Month: June 2022

romance, series

Bingeable series: Desperate Duchesses

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Yes I know I’ve already done a whole post of books on offer this week, but I spotted this one after I’d written the June Discounts post– and it inspired me to write a whole post. And yes, Villiers got a mention in the Reformed Rakes Recommendsday, but the rest of the series weren’t as good value at that point or I’d have done them a post of their own before this!

These are Georgian-set romances – which is an earlier and naughtier time than the Regency. In Georgette Heyer terms, we’re Masqueraders and These Old Shades sort of times, in fashion (as you can see from the cover pix) it’s bodices to the actual waist rather than the Empire-lines of Bridgerton. Kiera Knightley’s Pride and Prejudice rather than Jennifer Ehle. In trope terms we’ve got a several already married couples among the duchesses with a variety of issues, as well as a cross dressing plot, so some of my favourite things. And then there is Villiers – as previously mentioned, the rake of rakes who gets his book at the end of the series when you’ve had time to watch him develop.T

These were written in the late 2000s – and the first four got a UK release, making them on of the first series I discovered when rampaging through my local library in search of more books like Julia Quinn. So if you’ve read the Bridgerton books after watching the Netflix series, these were written around the same time and gave the same sort levels of heat. There were six books in the initial Desperate Duchesses series, but there’s a spin off Desperate Duchesses By Numbers that Amazon and Kindle count as the same series but is a second generation so if you like them, there are 9 to binge on – and if you read the first six, you’ll figure out whose second generation it is and who you’ll get to see again. I think the later ones are slightly more steamy, but still fairly restrained by the levels you see in contemporary romance novels written at the same sort of time.

Hilariously you can chart the progress of historical romance availability by looking at how I consumed this series: I read the first four from the library, I own three in the American step back editions – the final two because they weren’t available in the UK in paperback or on kindle and Duchess by a Night because it was my favourite of the first four and I wanted to read it again and had moved away from the library service who had copies. And when I ordered it, the copy that turned up was the US version not the UK one. And then I have the Desperate Duchesses by Numbers on the kindle because that had changes by the time they came out!

Anyway, if you want to start a binge, Desperate Duchesses – aka the first book in the series is on offer for 99p on Kindle and the rest of the early books in the series are also quite cheap right now.

Happy Friday!

not a book, theatre

Not a Book: Ben De La Creme

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We interrupt our scheduled programming for a rare midweek Not a Book post – because what’s the point of a review of a show if the show is already over…

Ben De La Crème’s new one woman show is called Ready to be Committed and it follows my favourite drag Queen as she tries to get married so she doesn’t end up alone and eaten by cats. The only problem, is well, everything – starting with the fact that she doesn’t have a groom. Over the course of the show De La goes on to breakdown marriage and the patriarchy in a style that she describes at the start as “take the smart but make it stupid”. She sings, she raps, she dances and she plays *all* the characters – including wedding cake toppers and a sentient Dorito.

And it’s very funny. De La’s character is a twist on a 50s-y ingenue and that makes her search for a husband (on Grindr) cringingly brilliant. It’s also very clever – think adult drag Queen Horrible Histories and you get a bit of a sense of some of it. And De La knows what she’s doing – most of the audience, like me were there because they had seen her on Drag Race rather than because they’d seen her live before (I know because she checked!) and she swept us all up in the personality that you knew from the show, but demonstrated that she has more range and versatility than you expected. And if you saw her on All Stars you already knew she was good.

This has been in my diary for two years – I originally bought a ticket to see this in February 2020 and it was one of the first casualties of the pandemic in my ticket box. I had the option to rearrange my ticket in to her Christmas show with Jinx Monsoon, but I hung on for Ready to be Committed and I’m so glad I did. Tuesday night when I went was the first night and it wasn’t full, so if you like the sound of it from the review you might be able to get a ticket, although I’m hoping for De La’s sake that it’s all sold out now! Run don’t walk!

Ben De La Creme is at the Leicester Square Theatre until Saturday, in Brighton on Sunday and then Manchester on Tuesday. Then she goes back to the US where the tour continues…

book round-ups, Recommendsday

Recommendsday: June Kindle offers

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I’m trying a new thing this month, and doing a round up of good books that are on offer on Kindle in the UK at the moment. Now this will only work if there are books that I’ve read on offer, so who knows if it’ll be a regular thing!

Cover montage

First up is recent release Book Lovers, which I did a post about the day it came out, and which is now 99p. Perfect for reading on a sun lounger. And if you’re into Bridgerton and have already read the whole series, Just Like Heaven, the first book in Julia Quinn’s Smythe Smith series is 99p. I bought the paperback back when it first came out – in my pre-Kindle let along pre-blog days. The series is is about a group of young ladies who play in a string quartet – most of whom are oblivious to the fact that the music they play sounds terrible. Honoria is the exception – she knows they’re awful and she’s determined to get married so she doesn’t have to play any more. The hero is her brother’s best friend who is meant to be looking out for her and keeping her out of trouble…

I wrote about Paula Byrne’s biography of Barbara Pym a few months back and now the first Barbara Pym novel I read is on offer – ok the Kindle edition of Excellent Women isn’t as pretty as my designer hardback, but for 99p you don’t expect it to be. In other books I’ve mentioned recently, the first Nicola Upson Josephine Tey novel An Expert in Murder is 99p as well as Dear Little Corpses, the latest.

In other books I have recently mentioned, Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep, which came up in my books set in schools post, is also 99p, as is Three Sisters, Three Queens which one of the later Philippa Gregory Tudor books that I haven’t read yet! You’ll probably have noticed Sarah Morgan’s Beach House Summer on my in progress list – but it’s 99p at the moment as well if you want to try and finish it before me!

In past books of the week that are on offer, T J Klune The House in the Cerulean Sea was one last year, Lyssa Kay Adams’s The Bromance Book Club was one in 2019. In Authors who I like, but who I haven’t read *this* one of – there’s Ian Mortimer’s A Time Traveller’s Guide to Medieval Britain – I’ve listened to the Elizabethan and Restoration ones of these on audiobook and they’re lovely, but I’ve never read (or listened to) this one.

There’s almost always a Terry Pratchett book on offer – that’s how I’ve picked up my Kindle copies to supplement my hard copies. This month it’s Eric (which I haven’t read in ages) and the very first one, the Colour of Magic, which as I explain in Where to start with Terry Pratchett isn’t actually where I tell people to start usually! Sadly the deal on Wee Free Men was a one day one, but it will come around again I’m sure.

In books I own but haven’t read yet, there is The Strawberry Thief, the fourth in Joanne Harris’s Chocolate series. Charlie Homberg’s The Paper Magician – which is the first in the series is 99p, books 2 and 3 are £1 each and only book 4 is not on offer (and the whole series is in Kindle Unlimited ). Rose Tremain’s The Gustav Sonata, is one of two of hers sitting on the tbr shelf I think! Harriet Evans’ latest The Beloved Girls is 99p again too – I bought it last time it was on offer! There’s also Labyrinth by Kate Mosse, which I really need to read as I have a hard copy I borrowed from a friend about a year ago sitting on my bureau…

I read Umberto Eco’s In the Name of the Rose as part of my history degree, and I think £1.99 is a bit of a bargain for it, plus the latest cover is gorgeous. It was adapted for TV the other year, which was an interesting watch as it was much more violent than I remembered!

And finally, because this post has got super long, in books I mention because other people liked them but I didn’t, (and really didn’t in this case) there is Claire Lombardo’s The Most Fun We Ever Had, which was even long listed for the Women’s Prize, which just goes to prove everything I’ve ever said about me and award nominated (or winning) novels!

Enjoy – I hope I haven’t cost you all too much money

Book of the Week, graphic novels

Book of the Week: Bloodlust and Bonnets

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It was a really fun week of reading last week – and I had a few options for this today. But I decided to pick a graphic novel for the first time in a long time this week and it’s a really fun one.

Bloodlust and Bonnets is a pastiche of romantic literature, where a trio of misfits go chasing after vampires for Reasons. Lucy is an innocent and highly suggestible debutant. Shram is a mysterious bounty Hunter. Lord Byron is, well Lord Byron. There is a psychic eagle and a talking castle and lies, flirting and manipulation. And lots of gory slapstick stuff. It’s a lot of fun and very clever.

With my poor record of having read the classics, I think I’ve read more books about Romantic literature or pastiching romantic literature than I’ve actually read of actual classic novels this is based on, but I still got most of the jokes – especially about Byron after I read The House of Byron last year. And I really love Emily McGovern’s art – I have one of her Life as a Background Slytherin prints on my kitchen wall – and this is just as delightful. She does so much with not many lines and it’s so clever. As you can see from the cover, the faces are basically eyebrows and dots and yet they convey so much. It’s a delightful way to spend a few hours. This was McGovern’s first graphic novel – her second, Twelve Percent Dread, is out in July and I already have it on order at the comic book store.

My copy of Bloodlust and Bonnets came from my local comic store, and you should try yours first for it too – if they don’t have it they can order it in for you. Otherwise, you should be able to order it from the usual sources.

Happy reading!

books, stats, The pile, week in books

The Week in Books: May 30 – June 5

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Well that was quite a weekend. The Platinum Jubilee was quite a spectacle – and the weather in my part of the world was quite a ride! I had a good week in reading too – even if the rain showers meant I still haven’t got the hammock out. But that will come. Another week with a lot of authors I’ve read before in the list, but I’ve started some new to me authors too – including a few books from last month’s Books Incoming post.

Read:

A Reconstructed Corpse by Simon Brett

Jumping Jenny by Anthony Berkeley

Making Money by Terry Pratchett

Raisins and Almonds by Kerry Greenwood

Mirror Lake by Juneau Black*

Paint the Down Dead by Nancy Silver

Cinderella Goes to the Morgue by Nancy Spain

Bloodlust and Bonnets by Emily McGovern

A Likely Story by Jenn McKinlay

Started:

Death in Fancy Dress by Anthony Gilbert

The Intoxicating Mr Lavelle by Neil Blackmore

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

Still reading:

Paper Lion by George Plimpton

Plan for the Worst by Jodi Taylor

Miss Aldridge Regrets by Louise Hare*

Beach House Summer by Sarah Morgan*

One pre-order and one kindle purchase. Very restrained given I had a four day weekend!

Bonus photo: We went for a delightful wood around a forest near us on Friday – so here is part of my slice of the British countryside in early summer.

A woodland path

An * next to a book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley

 

not a book

Not a book: Jubilee fete picture dump!

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I haven’t been in London for the Platinum Jubilee, but we have been out and about a little bit to mark the occasion – after all it could be a while before we have another one!

Here we have a traditional English fête…
Complete with rainstorm and hiding in a tent
There was a dog show – this is the most regal category
and a tug of war competition,
A motorbike and car show,
a pipe band
And jubilee themed ice cream!
book round-ups, historical

Platinum Jubilee: Royal-related books…

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As I said yesterday, it’s the Platinum Jubilee holidays here this (long) weekend, so today I thought I’d do a recap of the various royal related books I’ve talked about here over the years. I’m going to try and work my way back in time rather than split this into fiction and non-fiction. We’ll see how that goes…

I took this on Wednesday in my favourite Italian deli when I was buying lunch. It just tickled me!

To start with, I did a post about books featuring the Queen back on the actual anniversary of her accession. Then from the pre Elizabeth II half of the twentieth century we have in non-fiction: Andrew Lownie’s Traitor King about Edward VIII after his abdication, Mary S Lovell’s The Riviera Set which also features the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in the background. In fiction there is TP Fielden’s Stealing the Crown mystery set in Buckingham Palace during World War II, the Royal Spyness series of mystery books and Deanna Raybourn’s Veronica Speedwell books have more than one royal connection across the series so far. Oh and don’t forget my beloved Gone With The Windsors by Laurie Graham – what would Maybell say if I didn’t mention her experiences with Wallis Simpson and Edward VIII?

Back into the nineteenth century now and I have a whole post about books related to Queen Victoria’s Dynasty and there’s more on Hannah Pakula’s An Uncommon Woman about Princess Victoria, Queen Victoria’s eldest daughter and wife of Kaiser here as well. There’s also Greedy Queen about the food that Queen Victoria ate. Daisy Goodwin’s The Fortune Hunter features Empress Sisi of Austria and a cameo from Queen Victoria and John Brown. Pre Queen Victoria there’s a royal connection in Georgette Heyer’s Regency Buck. Honorable mention to the Pink Carnation series, which features Royalist plots, the Napoleonic Empire and Sultans at various points so could rightly be considered Royal Related. In fantasy novels, both Zen Cho’s Sorcerer to the Crown and V E Schwab’s Shades of Magic trilogy are set in alternate universe Regency Londons as is a lot of Gail Carriger’s Parasolverse.

Pre-nineteenth century I’ve written about a lot less royals – here at least, although there are reviews of more over on my Goodreads profile if you can find them. But there’s still Simon Sebag Montefiore’s The Romanovs (I’m still not past the Napoleonic era), David Starkey’s Elizabeth about Elizabeth I, yesterday’s post about Philippa Gregory’s Tudor novels and some of Shakespeare’s various Kings get a mention in my post about Sir Antony Sher. I really should try and write some more here about of it. After all I was a history student at university and I’ve read a lot on the French Revolution, the French monarchy, and the Stuarts – even if not all of it is royal related. I must pull my socks up and do better in future. I think I’ve got at least half a dozen bits on the to read shelves virtual and physical at the moment that could fit in this post- including more than one about Charles II and about the Bourbon Kings.

I also did a whole post of Royal Romances – which covers a whole bunch of different time periods so I’m putting it on the end, but there’s also Talia Hibbert’s The Princess Trap which is a contemporary romance. I also wanted to mention Tomi Adeyemi’s Children of Blood and Bone set in a West Africa inspired magical world which has a heroine fighting the monarchy to return magic to the people.

And if this doesn’t break WordPress’s little brain with all the links back to my own blog, I don’t know what will. Have a great weekend everyone!

historical, series

Series: Philippa Gregory’s Tudor novels

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Today is day two of the bumper bank holiday weekend here in the UK to mark the Platinum Jubilee. I wanted to write a post about a royal related series today to tie in, so I’m going back in history for Philippa Gregory’s historical novels about the Tudor Royals and adjacent families.

Covers of The Constant Princess, The Boleyn Inheritance, The Queen's Fool and The Virgin's Lover

Now this is a complicated series to write about because although they are lumped now together on Philippa Gregory’s website, on Goodreads and on Amazon as the Plantagenet and Tudor novels, they used to be two listed as two distinct series – the Tudor Court and The Cousins’ War. And I agreed with that because the Cousin’s War books have magic in them and the Tudor Court does not which to me suggests that they can’t really be seen as being in the same timeline. And the order that they were written is not at all the chronological order either. The magic issue is also one of the reasons why I haven’t read all of them – after the magic in The White Queen I didn’t fancy doing the others in that part of the series. The other is that as the series has gone on we’ve got into some of the figures where I know it ends badly (as in beheadings) and as we know I’m not always in the mood for that. I’d also not really appreciated exactly how many of them there are now – because I have been ignoring the potentially magic including newer titles…

So really I suppose I’m writing about the first five to be published: The Other Boleyn Girl, the Queen’s Fool, The Virgin’s Lover, the Constant Princess and the Boleyn Inheritance which cover (in the order I’ve given the titles) Anne Boleyn’s rise and fall, the changing fortunes of Henry VIII’s two daughters during the decade from the late 1540s to the late 1550s, Robert Dudley’s time as favourite of Elizabeth I, Catherine of Aragon’s time in England and the fourth and fifth marriages of Henry VIII. From this you can see that they are not exactly chronological – and have now ended up being (again in the order I gave the titles at the start of this paragraph) books 9, 12, 13, 6 and 10 in the amalgamated Plantagnet and Tudor series! There is a sixth book from this phase in Philippa Gregory’s career – The Other Queen, about Bess of Hardwick and Mary, Queen of Scots – which I haven’t read, but writing this post has reminded me that I would like to!

Anyway, I first read the Other Boleyn Girl back when I was at university and borrowed it off my sister in the holidays. I have a vivid memory of buying the Airport Paperback edition of The Virgin’s Lover at Stansted on my way to Tours during my year abroad and can see it now sitting on the bookshelf in my room in halls there. The others were bought either by my sister of me and we shared our copies between us – which probably explains why I don’t have any of them in my house anymore. I reread the Virgin’s Lover a few times during my time in Tours – because I didn’t have many books in English and buying more was expensive – and reread the others too at the time but I haven’t read any of them for a while.

Of course this means I’m not quite sure how they stand up these days, but I remember them as fun historical romps which were accurate enough in terms of the time line of things happening, but took a lot of liberties with what the actual people got up to. If you went to school in Britain, it would be nearly impossible not to know the vague outline of events – because as Greg Jenner says in Ask a Historian we have a national obsession with the Tudors. But even knowing what happens, it’s still a really good read to get there – and the books often focus on side characters whose stories intersects with the Big Figures rather than the figures themselves which means you can still hope for a happy ending (for Mary Boleyn in the Other Boleyn Girl for example) or for comeuppance (for Jane Boleyn for example!) as well as trying to work out where the liberties are being taken with the timeline and historical fact if you’re a history student!

I have two of the later books sitting unread on my kindle because they’ve been Kindle Daily Deals at some point – although I think little sister has read them – and once I get my new library card, I will look at filling in some more of the gaps in the Tudor section of the series without the risk of buying (more?) books with magic in them that I will give up on! You should be able to get hold of any of these very easily – Philippa Gregory is in practically every bookshop, they’re also often in the second hand and charity bookshops and they’re on all the ebook platforms too. They’ve been through several editions – the covers I have in the photo for the post are the current Kindle ones, which are totally different to the ones my old paperbacks had and there are several different styles that I’ve seen in the shops too.

Happy Friday everyone – whether it’s day two of the four day Jubilee weekend or the eve of the Whit weekend or just a normal Friday!

books, stats

May Stats

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Books read this month: 33*

New books: 20

Re-reads: 13 (5 audiobooks, 8 books)

Books from the to-read pile: 5

NetGalley books read: 9

Kindle Unlimited read: 4

Ebooks: 7

Library books: 2 (all ebooks)

Audiobooks: 6

Non-fiction books: 2

Favourite book this month: hard to chose this month – because there were a bunch of 5 star books – but I’m going to go with The Young Pretenders.

Most read author: Elizabeth Peters – 5 Vicky Bliss novels on the reread and an Amelia Peabody audiobook!

Books bought: 3 books at the work book sale, 1 book ordered online, 1 pre-order, 1 ebook. Considering the number of books in the Books Incoming post a few weeks back, this surprised me. But when I checked, it was right – three from the book sale, three pre-orders that already got counted in previous months, the Young Pretenders which arrived April after the Books Incoming post (and was a Persephone subscription book anyway so not bought by me) and the Bonnie Garmus which I ordered in April but arrived in May. So that really does just leave the Jenn McKinlay Book Lovers mystery!

Books read in 2022: 166

Books on the Goodreads to-read shelf (I don’t have copies of all of these!): 660 – this number never really goes down, but it has gone up by a lot this month because there’s been a bunch of series with new books announced or where I hadn’t added the unread ones to the list, but I also updated it to add some stuff from the to read shelf that wasn’t on there and my new acquisitions…

I’ve been more than usually chatty in this post already, but it really was a good month of reading in May. I read a lot of new releases, and I think I have less books in the NetGalley backlog than I did at the start of the month, even if I didn’t read all the May releases. I’ve managed to be restrained with my requesting for June, so if I can control my virulent re-reading urges, I should be able to reduce the list further in June. Speaking of re-reading, I’ve really enjoyed revisiting the Vicky Bliss books – I think you can expect a Series I Love post soon – and I’ve carried on with the Phryne Fisher re-read too. I’m going to need to try and actually go to the library in June too – as my library card has expired, so if I don’t, the library book list is about to dry up! And I read a fair few actual books in May – but I’m still behind on my goal for that for the year, so a big effort coming in June to try and catch up. All I need to do is get the hammock out and into the garden ready for summer reading now…

Bonus picture: a month in Wisteria. How could I resist doing a mash up when I’ve enjoyed watching it happen so much on my walks from Euston to the office!

*Usually includes some short stories/novellas/comics/graphic novels, but for the second month in a row it doesn’t!

Recommendsday

May Quick Reviews

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It’s the first day of June – but it’s also a Wednesday so it’s time for some more quick reviews. This is a somewhat shorter post than usual this month (who knew that was even possible) because I’ve already talked about so many of the books that I read that weren’t rereads. But I have still managed to find some books to talk about! However I would say this is very much a post of books where I have a but in my thoughts about them!

Jumping Jenny by Anthony Berkeley

So this was one I started when I was working on the British Library Crime Classic post and didn’t get finished in time because I got distracted by rereading Vicky Bliss! Anyway, this is another Roger Sheringham mystery (the next in the series after Murder in the Basement in fact) and is quite hard to write about without giving more spoilers than I should. Roger is attending a fancy dress house party where the theme is murderers when the horrible wife of one of the other guests is found murdered. Berkeley enjoyed playing with the genre and genre conventions – and if in Body in the Basement you spent a lot of the book trying to find out who the body is, in this he is playing with another aspect of the genre. I didn’t find it entirely satisfying and it’s not quite playing fair with the rules of the time either and that’s about all I can say – but if you read it you’ll probably be able to work out what my issues are. Aside from the spoilers issues, I’m not sure that Berkeley really liked women, but there are quite a few like that from his era so that’s not entirely unexpected.

Set on You by Amy Lea*

I read this in an incredibly busy week of new books so this got skipped at the time because I didn’t love it the way that I loved Lady’s Guide to Fortune Hunting or Book Lovers. Crystal is a successful curvy fitness influencer, Scott is her gym nemesis. But when her grandmother announces she’s getting remarried, it turns out that Scott is about to be part of the family. In the run up to the wedding the two grow closer, until the internet threatens to tear them apart. This is a romantic comedy where I liked the characters and I liked some aspects of the way their romance unfolded – but the start of the novel where they’re irritating each other didn’t work for me – and some of the resolution of it didn’t work for me either. But we know I have issues with pranks in novels (see previous reviews for some of the early Christina Laurens) but in between there was flirty, romantic fun with a main character who has more going on that just the romance, and a hero who is just about adorable once you find out what he is really like. Also I really liked the extended families. I will definitely watch out for more from Amy Lea.

Hotel Magnifique by Emily J Taylor*

I also just wanted to give a mention to Hotel Magnifique – which was not for me but I’m sure will suit other people. Jani and her sister get jobs at the magical Hotel Magnifique because Jani thinks it’s the way to a better future for them and an adventure as it moves from place to place each day. But behind the doors of the hotel, things are not what they seem and soon Jani is fighting to free herself, her sister and the other staff from the Magic. I was hoping for something similar to the Night Circus but YA and although it starts like that, it’s not how it carries on. I found the heroine quite hard to like, the magic is hard to understand and it all gets a bit brutal. The closest I can get for a description is the closest I can get is Dystopian YA Magic. And that’s still not quite right. I see some people comparing it to Caravel but it’s hard to tell without having read that. This has reminded me thatI really do need to try and read Caravel…

And that’s your lot. It’s a bank holiday here tomorrow, but you’ll get your stats as usual.