that people (and animals—are not humans animals? a basic tenant that causes much trouble for Elizabeth) are able to “do” things. That extends to the audience of her unexpected job hosting a TV Cooking show (which Elizabeth translates as chemistry for her own understanding), daughter Mad who by five...