Alliteration. It's a Thing.
Feb. 20th, 2014 11:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shipperxI wrote up some comments recently about one of the romances that I had read and ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nutmeg3 pointed out that I never gave the title of the novel. I had to admit that I had forgotten the title of the novel. I forget titles all the time.
Want evidence of why it's so damn easy to forget the titles? There are two novels (that are in no way related) currently downloaded from my Audible account.
* Beguiling the Beauty
* To Beguile a Beast
Gee, who could ever confuse those?
(And how often is the term 'beguile' used in everyday conversation?)
nutmeg3 pointed out that I never gave the title of the novel. I had to admit that I had forgotten the title of the novel. I forget titles all the time.Want evidence of why it's so damn easy to forget the titles? There are two novels (that are in no way related) currently downloaded from my Audible account.
* Beguiling the Beauty
* To Beguile a Beast
Gee, who could ever confuse those?
(And how often is the term 'beguile' used in everyday conversation?)
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Date: 2014-02-20 08:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-24 06:29 pm (UTC)How to use Beguile in daily conversation!
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Date: 2014-02-20 10:38 pm (UTC)That said, Regency titles are so seemingly interchangeable that it's really hard to keep books straight.
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Date: 2014-02-24 06:31 pm (UTC)Frankly, they should come with "Friends" episode titles. "The One With ________"
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Date: 2014-02-20 11:18 pm (UTC)Not helped by the fact that a lot of them have similar titles:
My Wicked Ways, A Week to be Wicked, Your Wicked Desire....
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Date: 2014-02-21 03:43 pm (UTC)Actually, I've been enjoying "To Beguile a Beast." It's a more mature take on the trope than Ivory's "Beast," which was kind of a Howard Hawks screwball comedy with immature characters (which relates to what I think is a misstep in Ivory's novel. The hero is needlessly too old. Despite the numerical age given to him (not that 33 is 'old' but she keeps using the description "old"), he seems every bit as immature as the 18 year old heroine. He should have been 23 to her 18 rather than 33. It would've played better, because he certainly didn't act 33).
At any rate, in comparison, Elizabeth Hoyt's "To Beguile a Beast" is more mature. The heroine is in her mid thirties and the hero comments that he's only a few years away from 40. But more than the numerical ages, they behave as adults.
It's apparently part of "The Four Soldiers" Series, with the tie-together being that its heroes trace back to a massacre during the French-Indian war in New England. "Beast" must come somewhere in the middle of the series because I had the definite impression in the novel that Lord and Lady Vale were the hero and heroine of a previous work. It's not intrusive as they are there to serve this story, though.
Anyway, the hero of "Beast" is one of the very small handfull of survivors of the massacre, where not only were they led into an ambush/massacre by one of their own (traitor's identity unknown), but also where the survivors were horrifically tortured and executed one-by-one (think Harrenhal in "A Clash of Kings"). The hero was the one being tortured when they were rescued, and yes they had done unspeakable things to him by then. Half his face is ruined, he lost an eye, etc.
After returning home to England, he retreated to his castle and basically become a hermit while writing naturalist tracts on "The Flora and Fauna of New England" etc. Lord Vale, a fellow survivor, remains a close friend and is still, all these years later, determined to find the traitor who was responsible for the ambush, enlisting the hero in the search (at least by correspondence. The hero refuses to leave his castle, which concerns both the Vales and the hero's older sister). (cont'd)
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Date: 2014-02-22 02:48 am (UTC)I think you may have hit on my difficulty with Ivory's writing style. Her characters come across as a bit silly.
I'm reading The Proposition...and I find her comedy a bit too screwball for the prose. And she's repetitive. It's starting to drag in places. Don't get me wrong - I'm enjoying the novel and I like the characters quite a bit, but...it's not quite as good as Sherry Thomas and Milan's writing styles. Too much description...I want to edit out some of it. And the characters feel like teenagers at times, when I know she's almost 30 and he's in his 30s.
Elizabeth Hoyt's Beast novel sounds interesting and rather different. I'm definitely intrigued.
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Date: 2014-02-24 05:17 pm (UTC)I definitely preferred Hoyt's "Beast" novel to Ivory's (again, it's probably a personal preference/personal story kinks kind of thing. We like what we like). The two books are entirely different beasts.[/bad pun] (I've also noticed that Hoyt has one coming out in the fall that, having read bits and pieces about him in another novel, I'm intrigued enough that I'll probably read it when it comes out.)
What I've found with Hoyt thus far is that she doesn't move me emotionally as much as Milan does (or even Sherry Thomas for that matter) but intellectually I enjoy the way she builds her characters and stories. It doesn't hinge on misunderstandings, and she gives issues to both the hero and heroine, so it's not lop-sided. Her angst isn't as angsty as Milan and her characters aren't quite as maddening as Thomas's can be.
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Date: 2014-02-25 02:53 am (UTC)Because I'm having somewhat the same reactions. I am enjoying The Proposition quite a bit at the moment (thanks for the rec)...but yes, she reminds me a little of Eloisa James. So definitely will be hit or miss.
(YMMV on this one, don't know. But I'm probably going to skip The Beast...because the much older guy/much younger girl romance doesn't quite work for me. I've equally skipped numerous movies playing with this trope and the one's I've seen I've struggled with. There's just something...well, it smacks of Freudian kink. I admittedly struggled with a few of Eloisa James novels for this reason.) Ivory's and James writing styles are similar.
The hero in The Proposition is quite lovable though and against the usual "rake" trope. Actually the whole story (so far - about 69% of the way through) is against the trope, she's doing a good job of playing with and subverting the spinister/rake trope. Not crazy about her sex scenes - but Eloisa James sex scenes bugged me too.
Curious which Eloisa James you returned. (Would not recommend The Ugly Duckling...that one left a bitter taste in my mouth. And I waited too long before I could return another novel of hers - the title I forget, but it concerned an annoying drunken duke and a female character - that I'd despised in previous books and just got worse and worse and worse as time wore on.)
It doesn't hinge on misunderstandings, and she gives issues to both the hero and heroine, so it's not lop-sided.
This is why Hoyt's horsemen series intrigues me. I want a bit more complexity in the characters and their interactions. And to have both have issues, not one be perfectly okay, and the other tormented.
What worked for me in Milan, and I don't see this with many of the others is she spent time on the supporting characters. Was good at witty dialogue (that's hard to pull off). And the supporting characters have their own issues, and aren't just stock characters, or plot points - moving the plot forward, but serving no other purpose. She tends to give them more complexity.
If you want emotional angst...Meredith Duran is not bad. A bit melodramatic perhaps...but not bad. I liked her. The two I read of hers were Duke of Shadows and At Your Pleasure. And her plots are bit more convoluted and deal with War. The first one - takes place in India, and then England. The second in England during the Georgian period - it deals with the religious strife between Catholics and Protestants. Both characters have issues. And the characters are rather complex. She reminds me a little of Laura Kinsale in her writing style. (BTW thank you for the Laura Kinsale rec - Flowers From the Storm.) Deals with similar themes and similar angst.
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Date: 2014-02-25 04:56 pm (UTC)Of the writers I've been reading lately, Milan is my favorite. I like a lot of her prose and her characterizations. Right now Thomas and Hoyt are neck and neck for me. Both have strengths and weaknesses but they both do enough interesting things to keep me involved.
I've only read Hoyt's "Beast" one in the Horseman series so far. I think I will double back and read the one about Lord Vale and perhaps the one with the American hero, but at the moment I'm in her Maiden Lane series.
What I can gather in her Maiden Lane series is that she's created a community of characters who intersect, so that characters in earlier books pop up in later ones. I haven't read any of the early books, but I know they feature brothers, sisters, and associates of the heroes and heroines of the later ones. Plus there are some characters who keep popping up who you can feel are bound to have books of their own one day (the ones who seem most likely are Lord D'Arque {who at this point has to becoming paranoid. Of his three best friends one was murdered and the other two were revealed as villains} and the [Heiress] Royle.} Within the Maiden Lane series, I'm in the midst of reading the Ghost of St. Giles trilogy.
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Date: 2014-02-26 02:10 am (UTC)You admittedly have me intrigued with the Ghost series. Although I'm impressed by how fast you are ripping through these books. I think you've managed to read 10 in one week.
I'm still meandering through the Proposition - about 80% of the way through. They've been having lots of sex. Judith Ivory reminds me a great deal of Eloisa James when it comes to sex scenes. She rambles.
Spoilers - Ghosts of St. Giles Trilogy
Date: 2014-02-25 05:08 pm (UTC)This synchronization actually worked out better than I hoped because Hoyt did the somewhat clumsy thing of prefacing Book 3 in Book 2, so there are these random scenes of the heroine of Book 3 having an entirely independent, unresolved series of scenes in Book 2 that honestly don't belong there. But, because I'm listening to Book 3, rather than being annoyed by those detours, they're adding to my enjoyment of Book 3.
The other thing that became more obvious to me while reading all of these more or less at once, is that Hoyt is doing different things with each of the three Ghosts.
Ghost 1{Winter Makepeace}'s actions truly are motivated by altruism. He truly wants to save the world, help the helpless, etc. Even though it's a bit like the kid holding back the flood with his finger in the dike -- overwhelming, impossible, and one day he's likely to drown). Winter (earnestly) carries the world on his shoulders. His heroine tells him that somehow he got it into his head to be a bloody saint (and she's not entirely wrong.) Winter is the least angsty of the trio of 'Ghosts', and the heroine loosens him up and opens him to being less 'saint like' >;) I liked his heroine a lot.
Ghost 2 (St. John)'s actions are more about self-annihilation. It's like he damn well wants to get killed and thus constantly tempts fate. He lost his first wife to illness and between that sense of helplessness and his darn well wanting to bury himself with her, he seems to have a death wish. His heroine is the one whose 'true love' died in Ghost 1's story (The "Ghost" was labeled his murderer, but it would've been Winter's Ghost not St. John's Ghost) leaving the heroine pregnant and heart broken. The heroine's brother, who had run-ins with 'the Ghost', blackmailed St. John into marrying her or he would reveal 'the Ghost's identity (as the brother knew him. I don't think the brother knows there are three of them. Still, the brother clearly didn't believe the Ghost had actually killed the 'true love'). This book, while not without its charms, suffers in comparison to the other two ghosts because I'm not a huge fan of decade older man/younger woman. Plus, both the hero and heroine seem to want to curl up and die because their 'true loves' died. Still, St. John, for all his 'daring death' tendencies does try to help the helpless etc. Which brings us to Ghost 3...
Ghost 3 is Batman.
His background is Batman (saw his parents murdered, etc. You know the story, complete with an Alfred). Right now my jury is out. This could be very good or not so much depending on whether what's going on is what I THINK is going on.
What I THINK is going on is deconstructing Batman. (Which could be good if this is how it continues).
Re: Spoilers - Ghosts of St. Giles Trilogy
Date: 2014-02-26 02:17 am (UTC)Oh damn. I bought the wrong one. Not a fan of either of those tropes. The long lost/first love you never get over bit is completely lost on me. I just can't identify. And I tend to think it's a bit silly. (which was admittedly my problem with Bangle too). And well, as you already know not a fan of much older man/younger woman trope. Slightly Older woman/younger man on the other hand...intrigues me. I can do 5-10 years apart for both, anything over ten years..
The reason I bought the middle one - was the heroine wanting to kill the Ghost to avenge her lover's death, only to discover he's her current husband, and the hero avoiding his seductive wife, only to discover she wants to kill him ...intrigued me.
Now not so much. I'm more intrigued by the first Ghost, Winter, who is a schoolmaster by day and a Ghost by night, and a virgin to boot. Male virgins in romance novels are rather innovative. Rakes not so much...
Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-25 05:11 pm (UTC)This feels like deconstructing Batman's priviledge.
So much of the story has been highlighting his priviledge. He's rich, he's powerful, he's a titled sought after peer. Yes, his parents were murdered, which is terrible, but while he has his manpain, he doesn't seem fully aware that while that's terrible, things could be worse. A hell of a lot worse. He could be the heroine, for instance. SHE is visited by a host of tragedies and must struggle and endure... without any of his privileges but on her strength of character alone.
She is a woman. Worse, she is a poor woman, depending upon a distant silly, selfish, shallow cousin for any sort of livlihood. She has to suppress her thoughts and feelings because she has no 'station' in society (which, as the hero thinks early on, is just the way it should be. Such is society/life after all and the fate of poor female relations). Worse, she's screaming inside all the time because on top of her father having gone insane and her fiance having dumped her, her beloved brother is wrongly accused of {mass} murder, labeled 'incurably insane' and locked up (and tortured) in Bedlam. She's desperate to save her brother, and -- unlike the hero -- has NO privileges or powerbase. Just her own resolve.
She figures out that Wakefield is The Ghost, and decides to blackmail him into helping her brother. But he WON'T (putting weight behind Makepeace's and St. John's opinion of Wakefield in the previous novels). Wakefield bristles that she dares to 'demand' that he do anything. Doesn't she realize who he is? He's a duke. One does not command dukes, or blackmail dukes. Besides, her brother is no doubt guilty and 'deserves' his hellish, tortured fate.
I'm at almost 1/3 and if what just happened is what I think just happened, Wakefield is going to need to walk through fire and glass and hell to be worthy of the heroine. And he damn well had better begin seeing the world outside himself and be mortally ASHAMED of how he had dismissed the heroine's quest.
The heroine's brother (as glimpsed in Ghost 2 book and so far in Ghost 3 book) had been gallant and loving, trying to hold his sanity (and humor) together in Bedlam with only his sister giving a damn about him. She's been paying guards money that she cannot afford to try to decrease his abuse, while desperately trying to find a way to help him. When he hears a trio of guards attempting to rape a female Bedlamite, he gallantly tries to distract and deflect their attention from the female to himself and... Dear God. He does. It's a 'fade to black' but the implications appear to be exactly the worst case scenario you might suspect. (And from the brother as we glimpsed in Ghost 2 and in Ghost 3 versus the character description of him for the blurb of the upcoming book, this is a deflection point. The guy is seriously, seriously damaged from here on out.)
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-26 02:29 am (UTC)Would however like to see a deconstruction of Batman's privilege. Never seen anyone do that...they are sort of doing it in Arrow, with Oliver Queen.
Which admittedly is why I'm sticking with Arrow. Mostly they focus on Batman's manpain and well the vigilante quest.
Makepeace sounds a bit...full of himself? Also a wee bit on the whiny side.
And the heroine, dear ghod. She's lost her father and her brother, and according to Good Reads, her nasty cousin is to marry Batman, who she's been flirting with.
OTOH...I find the heroine intriguing, if a bit tortured. Also not sure how they can get past the conflict: The hero's refusal to act - has resulted in her brother being needlessly tortured and almost killed. How can the heroine forgive him for that? Plus he's treated her as if she's beneath him? I don't see how they can overcome that.
There's another book out there featuring the heroine's brother as a lead?
Talk about your tortured heroes...
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-26 04:51 pm (UTC)Winter Makepeace (Ghost 1 {probably closer to Captain America than Batman}) is a pretty great guy start to finish. Nothing for him to be redeemed for. He's overcoming a fairly low social status and convincing a woman who can't have children that he loves her more than any child they can never have.
Wakefield (Ghost 3) is an ASSHOLE. And he needs therapy. He's lousy with manpain and priviledge, and I spent waaaaaayyyy too much time thinking "You're a DICK!"
But, then, from Good Reads, I think that's some people's kink. They like domineering capital "A" alphas, and it's not like the author doesn't know better because there are things that Wakefield does that other of her heroes specifically choose NOT to do. It's like Wakefield subconsciously wants to be forced to marry the heroine because he will not allow himself to view it as an option (with other characters specifically pointing out that the only reason it's NOT an option is in his own damn head. "Alfred" almost threatens to walk out over this).
I remember in Hoyt's "Beast" story, in deference to the heroine's reputation, how careful the hero was with contraception (not an issue with Winter Makepeace, who would only sleep with someone he'd marry and upon consummating the relationship embarked on a deliberate campaign to convince a titled Lady who cannot have children to marry a young commoner. Nor with St. John (Ghost 2) whose deal with his wife of convenience is specifically that he agree to consummate their marriage so that she can have a child). Wakefield on the other hand makes no effort whatsoever to prevent conception or any possible scandal or fall-out (while actively telling her that he'll never marry her). She's a lady's companion and 'respectable' (and a friend of his sisters!) but he has her in his bedroom until noon, with all the servants knowing he's banging her (and his younger sister living in the house). He has public fights with her where they sneak off together and are noticed. Subconsciously he'd doing everything possible to cause a scandal while at the same time claiming to everyone who CALLS him out on it (which several characters do) that he 'cannot' marry her (he claims it's because 'it's the "Dukedom"' so he must marry someone 'appropriate' {the cousin almost every other character thinks is stupid and awful, though is beautiful, spoiled, and rich}, BUT the G3's heroine is actually aristocracy (if disowned by her grandfather) and a close friend of his sisters, so when he's saying that, he's talking about the fact that a) there's 'insanity' in the family (her brother is not insane) and b) she's POOR (but he doesn't need money!)
Frankly, when her 'mad' brother punches G3, I'm 110% on the brother's side because the brother a) isn't crazed b) isn't predisposed to violence and c) is totally justified in being hella pissed with the situation Wakefield has his sister in.
I think we're to think that Wakefield 'changes' near the end when he asks her to marry him (because she nearly died), but frankly, I look at ALL of his behavior and tend to think he just did the next thing. He never did want to give her up and she'd walked out on him (which he totally deserved) so to win her back he was going to have to propose. I don't know if he 'changed' or was just backed into a corner where this was his only option. I never saw any actual change in his controlling behavior (not just with her, but with his youngest sister as well).
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-27 01:31 am (UTC)It really is.
Two big kinks on Good Reads: "Domineering Alpha Male Control Freak, with tortured past" and "Extremely rich Domineering Alpha Male Control Freak."
And unfortunately? Instead of having them get to be redeemed or change, they just give them a tortured childhood - which in many readers minds excuses everything. [ie. He was abused or his parents were killed, so of course he acts like a spoiled 14 year old, with control/trust/anger issues. ]
I've admittedly read a few of these - I was hunting for a redemption/forgiveness arc...which unfortunately I seldom found, damn writers are more interested in steamy seduction scenes than character development. ;-)
Wakefield (Ghost 3) is an ASSHOLE. And he needs therapy. He's lousy with manpain and priviledge, and I spent waaaaaayyyy too much time thinking "You're a DICK!"
Apparently he's a Dick throughout the series. I was reading a review that referenced the second book in the series - Notorious Pleasures (oh dear who comes up with these titles?) - which is about Wakefield's sister Hero.
Apparently Wakefield attempts to force his sister to marry her fiance, after said fiance punched her in the face in front of him. The reviewer was hoping he'd be redeemed in this book - and felt that he wasn't, but hey he lost his parents at 14 and she figured his just stuck at that age and doesn't know any better.
Considering reading the first book...Wicked Intentions, which is a murder mystery and has a notorious rake requesting the aide of a Shelter worker to find someone in Maiden Lane.
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-27 02:55 pm (UTC)This. Is. HIM!!!
His big revelation about his guilt over his parents death is supposed to wring sympathy from us, and it is sad. BUT...
but, but, but
The mulish, bratty behavior he describes he had at fourteen that was part of his parents death is the SAME MULISH BRATTY BEHAVIOR that he continues well into his thirties.
To quote BtVS's Cordelia Chase: Spank your inner moppet!
I've admittedly read a few of these - I was hunting for a redemption/forgiveness arc...which unfortunately I seldom found, damn writers are more interested in steamy seduction scenes than character development. ;-)
This. (If you ever want a really, really quick read, you might like Milan's "Unlocked". It's a .99 e-novella so it's SHORT but that's the kink its appealing to.
Apparently Wakefield attempts to force his sister to marry her fiance, after said fiance punched her in the face in front of him. The reviewer was hoping he'd be redeemed in this book - and felt that he wasn't,
Holy bejeebus. That's awful. But I could see his doing that and being self-righteous and proper about it all along. What. A. Dick.
(And yet weirdly, I still enjoyed the novel as a whole. I just do not like it as a ROMANCE. He's not appealling to me. At all.
I hope the upcoming story with the mad brother turns out to be good {and more along the lines of Beast or Ghost 1} because I was definitely rooting for him. )
I admit I haven't read any of the early part of this series (though I may someday). I started in with the Ghosts. I really don't read as many books or as fast as it may appear. I sample series so I may have read a couple of them and perhaps googled or know about the rest of the series but haven't gotten around to reading them all yet (still haven't read all the novels in any of the Milan series --though I suspect I eventually will, even the ones that didn't seem to appeal in the beginning seem to appeal on closer inspection. I haven't run across an Eolisa James "er... I'm not finishing this!" of Milan's yet. Nor have I read the entirity of any one of the Hoyt series {Soldiers, Maiden Lane, or Princes} Some of those I plan to read, others I'll probably skip due to trope and or kink preferences.
As we both know by now, I can be opinionated. :)
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-28 12:19 am (UTC)Anyhow...the story is about Winter's older sister, Temperance. (At least I think she's older, since she's a widow, her husband died nine years ago, and he's only 24-25. If she's not older, she'd have to have gotten married as a kid.) They are running their dead father's charity together - which is a home for orphaned children (all called Mary or Joseph). And you're right about Winter...he's got a huge savior complex, which either works for me or doesn't. Depends on whether they are holier than thou or full of themselves. He doesn't appear to be. It's early yet.
Temperance meets the notorious and nefarious Lazarus Huntington, Lord Cair, who employs her services to act as a guide - at night. He needs someone who knows the area and the people - to aid him in his search for someone. We don't know yet, why. According to a blurb it's a murderer.
I'm not quite sure why he asked Temperance. Except that she has wandered about at night to pick up infant kids, much to her brother's considerable annoyance, and he probably wants someone he can control and won't ask too many questions? (This is what kicked a lot of the Good Reads readers and Amazon readers out of the story - they couldn't buy that he would ask a woman to search a dangerous neighborhood.)
Cair is a friend of Godric St. John's and thinks Wakefield is a fool. He's not a fan of Wakefield. Who Godric calls an idealist. Godric and Cair are the same age and good friends. So, I'm guessing Cair pops up in the books you read? Don't spoil me on him...sort of want to figure out his game on my own.
I rather like Hoyt's style and how she's into developing her world. She's a world-builder. [I don't care if its historically accurate - sort of viewing her world as a fantasy, alternate universe similar to Ellen Kushner's Privilege of the Sword novels. It doesn't abide by our world's rules.]
Also she wins an award for interesting character names. Silence. Temperance. Winter. Lazarus. Godric. Neat. I think she may be a frustrated fantasy writer in the making.
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-28 03:27 pm (UTC)Winter never appeared to be judgemental, just holding himself to an impossibly high standard.
And I have indeed backtracked to the 4 Soldiers Quadrology with the one with Lord and Lady Vale. Really liking it so far. Thumbs up.
I haven't read the early books of Maiden Lane, but yeah there are a bunch of characters that pop up repeatedly. I haven't read Cair's book so I cannot spoil, but I'm fairly certain he had one. ...I think. Haven't read it. He pops up in several though. Is his first name Griffin by any chance?
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-03-01 02:08 am (UTC)Notorious Pleasures is Griffin and Hero
Scandalous ...is Silence and Captain Mickey
Wicked is interesting. Asa is apparently the middle brother, and never-do-well, who was angry at them for keeping the home. Concord is the oldest Makepeace brother and owns the brewery. Verity is the eldest sister.
Lord Cair is Lazurus Huntington. He's about 34. Temperance is 28. Both have sexual experience and are more or less equals. He's also a rake and has never loved anyone. But he's become obsessed with finding the murderer of his mistress of 3 years, Marie. And has requested Temperance's help - because she knows the area, and he's intrigued by her. (It's a romance novel - these things don't need to make sense.)
It's the first Maiden Lane novel - and sort of introduces the Makepeace family, St. Giles, and the world.
And...oooh...I'm going to have to try the Horseman after all. Thinking of skipping over Notorious Pleasures to Scandalous Desires or Theif of Shadows. The second and third novel in the Maiden Lane don't interest me that much - they sound sort of typical. I'm looking for atypical.
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-28 12:27 am (UTC)Wakefield sounds sort of intriguing. Actually, I'm intrigued by the heroine and how or why she falls for him and how he falls for her. This is what intrigues me in these books - how is the writer going to get these to characters together and make them work in a relationship? And can the writer pull it off? Artremis and Wakefield's romance sounds like an impossible mountain to climb or to pull off...
And yep, Wakefield is definitely a trope. I remember Clayton Westmoreland in Whitney, My Love - that book failed for me, because I could not warm to Clayton. He was a DICK. Worse? He had no reason for being a DICK. He just was one. A privileged DICK. And Maya Banks has this New Adult erotica series, where she also has a hero who is a collassal Dick, and again for no clear reason. Neither gets redeemed or they do, but I didn't buy the redemption. And both feel sort of one-note. Disliked both books quite a bit. Yet, people at Amazon and Good Reads LOVED them. I'm learning to be careful with reviews...
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-28 03:54 pm (UTC)One of the things I liked in "Beast" was that the young daughter was given POV chapters of her own. Those sections aren't about the central romance, but the grave little girl's concerns about her relationship with her mother, her family's precarious situation re: her biological father, etc. (she's a little worrier) These POV bits had an almost YA novel feel...and totally worked as in her own right the little girl discovers that 'the scarred beast' turns out to be a gentle, caring man who evolves into a supportive substitute father (since her biological father was virtually no father at all).
And one unanticipated aspect I'm liking in the Lord and Lady Vale novel is the inclusion of downstairs activity of the servants with a subplot of Lady Vale's lady's maid being a girl who grew up in St. Giles and has through sheer determination, grit, and seizing oppotunities gone from desperately poor guttersnipe to (in her eyes) the relatively high position of a lady's maid to a Viscountess. Her finding the 'downstairs' at her new situation to be a family-like unit, with a likable and fair mistress and master, while falling for Lord Vale's valet is a sweet subplot. (And I bet that the poor footman tasked with taking care of Lady Vale's dog hates that little beast. Heh.)
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-03-01 02:22 am (UTC)And you're right - she does expand her novels. We're in Temperance's sister, Silence's point of view in some sections of Wicked. I love that. It gives the novel greater depth. Hoyt's not quite as repetitive in her writing style as Ivory either. So far, I'm liking this writer quite a bit.
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-28 05:56 pm (UTC)On a plot level, when she figures out that he's the Ghost it's a huge moment for her in that she quickly figures out that at last she's found a way to rescue her brother. Her brother has been locked up for years and she knows that there's no way that he can last that way forever. But she has no power. She cannot exercise any political power for him to be released and, determined though she is, she doesn't have the means, opportunity, or ability to help her brother physically escape... at least not until she figures out that Wakefield is The Ghost. It's an exhilarating discovery for her because putting together his real identity with his vigilante identity will allow her to blackmail him (I was pleased with her figuring that out. My first thought was BLACKMAIL HIS ASS! And so I was glad that it was her immediate idea too). He becomes her tool to engineer an escape, a way of saving her brother.
The second means of escape he represents is to her own far gentler social prison. She's a lady's companion to her cousin who, while idiotic and annoying isn't evil or mean, just selfish and vain. The heroine isn't being abused or anything, but she has no autonomy, she's boxed in and limited in every direction. Because she is dependent, she can't express her unvarnished opinions, have her own free time, etc. She's effectively trapped by her gender and her social station. Further emphasizing this is Wakefield's older maiden aunt who empathizes with the heroine about 'the lives of women like us.' Even when the heroine tries to resist the depressing Venn diagram, the aunt asks whether the heroine thinks that she wasn't once a young energetic woman too? The heroine's realization that this could well be her life forever is what drives her to go to Wakefield's bed. Better to take something rather than never to have had anything at all.
That said, it isn't a great foundation for love, is it?
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-03-01 02:17 am (UTC)Actually I think this trope really only works in historical romances or in world's like Hoyt's. It does not work in contemporary romance novels. (I know I read a few of them - and it just does not work. The heroine comes across as a dingbat. And the hero - a monster. You want to kick both of them.) The reason is - there isn't quite the same gender power imbalance. Women don't have to marry for power, financial support, or safety in today's world (obviously - just look at us). We are actually more on equal footing. While in the historical romance - they aren't, she, the heroine, is really at the hero's mercy. He can destroy her - with little difficulty.
What I find interesting in historical romance novels is how the heroine overcomes it, how she copes, and how the hero deals with it. Sometimes, she does have power over him, be it sexual or otherwise.
Cont'd Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-26 04:52 pm (UTC)One instance is Trevellion, who has been the military officer 'unsuccessfully' chasing "The Ghost" in all three novels. He investigated (G1), he deliberately allowed(G2) to escape capture, and actively helps (G3) so it's a payoff in this book when he finally openly confirms that he not only knows that there are three Ghosts but also knows exactly who each is and which is responsible for what as he readily recognizes the differences in their M.O.'s (which was a nice bonus in that his conclusions matched my own.) I rather suspect that Trevillion will have his own book someday (though he was terribly injured by the villain of this book). And I fully intend to read the story about G3's heroine's brother when it comes out this fall because I LIKE him. A lot. And, jeebus, he deserves something good to happen to him.
The weakness of her soap opera-ish ongoing style is that I don't know that reading one novel by itself doesn't end up with oddities. Not only the irrelevancy of G3's heroine's totally unrelated scenes in G2's book, but because things may seem out of the blue in the currrent book without a more broad context. For instance, G1's wife stepping into the breach and saving G3's heroine from social ruin near the end novel could seem out of the blue in G3's book alone... but it's completely in character for G1's wife based not only on who she is, but her own past behavior, and also the fact that she cannot stand G3 heroine's ditzy, awful cousin for reasons that are entirely her own. Similarly, it makes perfect sense that it is G2 who kills the villain as it's established that G1 doesn't kill (except one instance in his own book, which is his one and only kill) and it was important that G3 choose his heroine over his own vengeance. And I suspect the hanging plot thread that G3's heroine and her brother's grandfather is both titled and alive (but never chose to HELP THEM) will be some sort of plot point in the brother's book, because it's never dealt with here (unlike the "Beast" who makes effort to reconcile his heroine with her estranged father, G3 never confronts the grandfather who turned his back in his grandchildren's hours of need).
Basically I've rather enjoyed the series and even this book. ...Too bad the hero is such a DICK!
Re: The "Mad" brother
Date: 2014-02-26 07:41 pm (UTC)It's listed on Kindle to be out in a few months. He's the epilogue of the G3 novel. Hoyt tends to do epilogues which are set-ups for the next book.
In the epilogue, Ghost 3 heroine's brother is last seen in hiding with Ghost 1's brother, who appears to be a long time friend who doesn't consider him to be either insane or a murderous fiend -- despite his still being mute and 'an escapee from Bedlam' who was never cleared of a mass murder...
Talk about your tortured heroes...
Made worse by his seeming to be such a nice guy!
In his appearances in G2, he had retained a sense of humor and gallantry despite being locked up in Bedlam for three years. He's kind and loving to his sister. He was sweet, playful, and considerate.
In G3, when Wakefield was investigating a missing emerald that connected to his own mother's murder, Wakefield ended up talking with a school fellow of the 'mad' brother who mentioned that as a teen the 'mad' brother was "the type to be found studying his Latin in his free time. Never would've imagined he could turn into the violent or murdering sort..."
And the reason the 'mad' brother was beaten and raped in the G3 book was his trying to prevent a female patient from being abused and raped. He was being heroic.
And, even after that, even when he awakes chained in Wakefield's basement(because though Wakefield rescues him and takes him to his home, Wakefield never does get over the fact that the brother was accused and convicted of mass murder -- despite the heroine's insistance that her brother is innocent.) The brother still remains kind, protective, and sane towards his sister...after EVERYTHING that he has been through.
He's mute now (it seems to start as a physical problem resulting from one of the rapists stomping his throat during the attack, but there's undoubtedly a traumatized emotional component to its persistance. Doubt it's permanent. Very little time passed in the novel. It's over the course of a few weeks.), but his written communication to his sister, scribled in a notebook she gives him, remains as loving and sane as ever.
Hell, by the end of the novel, even Wakefield admits that the brother isn't crazy, even after the brother attacks him, because Wakefield has to admit that he deserved to be punched. Wakefield himself would attack any man who treated HIS sister the way that Wakefield had treated the heroine. (Hell, I thought the fact that Wakefield's life wasn't in danger after the brother escaped the basement proved that the 'mad brother' isn't the murderous sort. Wakefield more than deserved to have his ass kicked.)
Anyway, there's still the mystery of the murder the brother was accused of (he woke up in a room with three dead men with the murder weapon in his hand) as well as a question of whether Hoyt is ever going to address the titled grandfather that never did anything for his grandchildren despite their dire straits.
Re: The "Mad" brother
Date: 2014-02-27 01:38 am (UTC)I have a serious kink for that sort of story.
The series intrigues me...although I may skip Notorious Pleasures and Scandalous Desires. They don't look that interesting.
G3 sounds like a good read for some of the other characters, and the heroine...the hero, well, I've seen worse. [Again, avoid the New Adult contemporary genre at all costs. The heroes in those are without exception, Wealthy Dicks.]
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (Cont'd)
Date: 2014-02-26 07:41 pm (UTC)I was ready to hate him forever because of it. But, to be begrudgingly fair (if I absolutely must be), the reader knows a hell of a lot more about the timing and what happened than the characters do.
For the characters the hero's refusal to initially act became a moot point due to Wakefield rescuing the brother the evening after she discovered that the brother was dying. (Though it was rather late in this reader's eyes, thank you very much). Because of this, in the heroine's eyes, the hero prevented her brother's death in Bedlam and brought him home (if, hrpmph, chained in the basement) to be compassionately nursed back to health by "Alfred" ...meaning she ends up crediting Wakefield more with the rescue than realizing the implication of the tardiness.
And, again, the reader knows far more. We know that timing wise, had the hero ascented to her first request rather than her most desperate one, he could have gotten there earlier. Given postal systems at the time, I'm not sure how certain she would be of that timing, however.
Also, though she knows her brother was horribly beaten, she's never made aware of the fact that he was brutally raped (I think Wakefield caught the implication during the rescue from Bedlam, but he never mentions the subject aloud. [Actually, that's probably one of the nicer things that Wakefield does.] He does go through the thought that even if the brother is a murderer, no one deserves to have been treated the way the brother has been and Wakefield punishes and threatens the guards, saying that the Ghost will return to Bedlam and if he EVER finds hint of this ever happening again, he'll kill them. Though, frankly, the Duke of Wakefield should take more direct action than The Ghost can.)
The rape was only ever truly confirmed to have uncontestably happened in inner thoughts of the brother. He keeps it to himself. (Though I wouldn't be a surprised to find out in the next novel that "Alfred" figured it out, since he must of been the one to clean up the brother while playing doctor for the injured man.) The sister/heroine only knows that he's been horribly beaten.
At any rate, despite everything, it's always clear to the reader and to the heroine that the brother is not crazed. Even violent violation, on top of four years in Bedlam and being falsely accused of mass murder didn't tip him into a compromised mental state... beyond the reaction one would expect of a rape victim (a sense of shame, powerlessness, etc.) He has trauma that will have to be worked through in his own book. Still, it's clear to the reader and to his sister that he's compos mentis. Even Wakefield (who seemingly never overcomes the brother being accused of murder) finally concedes that the brother isn't crazy (acknowleging that the brother had right to be seethingly furious with him for seducing his sister).
I really want the brother to get his 'happier ending', so I'll buy that book when it comes out. (And if he gets to punch Wakefield again, so much the better. Although he's probably as stalwart and forgiving as his sister and will end up thanking the asshole for rescuing him from Bedlam and (finally) marrying his sister.)
Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (cont'd x2)
Date: 2014-02-25 05:15 pm (UTC)Where I am, she just got word from one of the guards she's been paying that her brother is dying (no details to her what happened, which I expect will be horrifying to her when she discovers them. She's going to blame herself for spending days spurring/sparring/flirting with Wakefield while trying to convince him to help, when her brother was being raped and possibly beaten to death. She's going to be hard on herself and how she might react to Wakefield after this...
With news that her brother is dying, the gloves have come off for the heroine. Her brother is the last thing that she has to lose. So she no longer cares about her reputation, Wakefield's reputation, or about what might happen to her and her future. She's unleashed, swearing she'll do whatever it takes -- including bringing Wakefield down if he won't help her.
If Wakefield isn't mortally ashamed of what happened to her brother while he dawdled around, indignantly refusing to help because 'how dare she make demands of a Duke' then things could get ugly.
If, however, it's about deconstructing his manpain and waking him up to the fact that as bad as it was that his parents were murdered, there are a hell of a lot of people who have a shitload problems, some in fact have it far, far worse than him --and without his buttload of priviledge to ammeliorate consequences. If he learns that he needs to get his head out of his ass, then it could be quite good.
Still 2/3 of the book to go, so I'm hopefull.
Where I am now, the heroine deserves to become an avenging Valkyrie. Her warpath has been earned.
ETA: And it turns out that she's more passive and he's more arrogant than I would've wished. Could've been stronger.
Re: Spoilers - Ghost Trilogy (cont'd x2)
Date: 2014-02-26 02:04 am (UTC)Not sure I can handle wishy-washy heroine and arrogant hero. It does however have some nice quotes posted on Good Reads. Also, Batman is one of my story kinks. (ETA: depending on what they do with him. I like deconstruction of Batman - either of the vigilante bit, or the manpain, or the privilege.)
Actually my story kink is furious heroine and hero who has to walk through fire to obtain her forgiveness. Really work for it. This is a hard kink to pull off though...most writers I've discovered fail miserably at it.
So, yes, I'm a masochistic reader, apparently.
cont'd
Date: 2014-02-21 03:47 pm (UTC)The heroine is the 30-something mistress of a Duke, who is attempting to run away from said Duke. The Duke (far older) had seduced her during her teens. She was 'ruined', thrown out by her family, and thus became the Duke's long term mistress, having had two children by him. The Duke has long since moved on from her to younger mistresses, but he views people as possessions. She's 'his property' as far as he's concerned and so are her children (though he doesn't acknowledge them and never had anything to do with them). The one time she tried to leave the Duke, he stole her children, pointing out that under the law of the time he has sole legal claim to them. If she wants her kids, she had to remain 'under his protection.' She's long since found the situation untenable and has plotted escape with her children.
Her friend, Lady Vale, apparently decided to do some matchmaking between this beauty and the injured beast, aiding the heroine's escape by sending her to the hero's remote castle to become the hero's housekeeper.
Despite some slutshaming when the hero belatedly discovers the truth about "Mrs. Hallifax" (which seemed equally fueled by the mores of the time and by the hero's insecurities, since he cannot imagine why someone as beautiful as her might wish to be with a wreck like him) with the heroine promptly pointing out his hypocrisy in the situation (after all HE was sleeping with her by the time he found out that rather than her being a 'respectable' widow, she's been a Duke's mistress), it's a very nice romance. Neither hero nor heroine nurse grudges, it seems. Plus, argument with slutshaming aside, he's a good guy. She's a good person too. And the story is told not only from his POV and her POV but also the POV of the heroine's nine year old daughter (who, never having had any sort of paternal relationship with her biological father, forms a very daughterly bond with the hero).
Then of course there are problems with the Duke and the subplot of who was the traitor who caused the massacre (which I think is solved only in a red-herring sense, as I feel that the person the hero comes to believe was the traitor may prove not to be in a later novel. The hero didn't want the guy he thinks to be the traitor to have been the traitor and so he keeps the information to himself, because not only was the 'traitor' Vale's best friend but the guy had 'died' horrifically in the massacre. What would be the point of posthumous exposure? Only the preview sample of the next novel reveals that the guy didn't die after all...}
Re: cont'd
Date: 2014-02-22 02:33 am (UTC)I currently have on my kindle one of her Maiden Lane series - this is the series about vigilantes or "Scarlet Pimpernels" who called "The Ghost of St. Giles". The one I grabbed was about a woman who is hunting the Ghost because she blames him for killing her first love, only to discover that he's her husband. Or something to that effect. Haven't read it yet. I have a tendency to buy books then get tempted by something over here...and forget about the book I bought. (Yes, I shouldn't be permitted to buy books on Kindle without supervision. Luckily the romance novels are cheap.)
Read the reviews of these on Amazon...Seduce the Sinner, and Deal with the Devil (I think that's the title - and you gotta love these titles. Romance novelists have the oddest taste when it comes to titles and covers.) Seduce the Sinner is about Lord Vale (who is a rake that marries the shy girl next door who is secretly in love with him, yet not so shy in bed),
Deal with the Devil is about the guy everyone thought was burned to death and the young lady that is currently residing in his estate, and his desire to get his estate and title back from her uncle. She's been intrigued with his portrait. Reviewers were annoyed with this one - because the writer sort of forgot that Lord Vale was tortured over his friend's presumed death, and barely blinked when he came back, alive.
Of the three...the Beast sounds the least...tortured, And that heroine sounds the strongest and the most interesting. The other two books heroines seem a wee bit on the weak side.
Re: cont'd
Date: 2014-02-24 05:38 pm (UTC)Actually, I'm currently on the one that you're speaking of. At the moment (about 1/3 in) I'm frustrated by both the hero and heroine and their dogged determination that their lives ended when their first loves died. I guess I 'get' their feeling that they cannot be disloyal to their lost loves, but it's frustrating that both of them seem to have surrended large chunks of their lives to loyalty to the dead. The hero seems prematurely old due to it, and the heroine is quite frustrating in that even though she wants to live, she doesn't want to enjoy being attracted to anyone but the guy she lost (actually that love affair -- and the man's death -- was briefly shown in the earlier Ghost of St. Giles story. And I'm wondering whether D'Arque [the dead guys friend] will show up in some later book as he seems to hit on the leading ladies of both the Ghosts so far, who both find him attractive but whose welcome he wears out. He seems a wrongheaded rake who antagonizes the heroes but who isn't actually 'evil' either.)
The first Ghost of St. Giles story has a younger viriginal hero/older experienced woman as its leads (He's 26 to 28 and she's 33 or 34, and had been married to an older man who died (and left behind a bastard child who she {eventually} raises) and she has had a couple of 'discreet lovers' since her husband's death as she doesn't think she'll ever remarry because -- after five miscarriages -- she cannot have children. The hero decided a while ago that he'd only have sex with someone he loved and wanted to marry. This juxtaposition is something that forms an obstacle for their 'happy ending.'). Hoyt seems to go with non-virgin heroines a good percentage of the time.
I will say that I found the first Ghost of St. Giles story to be hella sexy. They are very hot together, I thought.
And I enjoyed the way the power shifts between them (and the fact that what she finds so attractive about him is that he treats her as an equal).
I may go back and read the soldiers series with Viscount Vale, but some of the reviews I read of the last of the Soldiers books make me hesitate over "Deal with the Devil".
no subject
Date: 2014-02-21 01:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-21 06:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-22 02:43 am (UTC)And Janet Evanoich's...which worked at first than got silly: One for the Money, Two to Go, Three to Get Ready, Four to Score...(got to say they are memorable titles because of the rhyme scheme.)
The most innovative series titles that I've seen to date are the Kim Harrison Rachel Morgan urban fantasy books - the writer, who is a self-professed fan of Clint Eastwood flicks, does a twist on all his film titles.
Example:
Dead Witch Walking(novel) - Dead Man Walking (eastwood film)
The Good, the Bad, the Undead (novel title) - the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (eastwood film)
The Outlaw Demon Wails - The Outlaw Josey Wales.
Pale Demon - Pale Rider
The Undead Pool - the Dead Pool
Fistful of Chaos - Fistful of Dollars
For a Few Demons More - For a Few Dollars More
And she's consistent. Also, Eastwood's a good choice, since her urban fantasies like the Dresden files are sort of noir mystery fantasy novels...with the heroine falling slightly in the dark hero category. Think the female version of Dresden...except not as religious. (ie. we have demons but no angels, and demons aren't evil. Actually the heroine turns out to be a demon.)