I had so many competing feelings reading One Dance with a Duke. At so many points, many of them mere pages apart, I alternated between wanting to strangle and smooch both of the main characters. I’ll grab the summary quickly from Goodreads here and then move onward into my disorganized thoughts: “A handsome and reclusive horse breeder, Spencer Dumarque, the fourth Duke of Morland, is a member of the exclusive Stud Club, an organization so select it has only ten members–yet membership is attainable to anyone […]
Emotionally and historically epic.
The Lions of Al-Rassan is an incredible book that’s inspired by the religious and political conflict that marked Moorish Spain. It follows several characters from three at-odds religious groups: the Kindath (based on Jews), Jaddites (based on Christians) and Asharites (based on Muslims.) Though the religions as described in the novel bear no real-life similarity to their analogous counterparts, and the particulars of history don’t entirely line up with the events described in the book, GGK’s alternate imagining still captures the ideological turmoil that was rampant […]
Five historical romances with a family of huggable eccentrics
Lisa Kleypas strikes me as a somewhat traditional author of historical romance. Which isn’t to say that she’s boring or stuffy, because she can write great smolder and steamy love scenes. I’m not entirely sure that I can put my finger on what makes me think this way, but I have an impression of her as an author whose idea of rebellion against romance conventions is a wink rather than a thorough upending. None of that is to pass any kind of value judgement on […]
A little sad about this.
I have read all four of Rainbow Rowell’s novels now and I have been enamored with three of them. Landline is the fourth. Here’s what happens, basically: Georgie is married to Neal and they have two young children. He’s a stay at home dad, and she works as a TV comedy writer, currently on an awful sitcom-type show that she hates. The week of Christmas, Seth, Georgie’s writing partner, informs her that they may have a huge break in the works: a major producer wants […]