When Kelly’s family emails to let her know that ex-football star Seth Ralston is a special guest of her grandmother, and that while he’s staying he’s been kind enough to help out with the family’s finances, Kelly is furious and immediately hops on a plane to go home for the first time in 8 years.  Kelly’s parents died when she was very young and she was raised in her grandmother’s household with the help of assorted aunts and uncles and eccentric staff.   Grandmother is a famous actress (oblique references to a rivalry with Elizabeth Taylor), one uncle a famous painter, the other a famous violinist, one aunt a famous singer and the other a former animal tamer who has two pet tigers.  Kelly has been gone for so long because she took over running the family finances and schedules at 12 (or something, can’t be bothered to look that up) and it was just too much.  But really, we discover, she felt like the ugly duckling in a family of swans (which is a totally inaccurate application of that story, since the whole point is that the ugly duckling was really a cygnet raised by ducks, rather than a duck raised by swans but whatever).

Kelly runs into Seth as soon as she drives onto the island (because, of course, the family has a private island).  The two have words, she as good as tells him that she’s here to catch him fleecing her family and he puts her down for abandoning her family for so long.  Obviously they are in love!  The family is thrilled to see Kelly and fairly quickly it becomes evident that Seth is not up to anything shady and that the fam is trying to throw the two of them together in romantic situations.   Seth and Kelly call a truce and decide to fake interest in each other in order to keep the relatives from coming up with crazier and crazier schemes to get the two of them together.

Oh, Seth’s baggage. He was injured and can no longer play pro ball (like how I know the lingo?) and was offered a job as a sportscaster but turned it down.  This prompted his wife to divorce him and she’s now claiming that he’s an unfit father for their two kids.  But then she calls and asks him to keep them for two weeks while she’s in Europe. Oh, and he’s a sculptor and training for a doctorate in psychology.  Okay, we get it.  He’s strong, smart and sensitive.

Anyway, the two rapidly fall for each other, but each holds back due to the other’s “issues”, only to go from “we’ll part forever” to “lets wake up the kids and tell them they have a new step-mom!” in about 15 pages.

In my opinion, the best part of the book was Kelly’s family, which we had far too little of.  Only the Grandmother and tiger-owning aunt were really developed.  The story of Kelly growing up in that house would have been more entertaining.

I think I checked this out because I happened on the author’s blog, although I can’t be sure now.  And, despite some overwrought phrases and language in the sections about the past, it’s good.

Konstantine sold his soul, and those of his decendants, to the devil in exchange for the power to change into the form of an animal, heal quickly and so on.  The devil took his family’s icon, four images of the Madonna, to seal the deal.  Fearing treachery he broke the painting into 4 pieces and scattered them to the four corners of the earth.  Now it is up to 4 brothers, the sons of the only man to ever break with family tradition and settle down with one woman for life, to break the curse.

Obviously, there was a lot of world-building to get done in this book, but Dodd handles it fairly well, although some of it is a little overblown.   This book focuses on Jasha Wilder, the eldest son who owns a winery near his family home and his assistant, Ann Smith.  Ann is an orphan, raised in a Catholic orphanage, and I found her story quite intriguing, as we are given tantalizing little tastes of who she is and don’t get the full picture until the end (actually, I have the feeling we don’t get the full picture even then, but all the pieces we’ve got so far come together).  Her reactions to finding out that the boss she’s been half in love with for the past several years can turn into a wolf ring true.  I was drawn into the world, but probably could have walked away from the series, if it weren’t for the final paragraph which is a teasing tease of teasing and virtually guarantees I’ll look up the next one soon.

Mercedes Thompsan, Volkswagen mechanic and walker (kind of a Native American shaman able to change into a coyote at will) has a way of finding trouble.   And when a young werewolf comes to her shop, looking for work, trouble finds her.  Mercy was brought up by werewolves, has a pack Alpha for a neighbor and understands most things about them.   But she isn’t really a part of their world and isn’t really a match for them in a fight.  That doesn’t stop her when the young wolf is attacked in front of her.  Slowly she and her allies discover a plot that could put all of them in danger.

Blood Bound by Patricia Briggs

Mercy’s back, and she owes the vampires a favor.  This can’t be good.

I really hate to say too much about the plot of these books, since the suspense is important and you put the clues together right  along with Mercy.  Briggs does  an amazing job of world building, blending what we all “know” about werewolves, vampires and fae into a creation all her own.  I really appreciate that, unlike some recent authors, she doesn’t shy away from the predatory nature of all three (four, if you count that Mercy herself doesn’t fall into any of these categories) or make them super, super special in some way.  I suppose that’s a bit vague, but, for example, not all the werewolves (or vampires or fae, for that matter) are devastatingly beautiful (although all the male leads are).  And physical imperfections do not automatically imply that the person (or whatever) is any more evil than the others of it’s kind.

I actually read the third and fourth of this series some time ago and while I can’t remember all the details they were also very good.  I think the fourth may be my favorite.

When Caddie Winger’s grandmother insists that she wants to move into nearby Wake house until her broken leg heals Caddie never imagines that it will change the rest of her life.  There she meets Magill, a young man struggling to recover after a devastating sky-diving accident, Thea, more vital in her sixties than Caddie feels at 32 and a host of other colorful characters (naturally).  When her dog bites Thea, Caddie is inspired to seek training for him and meets handsome (and normal) Christopher and rapidly falls head over heels.  But are her feelings real?  Or is she destined to bring about her own downfall yet again?

Bleh.  Perhaps the reason I didn’t care for this book was the fact that I was in a foul mood when I read it, but it just didn’t sit well with me.  The majority of the plot was evident from the very beginning of the novel, the various tragedies felt forced and, despite the meandering pace to get there, the ending was way too fast.  There may as well have been notes in the margin indicating that  Christopher wasn’t going to work out (sorry if I just ruined the novel for you).

Tomboy and Highland orphan Catriona Kincaid accidentally intrudes on her cousin’s romantic interlude with the dangerously handsome Sir Simon Wescott of Her Majesty’s Navy.  Years later, he’s in debtor’s prison and she proposes marriage to him, as a means for both of them to get what they want.  He’ll get out of prison and she’ll be able to save her ancestral lands from her cousin’s wicked ex-fiance (yes, the same cousin.  This girl really gets around).  Then, they’ll have the marriage annulled and go on with their lives.  When they arrive at the ruined castle in Scotland, things don’t work out the way Catriona expected.  What with one thing and another they fall in love.

Okay, I had a few problems with this novel.  The most obvious is the fact that I continually read the heroine’s name as Catatonic.  The second, and more egregious, is that when she visits Simon in prison she sits on a three-legged stool which totters and nearly falls.  A three-legged stool will not totter.  If one leg is shorter than the other two it will sit at a slant, but it will not totter.  Three points determine a plane, a triangle is the strongest shape you can make.  All you have to do is give the stool a fourth leg and I will believe it, but a three-legged stool tottering will spoil the novel for me*.  If you, gentle reader, are not so particular about geometry perhaps you will like it better than I did.

*Look, I realize that perhaps this seems overly critical and that perhaps it is the sort of thing that most people no longer know, but it is ingrained deeply enough in me that I cannot let it go.  I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.  And frankly someone should have caught this.

This novel has managed to shoot to my favorites list after just one read.

Ruck, an English knight has agreed to accompany his wife on a pilgrimage.  He’s been on Crusade for some time and returned to find her having visions regularly and refusing to sleep with him.  When she is singled out by the Bishop to be brought into a convent he looses everything, literally.  She’s pledged every cent he has as well as his horse and armor.  But the mysterious lady who accused him of lust (thereby preventing him from joining the monastery, which would be the usual order of things) sends him two emeralds and the message that he should leave and never come back.  He vows to serve her as he continues to quest to regain his name (although we don’t know everything about that at this point).  Thirteen years later, Ruck is a trusted knight of the Duke of Lancaster (the king’s spare) when his path again crosses that of his lady.  Now he must risk everything to keep her safe, but she has dangerous secrets that might keep them apart forever.

Reading the first few pages of the prolouge I was prepared to hate this book.  There’s a lot of dialogue there, hit sy Ye Olde English gewrit.  Yeah.  (Well, not that bad, really.  But I have a tendency toward the dramatic).   But things pick up dramatically in the first chapter and the Old English is used sparingly and to good effect (I think it may help that much of the dialogue isn’t in English) (I was also really, really impressed to find out that Kinsale worked with an expert and put all the dialogue in old English and then watered it down sufficiently for the modern reader, although I wish there had been an index for a few words).  The story of these two characters and everything they want opposed to everything they can have (or sometimes think they can have) is so powerful that I was completely blown away.  Ruck is everything a knight should be, he defeats all comers in battle, is courteous to his Lady and has devoted himself, chastely, to the memory of his wife and his Lady.  Melanthe is beautiful and dangerous and clever and terrified.  The things they go through for each other are just amazing and I love, love this book.

A sort of sequel to Defy not the Heart, in that the son of that novel’s protagonist is the rival for the heroine’s affections in this one.

Wulfric, the future Earl of Shefford has been betrothed to Milisant Crispin more or less since she was born and he was a few years old.  They met once as children, an encounter that nearly crippled both of them, and he has avoided her ever since.  Wulfric has accomplished this primarily by going off to war and she has helped by refusing to take on the role of a lady and going about dressed like a boy while pursuing her favorite pastimes in the woods.  When Prince John hears of the match he fears the union of two such powerful families would be disaster for him and a plot is put in motion to stop the wedding at any cost.

I can have a bit of a hard time with these girls dressed as boys because girl jobs are no fun heroines, since they tend to exhibit those too stubborn to listen to anyone or ever change their mind ever qualities as well.  Milisant certainly did, but she was able to slowly overcome them.  Wulfric tended to allow her to jump to conclusions about his own behavior, but then she didn’t actually believe him when he defended himself so I’m not sure what he could have done.  The process of coming around was, in this case, worth it.

I’m on a bit of a medieval kick lately.  I’m not sure why I find these books so compelling, but I think part of it has to do with the fact that the world is so very different from ours.  Technically they even spoke another language (in Great Brittan, that is).

Through circumstances beyond her control, Lady Reina de Champeney has found herself protecting her castle’s keep from attackers with only a handful of soldiers.  She needs to marry, and wants to marry, but neither of her perspective grooms has responded to her letters requesting that they visit.  And so when an armed band of men show up and defeat the invaders, she naturally feels quite grateful.  Until they kidnap her to deliver her to a man who claims to be her betrothed.  Figuring that the devil you’ve just met must be better than the one you don’t know, and who is reputed to be quite awful, she ends up marrying Lord Rothwell, leader of the band of mercenaries.  Rothwell is the bastard son of a baron and his only desire is to gain his own land.    Could such a marriage of convenience end in love?

Well of course it could, that’s the whole point, isn’t it?  Reina and Rothwell but heads, foil villains, right wrongs and fall head over heels for each other.  Quite charming.

This is a beautifully crafted novel, which is stylistically quite different from most romances set in this era.  Countess Marina Wyatt is a celebrated Society novelist, and the gossip generated by her presumed affairs only adds to her fame.  When she arranges with her current paramour and her publisher to have the young man’s historian uncle attend a dinner party the plan is to get him to agree to write a book on antiquities.  But Marina feels an unexpected pull to Jasper Hedges and when it is clear he feels the same they begin a torrid affair.  What will happen when they can no longer keep their night life completely cut off from the every thing else?

The mood in this book was darker and more erotic than most romance novels.  In part, I think, this was due to the age of the lead characters, both at least in their 30′s (and Jasper possibly 40′s) rather than the typical 20′s (with them woman possibly as young as 18 and the man possibly 30-33).  Marina and Jasper have had, shall we say colorful? sexual experiences, but this new relationship pushes them past what they had known before.  Beyond that, there were so many layers and connections in the story that there was constantly a new outlook on what was happening (without being totally annoying).  Although there was a deus ex machina solution to the one big problem, the resolution did not feel forced.  Really, I want to go read more from Rosenthal, which is about the best thing I can say about that.

Sara Fielding, mild mannered lady author from a small village is merely trying to pick up some new London “cant” to use in her next novel when she hears the sounds of a struggle nearby.  When she sees that several men with a knife have attacked a single victim she does what any sensible woman would.  She takes out her pistol and shoots them.  Derek Craven, the man she rescues, is not suitably grateful, but he does allow her to observe his gaming club and speak to the staff, since she would clearly just end up in trouble elsewhere.   The pair feel the pull of attraction, but Craven is determined to resist.  He was born to a prostitute and has done unspeakable things to rise to his current position in the world.  No lady could ever forgive such actions, and up to this point Craven’s many mistresses have glorified in his infamy.

I really enjoyed this pairing of characters.  Sara is naive, but not stupid and she does understand the things Craven has had to do and is determined to love him in spite of himself.  Craven (such an interesting choice for a name, especially since I suspect he must have picked it for himself) is equally determined to save her, but cannot resist.  The villain, who tries to separate them and only succeeds in pushing them closer together is thoroughly wicked and the ending satisfactory.  All the same, I found myself wondering how this pair would fare after the story ends.  She’s an accomplished author used to the country life.  He’s a barely literate ex-thug who knows everything about every lord in London and relishes the power he hold over them.  What happens when the sexual heat dies down?