The Importance of Being Wicked is a romantic comedy of manners of the “you are everything I never knew I always wanted” variety. Victoria Alexander’s dialogue is wonderfully droll. I should have loved the book and yet it took me forever to get through. As my romance total climbs, I sometimes think I am losing interest in the genre, but the real issue is that it is taking better stories to claim my attention. Winfield Elliott, Viscount Stillwell, has been engaged and left at the altar three […]
The Valley of Mild Appreciation
My review of The Valley of Amazement is now up on my blog. I seem to be off to a slow start; in my defence I’ve been playing a lot of Skyrim – er, I mean, reading a footnoted non-fiction book which has slowed my reading down a lot but which I will review when I am finished. (Mainly Skyrim though. If I review books from Tamriel does that count? Because some of them are quite good.) Linky here:
A Lovely Meringue of a Romance
I regret returning The Sum of All Kisses to the library quickly, but I don’t want to buy my own copy. This tells me that while I enjoyed the book, it didn’t make a lasting impression If you are a historical romance fan, you already know who Julia Quinn is. If you are interested in trying historical romance, her Bridgerton series provides an excellent gateway. I use the words deft and witty every time I review one of her books because they are always apropos […]
In Which I Address My Intellectual Vulgarity
As someone who has been reading romance novels virtually non-stop for two years, I have a lot of feelings on the subject. As a successful writer in the genre, Maya Rodale has feelings and actual research on the subject. I purchased her thesis, Dangerous Books for Girls: The Bad Reputation of Romance Novels Explained, because I wanted to understand why this mass market genre is so consistently derided not only by readers, but also seemingly by the book industry as well. Many people read these books […]
It
If you can
A Feminist Treatise Wrapped in a Romance Novel
The Countess Conspiracy by Courtney Milan
The Countess Conspiracy made me cry. I have read scores romances in the past two years. I have laughed, swooned, scoffed, gasped, cackled, writhed, and sighed, but I have NEVER cried. What’s more, I did not cry over the romance, I cried over the gender politics. Once again, Courtney Milan has upended the tropes of the genre and crafted something tremendously entertaining that rises above the theoretical limitations she works within. Violet, Countess of Cambury, and her dearest friend, Sebastian Malheur, have been keeping secrets […]