Month: May 2022

Desperate Daughters: A Bluestocking Belles Collection With Friends by Bluestocking Belles

On By BarbaraIn Anthology, Barb's Reviews, Regency Era (1811-1820)Leave a comment

Desperate Daughters: A Bluestocking Belles Collection With FriendsBarbara’s rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Series: A Bluestocking Belles Collection With Friends
Publication Date: 5/8/22
Period: Regency York

If you read the book synopsis, you know that the Earl of Seahaven desperately wanted an heir, but after 5 wives and nine daughters, he died without that heir. The stories in this anthology show the struggle they went through when they were left practically penniless and how each of them – including his young countess – found their HEAs. Each of the stories is very well written and I think you will like all of them. With this book, as with all books with this premise, I have to wonder how Seahaven, who loved his family but was old, could leave his family with NO protection. Yes, titles are entailed as are major properties, but there is also bound to be some associated wealth and/or properties that are unentailed. Anyway – that aside, the stories are great and I love how each of the ladies used their unique talents to contribute to the welfare of them all.

You’ll find each story unique and special:

Caroline Warfield’s hotel employee, Lady Dorothea (Doro), and her curate Mr. Clark find their future in Lady Dorothea’s Curate.
Mary Lancaster’s musician, Lady Barbara, and Jack Sutton play a merry tune in Concerto
Rue Allyn’s historian, Elizabeth (Bess), and Malcolm K. Marr discover hidden identities in The Butler and the Bluestocking.
Elizabeth Ellen Carter’s artistic twins Ivy and Iris, who have vowed to only marry brothers, race to find that cousins can be as close as brothers in The Four-to-One Fancy.
Jude Knight’s Chloe (A cousin to the sisters) isn’t fashionable in any way but finds that she fits very nicely with Dom Finchley in Lord Cuckoo Comes Home.
Ella Quinn’s Miss Harriett Staunton and Lord Sextus (don’t you love it) Trevor, go to great lengths to out-maneuver the Duke of Somerset in I’ll Always Be Yours
Alina K. Fields’s Lady Honoria Twisden and Major August Kellborn stirs your heart in Lady Twisden’s Picture
Meara Platt’s botanist, Lady Josefina, and the Duke of Bourne find the cure for their lonely hearts in A Duke for Josefina
Sherry Ewing’s young dowager countess, Patience Bigglesworth, and Richard, Viscount Cranfield finally succumb to fate and find their HEA in A Countess To Remember.

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The Shadow of Memory by Connie Berry

On By BarbaraIn Barb's Reviews, Contemporary, Mystery, Part of a SeriesLeave a comment

The Shadow of Memory (Kate Hamilton Mysteries, #4)

Barbara’s rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Series: Kate Hamilton Mysteries #4
Publication Date: 5/10/22
Period: Contemporary Suffolk, England
Number of Pages: 352

When the past comes back to haunt us, it can leave a twisted trail of dead bodies. American antiques dealer, Kate Hamilton, and her friend Vivian Bunn are returning home from a ‘Hen Party’ when they discover a man’s body. The man is a stranger in their quiet village of Long Barston because nobody recognizes him. So, why is he laying dead on a pathway in their cemetery? He’s in his seventies, maybe he had a heart attack – or not.

When Kate’s fiancée, DCI Tom Mallory shows up to investigate, they can’t find any identification on the man, nor any sign of his car. Yet, the autopsy shows he died from a bee sting – natural causes then – or not.

While Tom is busy investigating the man’s death, Kate and local fine antiques dealer Ivor Tweedy head to the coast to do some appraisals and perhaps secure a commission to auction off some of those antiques – including an almost priceless painting. Unless that painting is really genuine – or is it?

When the body is identified as someone who had been a friend of Vivian’s sixty years ago, Kate and Vivian want to know more about him and why he was in Long Barston. Over sixty years ago, a teenage Vivian and her family spent time at a coastal resort each summer. There, Vivian, along with four other friends, discovered an abandoned house that appeared to be the scene of a crime. The friends went back to the home several times collecting ‘evidence’ and trying to deduce what had happened. Vivian had a crush on the boy who had found the abandoned house and who acted as their leader. Vivian had never forgotten him – and now – he was lying dead in the local morgue.

As Kate begins to try to learn more about the man, she learns that others from that group have just recently met their end. Could all of those current deaths be related to the events of sixty years ago? They were just kids – and they certainly didn’t learn anything – why would someone be coming after them now? Kate didn’t know, but she did know she had to keep Vivian safe.

Tom and Kate are trying to plan their wedding and decide where they’ll live – in the US or England – while also trying to solve the many mysteries that are cropping up in this case.

I can highly recommend this read. The characters are so very likable and I’ve come to love them as I’ve learned more about them. I love that Tom and Kate are older and have an appreciation for the life they have and the love they now share. You’ll love the mystery because it really is filled with twists and turns and you won’t guess the culprit until the end.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

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