Review: A Practical Partnership by Lily George

A Practical Partnership by Lily George is a historical romance that was released in February 2016 by Harlequin's Love Inspired line.  It is a sequel to The Nanny Arrangement, which is a sequel to A Rumored Engagement.  The three novels cover the romances of the Siddons sisters, Nan, Becky, and Susannah.  A Practical Partnership is Nan's story about her relationship with John Reed, a man with a roguish past.   It is a tale about opposites who are attracted to each other.

Nan is now the sole proprietor of the millinery shop in Tansley that she had previously shared with her sisters before Susannah and Becky made advantageous marriages of their own.  Nan has always seen herself as being the plainest and most sensible of the sisters, and has resigned herself to the life of a spinster.  However, with the arrival of a new French milliner in town, Nan has been facing competition for business, and is left wondering how she will be able to continue operating her shop.   She desperately wants to avoid being a financial burden to her sisters. 

John Reed has been reluctantly running his family's estate now that his father has passed on.  The whole idea of assuming these responsibilities is simply not fun or enjoyable to him.   However, he is forcing himself to do his duty.  In his eyes, this also means launching his sister, Jane, into her London season, even though Jane has no wish to have one.  When he sees how comfortable Jane is with Nan, he makes an offer to Nan:  come with the Reeds to create Jane's wardrobe.  Nan doesn't really want to leave her shop, but can't stay in Tansley if she is to work on Jane's wardrobe.  However, with dwindling orders for her shop, Nan agrees to take up John's offer, and leaves town so that she can begin working with Jane at the Reeds' estate, Grant Park.

While Nan is at Grant Park, she discovers the reason why Jane doesn't wish to have a London season, in addition to discovering that John has depths beyond that of a debauched, carefree bachelor.   John teaches her to have a bit of fun instead of being serious all the time.  Being with him encourages her to dream of greater things for her life.

John finds himself growing intrigued with a woman who isn't going out of her way to attract his attention.  However, being at Grant Park forces him to look deeply into the reasons why he doesn't want to take on the responsibilities of running the estate and why he is at odds with the Lord.  Spending time with Nan helps him to find faith again.  However, he finds it difficult to reconcile his romantic attraction to Nan with his perceptions about the class of woman that duty requires for him to marry, and unfortunately, Nan doesn't measure up to those demands.  In addition, a situation arises which leads John to feel betrayed by Nan, making it difficult for him to trust her.  Will this practical partnership ever grow into a romantic one?

I found A Practical Partnership to be a safe and clean read.  For a man who supposedly has spent much of his life before in the pursuit of pleasure, I didn't find John to be much of a rogue.  The hints of the romantic attraction between the two leads are dropped fairly early in the book, but John and Nan don't get anywhere near to a kiss until close to the end of the book.  As for his prankster reputation...well...it seemed to be on the tame side.  He came off as a fairly respectable person who might joke around a bit here and there, using a jovial cover to mask the anger that he had deep inside. 

I liked Nan.  She is a sensible and practical person, who has a dash of stoicism.  She needs to loosen up, and John is able to get her to do that.  It would seem that the two of them are able to bring out the best in each other. 

Even though A Practical Partnership is the third in a trilogy about the Siddons sisters, I think that it can be considered a stand alone novel, as it can be understood and enjoyed without needing to read the other books for more background information. 

Review: Accidental Fiancee by Mary Moore

Accidental Fiancee, by Mary Moore, was released in January 2015 by the Love Inspired Historical line.  I've had a few false starts on this book, but I finally finished it a couple of weeks ago.  I actually enjoyed the novel.  It is the story of Lord Weston, Brandon Roth, a marquis who finds himself proposing to Lady Grace Endicott, who is a complete stranger to himself.  The situation is a bit ironic.  Grace finds herself in this mess because she was trying to warn Lord Weston from getting trapped into proposing to a marriage minded miss who wasn't above using scandal to force him into making an offer.  Instead, Grace finds that she has inadvertently forced Lord Weston to offer for herself in order to protect her sister, Lydia, who has yet to make her come out in the upcoming season.  Grace no longer considers herself available on the market, but does not believe that Lydia would be able to weather the scandal and make a suitable match unless she and Lord Weston deal with their problem discretely.

They agree to enter into a fake engagement where Grace would cry off and break the engagement after a few weeks, when the gossip would sufficiently die down, or when Lydia successfully finds a match for herself.   Grace does not wish to be truly married to Lord Weston; he has a reputation of being a great rake, and she is mortified at the thought of even being perceived as one who would stoop so low as to trap the marquis into marriage.  Grace's conscience is also severely tested during this time; she loathes the fact that she is essentially lying to the ton, and is uncomfortable with the realization that she is developing genuine feelings for Lord Weston as they spend more time with each other. 

In Accidental Fiancee, Grace is the professing believer, while Lord Weston is the one who is making the journey towards faith.  He is helped along in this by his mentor, Lord Langley, who had agreed to support the marquis in his endeavours to make reforms in the House of Lords if Brandon sets aside his rakish ways, which he has.  What plagues Brandon is an inability to forget and forgive himself of the mistakes made in his past, which landed him the reputation of being an irresponsible rake.  When Grace shows him, well,...grace...and acceptance in spite of his past, Brandon starts to see himself as more than what he has perceived himself to be up to this point.  In the beginning, when he first enters into the fake engagement with Grace, Brandon is at first relieved that it is just a temporary measure taken to protect Grace and her sister.  However, as he gets to know her and her character, he realizes that he wants to make the engagement real and binding.

Unfortunately, the path to true love does not run smoothly for these two.  Besides Brandon's challenge of trying to convince Grace that he truly wants her to be his wife, our twosome must dodge opposition from a jealous widow who plans to become the next Lady Weston, and opponents to Brandon's work of reforms through the House of Lords.  Will Brandon be able to win Grace in truth to become his wife?  Will he be able to accept God's grace and forgiveness?  The key verse that is imprinted at the start of the novel is from Ephesians 2:8 which says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God...."  I've found sometimes that these verses, which are usually found at the start of all Love Inspired novels, to be perplexing as to why they were particularly chosen, but the verse for this novel is more than appropriate for this novel. 

As I mentioned before, I liked this novel.  I liked the theme of accepting God's grace and forgiveness...something that cannot be earned, but must be received as a gift.  It was nice to read a historical with this inspiring message in it. 

 

Review: The Matchmaker's Match by Jessica Nelson

After months of waiting for a regency to pop up in the Love Inspired Historical line, I found The Matchmaker's Match, by Jessica Nelson, which was released this month.  It's about Lord Ashwhite, a marquis who must marry within three months time in order to keep his estate, according to his father's will.  Helping him is Lady Amelia Baxley, who is secretly running a matchmaking business on the side so that she can maintain her own household and live independently from her brother and his wife, the latter whom Amelia finds difficult to get along with. 

Ashwhite, a former rake, and a new believer, wants Amelia to find him a believing spouse, but as he spends time with her, he discovers that his interest lingers on Lady Amelia.  However, her independent streak reminds him too much of his mother, with whom he has an estranged relationship.  Amelia finds herself attracted to the Marquis, but has been disappointed in love before. She keeps telling herself that she will do better on her own without love, trying to secure enough income so that she can buy a small home of her own.  On top of that, her own practicality doesn't leave much room for God.  That eliminates her from the Marquis' list of prospects...or will God do something to bring these two together?

I really liked Ashwhite; he's a charmer.  He and Amelia first meet when she steps into an argument that Ashwhite is having with a former paramour, but somehow he finagles Amelia into a dance, leaving both being intrigued with the other.  Amelia's life seems to have been quite defined by her Great Disappointment in love, so she has thrown herself into painting and writing letters to the House of Lords over political issues   As I read the story, two questions were raised over Amelia's character.  How would she come to faith in this story?  Would she get over her broken heart and open herself to another love?

As for Ashwhite, would he find someone to marry in time in order to save his estate?  Will he be able to reconcile with his mother for all the past hurts that she has caused him? 

I felt a bit of tension when I read that he was struggling to forgive his mother while Amelia was still searching for the Lord.  I wanted to call him a poor witness, but the truth is that, in reality, forgiveness is often a very difficult thing to do, whether one is a new or seasoned believer.  Besides dealing with forgiving his mother, Ashwhite also has to deal with the fallout of his previous behaviour as a rake.  Will people be able to forgive him of his past?  Or has he irreparably damaged his reputation so that no respectable woman will give him a chance?

There was a couple of confusing things that appeared in my copy of The Matchmaker's Match.  Chapter Four gives details about the will that has created problems for Ashwhite.  His lawyer tells him that he will lose his lands, except for property that will come to him through his mother, and that he will be able to keep the title "as Earl of Hartsacre" (p. 42.)  I suspect that this is a misprint and that it actually should have read, "Marquis of Ashwhite."  Anyways, it makes me wonder if the Marquis was actually an earl in earlier drafts, but that is just speculation. 

As with many regencies, it is a puzzle to figure out what the actual given names are of the nobility, because they are often referred to by their titles, or by the name associated with the title's seat.  It was tough digging for the Marquis' name, but I think that it is Spencer Broyhill.  The name, Spencer, was often used in this book, but it seemed it could have done as either a first or last name.  Anyhow, I found, "Broyhill," which is mentioned only once, in Chapter 2.  This actually led me to speculate about another puzzle in this book.  How long was the Marquis' father the holder of his title?  We are told that the Marquis and Lady's Amelia's brother are old friends, and that she had previously known the Marquis as Mr. Broyhill before he ascended to the title.  That would make sense if his father had assumed the title relatively recently, and with his death, passed it along to Spencer.  However, it seems as if Lord Ashwhite had been raised and trained to know what to do with the marquisate, and there is reference to Ashwhite (property) being the site of the family home, so I suspect that his father had held the title for quite a long time, and that Spencer would more likely have been referred to as Lord Broyhill, or Lord "X" (whatever title he would have been referred to before assuming the title of marquis).  

Now that I've spent two long paragraphs on my musings over those minor points in the book, I would like to say that I did like this book.  I think that Ms. Nelson did a good job in showing how the characters are attracted to each other, and also tied the minor plot lines (some of which I did not mention) quite well into the main plot.  I hope that she writes more regencies.  I certainly plan on reading them if she does.