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The fastest way to get me to read a historical romance novel is if the cover is stunning and this lovely, beautiful, absolutely gorgeous cover is just that. I haven’t read anything else by this author, but this one sealed the deal. I’m definitely going to be checking out more now.
Speaking of covers, I recently read the most insightful article from Penguin Random House about the evolution of book covers over the years. All I can say is that book publishers – and self-publishers too – need to bring back the classic, elegant covers.
I’m all for animated or modern covers because I understand they’re probably more accessible to indie authors, and it seems this is a trend publishers have picked up on.
In fact, several books have been republished with totally new covers as their only improvement, so I kept them. But at the same time, the readers on this side need their classic, timeless covers back.
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Unlike many other historical romance novels I’ve read, the male lead in this book is the one who insists on marrying for love. That’s mainly because the female lead had a disastrous experience with someone in the past that literally killed her artistic drive.
Now, all she wants is to settle into a well-connected family where she can get all the prestige and respect she desires without having to sacrifice any of her emotions.
But top of mind for her is trying to get her spark back and managing what she realizes is a romantic feeling for the most unexpected person ever.
The male lead, Jasper, on the other hand, is a caricature for a significant portion of the story. This is an act he puts on to fool his wicked uncle, who does get his comeuppance at the end, but honestly, that wasn’t very satisfying if you ask me.
Anyway, he has a bit of a Superman-style double life going on because when he’s being his true self, he’s totally unrecognizable from when he’s moving around in broad daylight. It’s one of those situations where someone is in society, gathering information because they’re the least likely person you’d suspect of doing so.
The female lead in this book, Althea, was such a joy because when we talk about characters doing things purely for the plot’s sake, I don’t think I’ve actually read a book where a character is simply playing along with the flow because it’s too exciting and they’re thinking about how they can use that story to tell others later.
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Anyway, that’s exactly what our female lead does, and she gets herself into the funniest situations simply to get a good story. But through all of this, we see her really grow into herself. She is such a writer, and what really stands out about her personality is the fact that she’s literally always chasing the drama.
Now, I talked earlier about the uncle’s comeuppance feeling very unsatisfying, and that’s because we spent a good deal of the book building up to something big.
Ideally, the climactic moment of the entire book should have been so shocking that it would justify all the buildup we had done up until that point but that just didn’t happen, and I was disappointed.
That’s not to say he doesn’t get his just deserts – he does – but with everything coming together, I expected whatever would come after to be much more intense, and that’s not what happens here.
On the flip side, what I will say was beyond satisfying was definitely the romantic connection between the male and female leads. I love reading books where the chemistry between characters is literally staring you in the face, and these two had some of the best romantic tension you can imagine.
I liked that the misunderstanding wasn’t used as a cheap plot device for their love story; their primary conflict came from outside factors. And I know I said earlier that I wouldn’t complain about this device because they now make sense to me – so I don’t mind a third-act breakup – it doesn’t mean I have to like it all the time.
In this particular book, I absolutely did not like it. It felt like it came out of nowhere, then it took a while before they got back together, and I just wanted them to reconcile faster, but I found that difficult.
So, the ending of this book felt a little rushed, but that’s not to say it affected the quality of the book as a whole. I just feel like the author tried to cram a lot into those final few pages.
This was definitely a very interesting read, and I would recommend it to anyone who wants the most gorgeous book on their bookshelf and also a sweet historical romance novel about two people finding a kind of love they never expected with each other.
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