An entertaining treat with enough history to satisfy serious-minded readers.
Jane Austen meets Bleak House in an engaging historical novel about the demands of marriage in late 18th-century England.
The first installment in a proposed trilogy, the book centers on Mary Cole, a Gloucester butcher’s daughter whose chief virtue is an unalterable sense of goodness, a quality hard to maintain as the youngest sister of two unapologetic harlots. Barely 16 years old, Mary catches the eye of notorious lothario Frederick Augustus, the 5th Earl of Berkeley, who has always sworn to avoid the prison of marriage. Frederick senses that a beautiful saint like Mary can save him from his immoral ways and stops at nothing to seduce her. When she refuses his advances, he manipulates her family’s dire economic state and tricks her into unwedded communion. Despite Mary’s true love for James Perry, an aspiring young lawyer with only the purest of intentions, she gives up her happiness to save her family. Answering demands that they marry, Frederick sets up a fraudulent marriage contract, one that he convinces Mary can never be revealed because of her low social status and the indecent reputation of her sisters. During the next 15 years, she bears a half-dozen children and potential heirs but finds that claiming a birthright for her seemingly illegitimate sons will become the fight of her life. Through the narrative thread concerning Frederick’s aversion to marriage, Cole explores the marital adventures of Frederick’s close friend the Prince of Wales, whose desire for the twice-widowed Maria Fitzherbert runs afoul of the Royal Marriages Act of 1772–it prohibits the prince from marrying without the consent of his father King George III, who disapproves of the widow’s Catholic faith. The novel moves along like a runaway carriage and features many delectable trappings–chance encounters at the opera, duplicitous servants, church officials taken to drink and hidden agendas–found in the very best Victorian novels.
An entertaining treat with enough history to satisfy serious-minded readers.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-9556877-1-6
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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