Tag: historical romance

January Wrap-up

January 2021, which felt an awful lot like December 2020 part two, is finally over, and it’s time to look at what I was actually able to read throughout the month. I had a very ambitious 24 titles in my January TBR and I didn’t read 24 books in January; I watched more television than I usually do. So out of those 24 books I read 12 and then 5 books that were not on the list. That makes a total of 17 books read for the month. Not bad. So what exactly did I read?

I completed the Morelli Family series by Sam Mariano:
Resisting Mateo book 5
Coming Home book 6
Last Words book 7
Entrapment book 8
Old Flame book 9
I enjoyed the series as a whole; there were some books that were way better than others but as a whole it was extremely entertaining. I’ll be posting a full review of the series in the next couple of weeks.

I also caught up to Giana Darling’s The Fallen Series:
Good Gone Bad book 3
After the Fall book 4
Inked in Lies book 5
Dead Man Walking book 6
So far this series is keeping my interest; there were some character decisions that pissed me off but overall it was a solid series and entertaining read.

From my initial January TBR I also read Land of Big Numbers a collection of short stories about the Chinese experience written by Te-Ping Chen; Roommate the new Sarina Bowen M/M romance which as expected was luke-warm, I’m in the middle of trying to organize my thoughts for a full review of this title; and Bad Habits by Neve Wilder and Onley James another M/M romance which was my favorite read of the month more because of the premise of the book rather than the romance.

Aside from those books on my initial TBR I also read five additional titles:

Bully King by Andi Jaxon part of Kindle Unlimited (KU) a M/M bully romance which veered way too much into religion and guilt associated with being gay and religious for my tastes.
Behind Closed Doors (KU) by Anna Stone a lesbian romance novel which started off strong but then lost steam and kinda fell apart toward the end.
Wicked Saint (KU) by Veronica Eden which wasn’t anything special and could be confused for any number of the hundred of bully straight romances that seem to multiply overnight. This is the first book of the Sinners and Saints series and I was so unimpressed that I’m not gonna be reading the rest.
A Notorious Vow (KU) by Joanna Shupe a historical romance novel set in New York with a deaf hero. I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading more from Ms. Shupe.
Stripped Love (KU) by Baylin Crow an M/M romance between a stripper and a college student. I prefer Baylin Crow’s sports romances. This was just an okay book. This is book one of Guys Next Door series I haven’t decided whether or not all read more from this series; I’m gonna take it on an individual basis.

I did DNF two books in January which were Not my Romeo by Ilsa Madden-Mills, I didn’t like either main character I stopped reading about halfway through when neither character became likeable to me, and The Chase by Elle Kennedy. I’m not sure if I should even call this a DNF since I only read one chapter and wanted to stab my eyes at how annoying I found the main female lead’s voice in my head.

Ten Things I Hate About the Duke

Pairing: M/F
Orientation: straight
Identity: cisgender
Genre: historical romance

Loretta Chase was one of the first historical romance authors that I ever read. The first time I picked up one of her books I was in high school, and at the time I found it scandalous and so very sexy. Of course, my reading before this consisted mostly of Stephen King, Clive Barker, and Dean Koontz, so even a hint of romance was enough to make my sixteen year old heart swoon. Soon, I was devouring all the historical romance I could find from Julie Garwood to Johanna Lindsey from Jude Deveraux to Brenda Joyce and Judith McNaught. But it was Chase that opened the door to reading about Dukes and their Duchesses, Highlanders and their fair maidens, and the Lords and Ladies of the Ton.

When the opportunity arose to read Loretta Chase’s latest historical, Ten Things I Hate About the Duke, I was excited. And then about half way through, I remembered why I stopped reading most historical romance authors. I probably couldn’t list ten things I hated about this book, but I’d be hard pressed to list ten things that I liked.

Ten Things I Hate About the Duke, is the story of Cassandra Pomfrey, an intellectual young woman who doesn’t wish to marry and have her life dictated by a man, and Lucious Duke of Ashmont, a rake who causes scandal and mischief wherever he goes. So pretty much the same characters that appear in 89% of all historical romance novels, and usually I don’t mind these stock characters except they weren’t interesting. There was nothing about either character that was different than any number of other characters in other romance novels. These people for as different and rakish as they purported to be were in fact boring. There was a lot of telling not showing. And if there was a plot outside of just the two of them getting together, I failed to see it.

This was also a slow burn that never really got above tepid. I read a lot of romance novels, and this one just wasn’t steamy or sexy. It was at best lukewarm. When we finally did get to the one and only sex scene all i could think of was that scene in Ten Things I Hate About You and how it read like the romance novel the principal was writing. Which might be what Chase was going for since it’s pretty obvious she took inspiration from the film and you know Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew.

I probably won’t read another Loretta Chase book, but reading this book reminded me how much I actually enjoy historical romance novels. After twenty years of reading romance, I’ve ventured way outside of what Chase’s audience is, but she was a great gateway to one of the greatest pleasures in my life.

This book was provided by NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.