Nonfiction and Nonsense

Last week I said that I needed to read something a bit more educational, but I ended up going away over the weekend and I could not concetrate on a nonficiton book. So I went ahead and read the next Bertrice Small book on my list, The Kadin.

This book was amazing! The life long tale that is The Kadin begins in Scotland with a young, illegitimate Janet Leslie being taken in by her father as his wife’s deathbed wish. Briefly, we see them at Scotlands court before being sent to San Lorenzo where her father has been asked to be the king’s ambassador. It is here that Janet is captured and sold as a slave and thus begins her decades long life as Cyra, the great love of prince Selim and the eventual sultan of Turkey. As the princes’ favorite, she holds a position of respect and influence in his harem. When she becomes mother to the princes’ heir she gains even more esteem. And as mother of the future sultan, she will eventually become the second most powerful person in the kingdom. She never lets any of this go to her head, she rules over everyone with fairness and wisdom. I loved that the majority of the story took place in the East. Due to conflict Cyra was forced to return to Scotland where she is reunited with the family that never forgot her. 

The book ends when Janet has peacefully passed away as an old woman and it leads into the sequel which follows her legacy. I am very excited to read the next book in this two part series, I actually had to tell myself that it was necessary for me to write this review before I started the next book or I would never get it done. I finished this over four hundred page book with incredible speed and I imagine that if the sequel is as good as The Kadin I will finish it just as quickly, so you can look forward to my review of Love Wild and Fair next week.

I forgot to mention on Friday last week how very proud I am of myself for getting a bonus review out to you after letting on that I might the Tuesday before. It has made me eager to write more of them this year because it made me feel so accomplished. For anyone reading this, I am happy to have caught your attention and I hope you stick around. Now, onto this weeks review.

This book takes place during my favorite historical romance time period, that being the mid 15th century to mid 17th century, as well as taking place in my favorite countries to read about, England, Scotland, and France. It’s romantic, frustrating, brutal, tragic, and promising. The plot is full of border disputes, bride stealing, political power struggles, various types of seduction, and blossoming love, all of which centers around English heiress Arabella Grey and Scottish earl Tavis Stewart and their various allies and adversaries. I enjoyed the book as a whole, but I feel like the end was a little rushed. I always want more when I read a great book, and I mean, who doesn’t, but when I was getting to the last few pages I was wondering how everything was going to get wrapped up. This always gives me readers anxiety, and I was feeling it to the extreme here. It was done well, but still, I wanted a little bit more, I wanted to get more of the characters. 

I have found a mild solution to my hunger for more of this story in another one of  Bertrice Smalls books, The Kadin. This novel follows the story of Janet Leslie, who was briefly introduced in The Spitfire when Tavis traveled to Glenkirk to try and convince the current lord to go and see the king. And on the plus side of having another novel with similar characters in the same time period, it is not a stand alone, it does have a sequel. I do think I need to take a break from my romance and spice binge and read something more educational, but once I have at least read one non fiction book I will not be able to resist discovering what happens to the young Leslie girl.

I received the next two books following Vicious Kings in the Dark Elite trilogy by Eva Ashwood, but I wasn’t in the mood to read them yet. I hope that I am wrong, in that they will be equally as poorly written as the first book, but I wasn’t ready to find out just yet. I went to the existing pile of historical romance novels in the house and I took another one of Bertrice Small’s stand alone novels, The Duchess. Like A Moment In Time, I had never read this one either, and once again I now wonder why I never had. 

This novel takes place at the very end of the 18th century in England as it follows Allegra, a young woman who has no great name but is outrageously wealthy, as she sets off to find a husband. She is very practical and forward, which she needs to be considering she knows that any man who shows interest in having her for a wife will only truly be interested because of  her riches. Allegra lets everyone close to her know that she is fully aware of what any prospective suitor is really after, and it isn’t love, and she accepts this fact. She meets her perfect match in Quinton, a man with the exact opposite problem faced by Allegra, a man who comes from a very distinguished and important family but who has hardly any money left to his name. He doesn’t want to marry at all, and he certainly is not looking for love, he is just looking to save his family’s name and estate. The two meet and agree to marry because they both get exactly what they want out of the arrangement, status and wealth, and they like each other well enough, but they make no promises of love. 

It’s a good book with a happy ending and not too much conflict. I enjoyed the happy ending after all of the turmoil and sadness I experienced after reading Ms. Small’s last book. If you love a good love story, you’ll definitely enjoy this one.