Format in which I consumed this book: ebook on my kindle
Did I like it/love it/hate it? Liked it, but in a very mild way
What’s it about? Oh my god, I have got to stop attempting these reviews weeks after I’ve read the book. Here’s the best my memory can come up with:
This is a sequel to Earl’s Trip and the mmc is nicknamed Effie. In the first book, I thought there were very strong hints that he is gay. In this one, he likes a lady so I assumed wrong and he is bi.
Effie is not yet an earl because his father is still alive. He has daddy issues in that he can never seem to please his father. The lady he sets his sights on works as an editor of a magazine, so the fact that she and Effie are not of the same social and economic class is one of the barriers to their relationship. Oh yes, and I just remembered that Effie has been submitting poems to her magazine under a female alias. He and the editor (I’m sorry, I cannot remember her name) have been writing to each other and, through these letters, have become good friends.
Effie and his male friends go on their annual vacation. The lady friend, through her correspondence with fake female Effie, knows about the travel plans and decides to surprise her friend by showing up. This happens fairly early in the story, so the lady does end up knowing Effie is a man for a majority of the book. Here’s where my memory fails me, because obviously stuff happens once they meet irl, but all I can recall is that they end up together in the end.
My thoughts: This was ok. I’m not sure I actually enjoy the Victorian time period setting with modern day values and vocabulary. That may be why I didn’t like this one as much as the first book (although the first book definitely also had those things). When I read about that long-gone time period, I want to see yearning and true societal obstacles. This had so much of a modern day viewpoint I thought, well why is their class difference getting in the way? Obviously they’d just say screw you dad, and get married.
Would I recommend this to my sister? No, I don’t think she would enjoy it in an authentic way and it’s not dumb enough for us to joke about.
So that’s review #7 in the bag! I’m still about 7 or 8 reviews behind what I’ve already read this year. I’m off work today, so catching up is on my to-do list. Then I’m hoping that, going forward, writing immediately after finishing a book will prevent me from crashing out and I’ll actually complete my Cannonball goal this time. The added benefit will be I may actually remember what happened in the book!
