Diane Gaston

Of the three authors I was looking forward to Marlowe the best. I've read her previous titles (An Improper Aristocrat by Deb Marlowe , Her Cinderella Season by Deb Marlowe) and enjoyed them immensely. McCabe and Gaston I know I've read before as well, but not as recently.

As a concept I think it was intriguing and full of possibilities. Its also possibly one of the more outlandish premises I've read in any historical novel. Its a 'Yours, Mine and Ours' set up--Manning had his 2 legal sons by his legal wife (Nicholas and Stephen), and his out of wedlock daughter Justine (from a previous liaison), the Duchess has her one legal son by her legal husband (Brenner) and together Manning and the Duchess had 3 children--2 girls and 1 boy (Leo, Annalise and Charlotte). Of all the children Brenner is the only one not to have grown up as part of the 'Fitzmanning Miscellany' as the group is called.

Gaston tackles the story of Brenner, made messenger by his recently departed mother the Duchess (having died on her honey moon trip with Manning) and his romance with Justine. Its a rather dry romance, with both being uncertain and afraid for their own reasons, but sweetly responsive to each other. The more interesting tale was of the Fitzmanning brood and how Brenner dealt with them. His stable, steadfast personality is a wonderful thing for the household and all the children had grown up in awe and respect of him even though they never met him.

Marlowe's story about Annalise and Ned, a friend of Nicholas', is far more spirited though still oddly subdued. The title is misleading as Ned is less of a rake and more like a regular young man of the ton. He doesn't purposely set out to seduce Annalise and is almost resistant because of the secret he harbors. The story takes place roughly a year later, but things haven't changed overmuch with the brood it would seem.

McCabe's story is about the youngest, Charlotte and her long time crush Drew. This story rather hot and cold for me. On the one hand I'm always in favor of long time crushes coming to fruition--who doesn't want their first crush to turn out to be their true love? On the other I think that Charlotte came off less of an ardent admirer and more of a stalker at times. It wasn't any one thing exactly, but she just seemed obsessive in a bad way.

I would have preferred if this had been a series of novels instead of three short stories--this easily could have been 6 books long, one for each kid's romance and it would have given me a better view of each of their individual personalities and traits. As it stood however the three boys--Nicholas, Stephen and Leo--were almost interchangeable at times. Less so in Marlowe's story, where Stephen is clearly the one who plays the most jokes on his siblings, but the fact remained that the overall premise didn't feel like it ended.… (more)

When respectable Miss Morgana Hart realizes her young maid intends to run away with a scoundrel and join a bawdy house, Morgana intends to stop her by any means necessary. She just never expected a dashing, rakish stranger to help her in the middle of a dark park as she’s fighting with said scoundrel.
All Cyprian Sloane wants is respectability. He’s lived the life of a carefree rake, a smuggler, and an English spy, but he couldn’t stop himself from helping the woman and her charges. Then he learns Morgana is the cousin of the flirtatious debutante he’s courting. Though Morgana intrigues him, he’s determined to woo and marry Lady Hannah for her family’s connections. Once Morgana embarks on a crusade to help Lucy and a few other unfortunate girls (teenage prostitutes) to better themselves in their scandalous lifestyle (to become courtesans), Sloane sees the proper future he envisioned for himself slipping away. After all, he cannot allow Morgana to delve into London’s underworld and expect her to survive. Likewise, with his stained reputation, society would surely blame him for Morgana’s actions, especially since he’s her next-door neighbor. The only thing for him to do is help her run the “courtesan school” and introduce her to decent-enough people in that seedy world.
There was a lot of sexual tension between Morgana and Sloane, but very little romance, at least until the last quarter of the book. He’s determined to marry Hannah, and Morgana is determined to make sure he does. They’re both likable characters and their motivations for their actions are honorable.
A few loose ends aren’t tied up, so I have some questions. Mainly, I want to know what Sloane did that was so horrible during his time as a spy (he’s keeping this a secret even from Morgana) and I want to know about his past relationship with Harriette. Harriette is a courtesan, so it’s likely she and Sloane have been intimate, but Sloane has stated he’s never paid for a woman, so that leads to confusion.
The story is written in British English, which I enjoyed, but the single quotation marks for dialogue was hard to read. There were formatting issues in my print copy, such as the use of both normal and large font size for words.
Overall, I liked the plot and the characters, but I wish Sloane and Morgana would’ve spent more time developing their relationship than trying to manage the four girls in Morgana’s care.
3 Stars
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If you liked Sanditon on PBS you will enjoy Gaston's latest that features Marcus Wolfdon, a diplomat who meets Juliana, a proper young lady, introduced as the cousin of the Countess of Ashcourt at the Circulating Library. Wolf has been called to Brighton to keep an eye on his profligate parents even if he can't keep them out of trouble. He recognizes Juliana as a gambler he spent a passionate night with in Paris only to wake up to empty pockets and an empty room so he knows some kind of scam is afoot. Gamblers and grifters abound along with clever twists, turns and even sunken treasure, as members of the ton enjoy sea side days in Brighton. This delightful summer read is a page turner. --Diana Tixier Herald… (more)

I found it difficult to put this story of a girl trying to rescue her brother from his own stupidity and finding love, previously lost, along the way. Features the Battle that became Waterloo and the ball before it that Georgette Heyer mentioned.
There were some times that the characters behaved in very 21st Century ways but overall I was rooting for the characters to do well and to get their HEA. The brother did almost deserve what happened to him for how he treated Helene. Both Helene and her brother have to face some very gory facts about war and I'm sure it will feature in further books in this series, her brother now has serious mental damage… (more)