Barbara HazardRecensioni

Ha they get MARRIED at Christmas (it's not a spoiler, this IS a romance) so counts as holidays.

If I had to guess Barbara Hazard was one of my top 5 favorite Regency authors in my teens. Her books were almost always auto-buys for me and indeed I bought this one new from Borders when it came out in 2001.

I mainly remember enjoying this because it was very different from the other Regencies at the time. It was told in first person, had a bit of a gothic mystery attached to it and while the romance was good it didn't seem the main focus.

In a lot of ways it reminded me of Northanger Abbey actually.

On re-read I still believe all of that...though find the heroine as clueless as a doorknob in many of the scenes. Indeed late in the book when she claims not to be blind to her brother's flaws despite loving him I rolled my eyes so hard I thought the one had popped out.

The back cover lies, she's not as practical as she seems - just next to her reprobate brother she's a bloody Saint.

That all being said, and even knowing some of the twists, I still enjoyed this and liked that the hero comes to his realization quickly and the works to secure her hand by dealing with her problems.

THE CLOISONNÉ LOCKET, by Barbara Hazard, has all the makings of a particularly fun gothic romance. A beautiful young girl, innocent to the ways of the world; a cynical jaded Duke attracted to her; a certifiably insane, reclusive relative and a revenge plot decades in the making. This is in fact categorized under the heading of 'Regency Romance', but the atmosphere is very foreboding.

Poor Rosemary Barton can't help how she looks—an exotic beauty she inherited from her Italian mother, she had spent the last eight years of her life with her father's sister, Mary Fleming, and her family. A more unremarkable family you shall be hard to meet. With her older cousin about to be set out into society, Aunt Mary turns a jealous eye towards her niece and sends her packing to her reclusive cousin Emily in London. A worse mistake she could never have made.

Hazard does a very good job of setting up the eeriness of Rosemary's new surroundings with Emily. Cantankerous old servants, dingy living conditions and Emily contemptuously telling her that she never wants to know she is even in the same house, all serve to make the reader understand Rosemary's dismay. Her one ray of light at first is her Aunt Mary's childhood friend, the dashing Lady Agatha, wife of a diplomat. She takes Rosemary under her wing and offers her the life all girls her age dream of.

If only I could be as happy with the Duke! From his very first meeting with Rosemary he is antagonistic, ungentlemanly, and outright accusatory of her actions. Further meetings yield scathing glares, disdainful sneers and more mocking words. He is convinced, merely because of how she looks and his own inflated ego, that she is chasing after him. That everything she says, or does, is merely meant to entrap him. It's obvious he is attracted to her, but until the last quarter of the book you'd never guess he was in love with her.

The other cast of characters—from his flighty card-happy mother, his younger crippled sister, prudish wannabe fiancée and Emily's own sleazy nephew—all serve their purposes well. I will say out of them all, his mother gave me the most surprise later in the book.

I do have a few minor problems with the book, such as what would happen exactly when Rosemary told her aunt of Emily's insanity. It's brought up by a few characters that Mary wanted Rosemary gone and never to return, but she did have affection for the girl and no matter what would happen to her daughter's romantic prospects, I wouldn't think she'd have deliberately sent her there if the full extent of Emily's 'eccentricities' had been known. There is also the matter that I would think that Emily's actions at the end of the book would have brought the police into it, at least mentioned if nothing else.

All in all this is an enjoyable read with enough gothic flair to make reading this a cut above the normal Regency romance.

In THE DREADFUL DUKE we were introduced to the Duke of Severn and his rambunctious offspring, Amelia and Anne, who were in sore need of civilizing after years of running amok. THE TURNABOUT TWINS moves the story forward five years, and the twins have turned 18 and made their bows to society. They are still close as peas in a pod, still practically similar in almost every way; but that, unfortunately, leads to some jealousies and heartbreak.

For me, this was like returning to a family I hadn’t seen in a while. I’ve followed the Duke of Severn through two previous titles (from his ill-managed courtship in the first book, to his eventual wooing of his current wife Juliet in the second book) and was excited to read about his daughters’ love stories run amok, as well.

Amelia and Anne, despite being ‘tamed’, certainly haven’t lost any of their sparkle or vivacity—the two have grown into well-sought-after beauties. I admit that the triangle formed between Amelia, Anne, and Mr. James Galt was a little bit tiring—especially when it became clear that Mr. Galt preferred Amelia over Anne, but I was very happy to see that it didn’t lead to Amelia and Anne resorting to nasty tricks to secure Mr. Galt’s affections. It hurt her, greatly, but Anne wanted her sister’s happiness above her own and so she stepped aside, however reluctantly.

Her own romance was of a more solid understanding that grew over time. The only part I find difficult to negotiate was her abrupt turnabout from ‘loving James forever and ever’ to being head-over-heels for her love interest. It happened within twenty pages—her realization of the fact, I mean, not the romance itself—but since Anne was of a more mercurial temperament than Amelia, it made sense.

And for anyone wondering, the ‘proud name of Severn’ is very much remarked upon again. The Duke just can’t seem to help himself!

Conceited hero,contrived plot and I dont care if they fall in love. I just know I wouldnt.

Arrogant, widowed duke with five children, including troublesome twin daughters, is fascinated by a young woman who has given up on men because of something nasty in her past. Not very good.

A traditional regency romance with serious issues addressed about women and parenting amongst the aristocracy. Duke of Severn was a secondary character in The Singular Miss Carrington who caught my interest so I read his story about his romance with Juliet. I did like the first book but liked this one more that dealt with an older couple who had life experiences which they had to conquer to form their relationship, would reccommend.

Not bad - decent fluff. I was wincing at the first part, I couldn't see any way it would work - but of course it did, in a rather obvious way; I should have known. I'm sorry she didn't fall for the nice guy (ok, he was rather weak), but it ended up well. And once she started fighting on an equal basis - once she was sure - it got quite amusing. The last chapter or two was excellent - lots of humor, and the two of them in equal positions (more or less). The earlier parts were rather dark, on many levels. The noble cousin was kind of pulled out of a hat, but she didn't play a large role, just large enough. The wager was in fact void - all Bredon proved was that a noble-born, sufficiently abused as a child, is indistinguishable from a servant girl. Very convenient he picked her...and I'm glad she pointed it out, eventually. Glad I read it, though I've no intention of rereading.

Only ok.

A gothic mystery inside a regency romance. I enjoyed it, but probably wont reread it. B-.

Although I prefer stories where the male and female leads detest each other at first or there's a good adventure, this story wasn't too bad. Diana Travis is a very young (17 going on 18) lady that has a disturbing although rather romantic run in with the Duke of Clare, reputed to be a rake. He immediately protests his love for her and his determination to make her his Duchess but she believes he's just playing with her affections and is really in love with the beautiful yet cold and conniving Lady Ponsonby. There are misunderstandings but not to the extent where you want to knock their two heads together so I enjoyed it. Good fluff that I needed to read after reading "Great Expectations".

Fiction,romance,European historical,piffle loan

Fiction,romance,European historical,piffle loan

A while ago on a quick visit to my mom's, I raided the book boxes in the garage and brought a handful of romances home with me. Beth by Barbara Hazard was the first one. It seemed familiar, so I may have read it decades ago in my youth, and doubtless I liked it back then. This time, though, it was quite flat and disappointing. To make any sort of sense of this story (or at least something resembling logic in the author's decisions) I am going to deconstruct it.

SPOILER ALERT (for anyone who might remotely care):
Hypothetical Decision 1: My guess is that the author started with the climactic scene, our heroine Beth being swept off her feet in the middle of a ball and carried away--the epitome of purple passion. But it's a Regency romance and people just don't do that. So who would? Obviously some sort of uncivilized savage; enter the Indian (read Native American) servant of our hero (I can't remember his name now, and I already returned the book, but he's a duke). It's very convenient that master and servant look alike, except for skin tone of course, and that it's a costume ball.

Hypothetical Decision 2: The hero and heroine are both fine, upstanding, smart, well-educated, caring, forthright, honest people, so why would the servant need to come and carry off the recalcitrant heroine thus leading to the most dreamy, romantical scene ever (snark)? Well, for some reason Beth must be very angry with the duke, which makes her very, very stupid and contrary and difficult, so very unlike her usual self, and thus she is the person standing in the way of the culmination of their romance. What would be the most dramatic reason for her ongoing hissy fit? He's a secret government agent, doesn't that make him ubersexy? For the sake of fairness, he had to treat her as a suspect along with the rest when super-secret documents went missing. And it turns out she was responsible for the papers going astray, so she feels a little guilty and embarrassed on top of it. There, that's why she's an idiot.

Decision Number 3: Well how would he be in a position to lose secret papers anyway? Enter the blizzard. Obviously he got stranded with an inn full of strangers for several days thanks to the weather. It's a timeworn plot device of many a romance and mystery novel and it serves its purpose here. People who would otherwise never cross paths are forced to socialize for days, cut off from the outside world.

Decision 4: The hero and heroine need a reason to shine so that they can fall in love under these unusual circumstances, so we need some adversity. The author pulls together a random assortment of travelers: the minister and his daughter (our heroine Beth), the duke of course, the handsome and rich twin brothers who are heirs to an earldom, and an overbearing social-climbing mother with her beautiful wigeon daughter. There's also the staff of the inn who have some minor dialogue. All of the tension is provided by the mother and daughter couple. Everyone else is quite nice and well-mannered to boot, well not really the duke, but that's part
of his manly charm and ducal privilege. The only unattractive person is also the only truly not nice character. Who knew that being obese was an obvious sign of character flaws? The pretentious mother is fat and demanding and complaining and a real boaster. The rest of the travelers bond over fat jokes behind her back. Beth has the opportunity to show her true nobility of spirit when she offers to share her room with the daughter when the mother insists that sharing is beneath her consequence, and even more so when she gets pushed down the stairs and suffers a sprained ankle (another timeworn plot device that gives couples time to bond) and forebears to accuse anyone. Similarly, the duke has the opportunity to appear masterful in more than one crisis.

Decision 5: So now we've worked from the climax to the starting point, but there's a few holes. Wouldn't Beth's reputation be ruined, her an unmarried girl carried off by an unrelated male in front of scores of witnesses? Needed, deus ex machina (part 2, the Indian is the first): enter all-knowing grandmother. When Beth and her father finally arrive in London. she perceives instantly that Beth is in love, thus demonstrating the eternal wisdom of older women when it comes to relationships. And she advises the duke in his belated proper courtship, but to no avail thanks to the hasty tempers of lovers. So she makes all of the appropriate excuses at the ball and saves the day.

Sure, there's a few other details, but those are the key points of the story. Overall--no character development, just some caricatures and unoriginal types to provide the appropriate foils and move the predictable plot forward. We never find out anything about any of the people staying at the inn, such as their reasons for traveling in the first place, beyond the duke and his government mission, of course. The best we get is that Beth's father is going to talk to the bishop. They're all just plopped down out of nowhere and once they've served their purpose they disappear immediately, including Beth's father. There might have been one or two good lines in the dialogue, but it was generally uninspired.

I was troubled not only by the one overweight person being the closest to a villain, but also by the near assault (date rape, anyone?) by the more clueless of the twin brothers when he manages to finagle an assignation with the beautiful wigeon in a deserted part of the inn (really, in such a small place where there are no private parlors available to the guests, how do they manage a deserted room?). In addition to everyone putting up with the awful mother, the smarter brother kept trying to keep his brother away from the beauty and her mother tried to throw them together. Mother and daughter are thinking marriage opportunities, and brother is thinking dalliance. The two moths to the flame get together and things get out of hand. She in her naivete didn't expect more than a couple of stolen kisses and a proposal, so when he gets sexually aggressive, she panics and screams, bringing everyone down on them--classic entrapment scene in period romances by unscrupulous women (or fortune-hunting men, for that matter, though they tend to kidnap/carry off). Mother demands justice (or whatever) for her poor daughter. The boy is shocked, shocked, that they could seriously believe marriage to be an option, after all, she's just not suitable. But they are respectable and he's in a pickle until the duke steps in and argues his case, leaving mother and daughter humiliated. Yay, upper class solidarity! It's all okay because they weren't nice people, and let's not look too closely at the boy's privilege and assumptions. After all, he was just acting the way he's expected to act as the scion of an aristocratic family. Boys will be boys. It's all part of the building up the noble and masterful characters of the hero and heroine. Sigh. Very disappointing.

did not finish - badly written in the first person

strange and difficult to follow plot re parentage, char heroine strange-story did not flow well

Poor Felicia Simmons. Since her father's illness, the family has fallen on hard times. But that doesn't stop her from feeding every orphan who comes by, or from trying to provide for her household of misfit servants. Felicia gets by with her music lessons. At first, when Sir Christopher Wilde moves in across the street, he scarcely notices her. But circumstances put them in each other's company, and he begins to admire her kindness and grace. When a fairy godmother in the form of her scatter-brained godmother intervenes, the romance begins to bloom. I enjoyed this book. It is the second in a series, and before I got a chance to read the next, they were out of print!

Lacy Sarah Lacey is a widow. And that's just fine with her. Her parents arranged the match and it wasn't a big success. So when her family put pressure on her to catch the neighboring earl, she's not very happy about that. He's much too young and arrogant. The man who has captured her eye is someone quite different, someone she's sure they won't approve of.

I liked the mystery. The male lead is much different from the norm. I liked the ending too--also very different from the usual.

CMB½