Category: Contests/Giveaways

The Uncompromising Lord Flint by Virginia Heath #BlogTour, #Giveaway

On By TracyIn Blog Tour, Contests/Giveaways, Regency Era (1811-1820), Tracy's Reviews1 Comment

 

the uncompromising lord flint
The Uncompromising Lord Flint

Imprisoned by her past- Set free by her enemy!
Charged with high treason, Lady Jessamine Fane is under the watchful eye of icily calm Peter, Lord Flint. It’s a task this spy won’t be swayed from, no matter how alluring his prisoner! Only it’s not long before Flint realises that tenacious Jess hides a lifetime of pain. With so much at stake, can he afford to take a chance on their powerful attraction?

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Author Bio

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When Virginia Heath was a little girl it took her ages to fall asleep, so she made up stories in her head to help pass the time while she was staring at the ceiling. As she got older, the stories became more complicated, sometimes taking weeks to get to the happy ending. Then one day, she decided to embrace the insomnia and start writing them down. Despite that, it still takes her forever to fall asleep.
Social Media Links: Facebook ~ Twitter

Giveaway

 Win 2 x e-copies of The Uncompromising Lord Flint (Open INT)
*Terms and Conditions –Worldwide entries welcome. Please enter using the Rafflecopter box below. The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then I reserve the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will be passed to the giveaway organiser and used only for fulfilment of the prize, after which time I will delete the data. I am not responsible for dispatch or delivery of the prize.
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Tracy’s Review

The Uncompromising Lord Flint (The King's Elite #2)The Uncompromising Lord Flint by Virginia Heath

Tracy’s rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Series: The King’s Elite, #2

Release Date: December 27, 2018

Lady Jessamine “Jess” Fane has been captured and is being taken to London to face charges of treason. Her capture is a break for the King’s Elite who have been investigating the smuggling ring she is purported to be part of, she has been placed into the custody of one of the Elite’s best agents, Peter, Baron Flint.

Peter is immediately attracted to Jess, but a sad past history with female prisoners puts him on high alert from the start. He doesn’t want to feel sorry for her, he just wants to get her to London and be done with her. But Jess is not going to make it easy, she fights tooth and nail against incarceration and manages to escape more than once. She doesn’t trust anyone and has a very sad and horrifying past of her own. But Peter is the first person she can ever remember being kind to her. She has to decide if she can trust him with her secrets or should she hold her information close in case her mother’s lover Comte Saint-Aubin finds her. She is torn, she wants to make amends by revealing her knowledge to Peter, but knows that Saint-Aubin will track her to the ends of the earth and that she will never survive his “punishment”.

Things take a turn when Jess reveals that Saint-Aubin is following them, Peter feels protective of her and changes the plan. Instead of London, he takes her to his home and leaks false information to throw Saint-Aubin off their trail. Once in his home, Jess meets his mother and sisters (who provide much needed lightness to the story) and slowly Jess comes to trust Peter. And Peter decides to follow his heart to save the woman he realizes he loves. But despite the best laid plans, Saint-Aubin finds them and they will both have decisions to make, decisions that may ultimately cost them the chance for a HEA.

I really enjoyed this book, it is well written, flows nicely, has a lot of action, some witty banter, lots of secrets, a bit of “tomfoolery”, a cringe-worthy villain and wonderful secondary characters. My heart broke for the pain and suffering Jess endured and I fervently hoped she would get her HEA. The author is English and the spelling and turn of phrase might be a little confusing for American readers, but as my mother is English, nothing seemed out of the norm to me 🙂 There were a few phrases that were decidedly not Regency era and a couple of times when characters with titles were introduced incorrectly, but they were minor and didn’t impact the story. All in all, this was an amazing, emotional book and I would happily recommend it. It is the second book in the series, but it can absolutely be read as a stand-alone title with no problem at all.

*I am voluntarily leaving a review for an eARC that was provided to me*

 

Mistress Spy by Pamela Mingle #BlogTour, #Giveaway

On By TracyIn Blog Tour, Contests/Giveaways, Elizabethan Era (1558-1603), Tracy's Reviews2 Comments

Meet the Author:

Pamela Mingle is a former teacher and librarian who was fortunate enough to choose writing as a third career. Or maybe it chose her. 🙂 She loves to create romantic tales that play out against historical events and always includes some humor in her books.

Pam and her husband enjoy walking in the UK–even though she’s done her share of whining on those fifteen-mile days. The walking trips have been an ideal way to discover new settings for her books.

Pam loves to hear from readers. Go to her website, http://www.pammingle.com/ to sign up for her newsletter. Subscribers learn first about giveaways and exclusive-to-subscriber content. You can also contact her via her website.

Connect: Site | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads

About the Book:

A determined sister . . .
Madeleine Vernon’s dreams should be filled with elegant gowns and marriageable men. Instead, she dreams of avenging her brother’s death. But when she’s captured by the queen’s men, she’s forced to become a spy by her mysterious yet undeniably attractive captor.
A rakish spy . . .
After years of working for his father in Queen Elizabeth’s service, Nicholas Ryder is close to going his own way. But now he’s got a feisty beauty he must protect or risk her execution as a traitor to the crown. She’s a distraction he can’t afford, but he also can’t stop thinking about her.
A dangerous lie . . .
It is Nicholas’s job to foil plots against Elizabeth, and he sends Maddy into a household of suspected traitors to garner what information she can. As the line between captor and prisoner blurs, deceit, betrayal, and desire become a perilous mix. Ultimately, Nicholas must decide whether duty to the queen is more important than winning Maddy’s heart.
Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks | Kobo

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Giveaway:

  • $15 Amazon Gift Card!

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Tracy’s Review:

Mistress SpyMistress Spy by Pamela Mingle

Tracy’s rating: 3 of 5 stars

Madeleine “Maddy” Vernon is taken prisoner during a failed rebellion attempt. Maddy joined the rebellion to avenge her brother Robert’s death, he had been part of the previous uprising and was hanged as a traitor. While imprisoned, Maddy is brought before Nicholas Ryder.

Nicholas needs a spy, he offers Maddy a full pardon in exchange for her cooperation. She will be placed in service to Lady Jane Darce, a suspected sympathizer to Queen Mary of Scotland. Nicholas wants Maddy to find out if Lady Darce or her step-son have any plans on aiding Queen Mary.

Maddy has no desire to be a spy, but she has even less desire to hang. She agrees to work with Nicholas, but reminds herself that despite her attraction to him, Nicholas is not her friend.

The intrigue starts almost as soon as she arrives, a man from her past is there using a false name, but she doesn’t have a chance to tell Nicholas. Later she decides to keep that information to herself. She settles into a routine with Lady Darce and is able to glean a little information.

When she sees Nicholas again, she meets his ward/nephew Daniel. She is taken with the boy and admires Nicholas for his care of his nephew, who stopped speaking after his father’s death. She wonders if she misjudged Nicholas. She passes on some of what she has learned, but doesn’t tell him everything. Nicholas is fighting his attraction to her and when he learns that her brother is not dead and the Queen has pardoned her, he keeps that to himself – afraid she will leave if she learns the truth.

With danger, secrets, murder and intrigue dogging their every step, is it possible for them to find love?

I thought this book was well written, but I found it to be mediocre and I didn’t care for Maddy. I never understood her motivation for keeping information from Nicholas and thought the story lagged a bit in the middle. The love scenes where warm, but I honestly never “felt” the love between them, it was almost as if the author was writing a spy novel and halfway through remembered that it was supposed to be a romance and threw in the required elements. I had a hard time deciding how to rate this book and settled for 3 stars because as an intrigue novel, I would rate this 4 stars, but I would be hard pressed to give it more than 2 stars as a romance.

*I am voluntarily leaving a review for an eARC that was provided to me by NetGalley and the publisher*