The Heiress at Sea starts out great, but unfortunately loses its way. Though the overall plot is good, the too-naive-to-be-true heroine takes away a lot from the story. Nathan is a great hero, though.
There is so much repetition in the story that it becomes jarring at times.
Overall, this is a low stakes, quick read for the nights when you are not sleepy but want to fall asleep on time and not lay awake till 4 AM, reading.
My thanks for the ARC!

I’m sorry but despite the fact that CC is a competent writer and there were some beautifully crafted scenes in this book, the heroine and her associated plot lines ruined it for me. I just could not suspend disbelief for the duration.

Cassia’s naivety, perpetual misunderstanding and overdone innocence meant she seemed literally to be unable to understand plain English or to navigate ordinary social conversation. A couple of scenes were funny, but as the misunderstandings continued, they became so utterly annoying that I swiftly lost the will to live.

Cassia’s constant challenges to the men around her struck me as so unreal and ridiculous for the period that I wanted to throw my iPad at the wall.

I know many readers and authors are not all that interested in historical authenticity but when I read a book like this - which creates a fictional version of the world, as far away from the historical era as is possible, the I want to cry.

The idea of a girl on a ship at that time and how the crew would view her made my blood run cold. But it’s as if modern authors want to wipe away history and create a world that is simply the 21st century, but with long dresses and no antibiotics.

I am so fed up of this re-writing of history. I didn’t finish the read, but skimmed the last bit instead.

This was a breath of fresh air compared to the usual historical romances I read! For once, we’re not in London, there are close to none shiny balls or arranged marriages. We’re on a ship and this element alone makes the story much more intriguing. The setting and the grumpy duke are the real entertainment of the story. The only problem I had was with Cassia, who has often been portrayed as childish and petulant. Nonetheless, I enjoyed this book and I’m going to delve deeper into Christi Caldwell’s writing!

Captain Nathaniel Ellsby is the second son of a duke. He makes his income from the sea, mostly as a privateer to the Crown. Nathaniel finds himself saddled with his late sibling’s ducal responsibilities and fiancée. He intends to finish one last mission before obeying his father’s strict mandate. However, a chatter-box stowaway distracts Nathaniel from his official duties. Can Nathaniel protect Cassia from the hardships of the sea? Or will he willingly give up his seafaring ways for her?
Lady Cassia McQuoid comes from a large, boisterous family. With no marriage prospects, she wants to “see the world” before surrendering to her future as a spinster. Cassia plans to sneak onto her brother and his friend’s ship; however, she boards the wrong vessel. She finds herself surrounded by unfriendly strangers. Cassia’s presence causes havoc with the surly captain and his crew. Can Cassia survive her first sea voyage? Or will she lose far more than just her heart on this trip?
I could never resist the pessimistic and surly type heroes! They are another weakness of mine. Nathaniel’s gruff and stern exterior conceals a warm heart. He does not have the opportunity to demonstrate that side of himself, except around his mother and later Cassia. I admire how Nathaniel gave certain criminals a second chance at life. When others had written them off, he offered them a new way of life and a paying job, thus earning their loyalty. What I love the most about Nathaniel is his acceptance of Cassia’s eccentricities. She annoyed him at first, but he started to crave her sunny, talkative ways.
Generally, Cassia is not the type of heroine I enjoy reading about. However, I could not help but feel for the young woman. There were instances when Cassia or her antics annoyed me, but not enough to dislike her outright. I understand Cassia’s anxiousness about being invisible, ignored, and overlooked. Something that I understand achingly well, so I easily empathized with her. What I like the most about Cassia is her talkative ways. I found it oddly endearing.
THE HEIRESS AT SEA is the second book in Christi Caldwell’s historical romance series, MCQUOID FAMILY. I am so delighted the author decided to write more stories involving this rambunctious noble family. The McQuoids, especially their antics, entertained and charmed me in the first book, THE DUKE ALONE. I cannot wait for more McQuoid stories!
The story had a GENTLE ROGUE and THE MAGIC OF YOU (by Johanna Lindsey) feel to it. I forgot just how much I enjoyed the stowaway/masquerading as a boy at sea angle in stories.

As a reader:

I'm going to be perfectly honest, this was painful to read. The FMC was unlikable and neither the FMC nor the MMC had much of anything going for them that would make a reader want to root for them. The author isn't a bad writer, but her characters could use some serious work.

As a librarian:

This is not a book I will be recommending for purchase for our fiction collection because I can easily think of four similar books my patrons would enjoy more.

The story line was trope-heavy, which I don't mind and can really enjoy, but I was really surprised Lady Cassia didn't get thrown off the "boat" sooner. For someone who bills herself as so unremarkable and average, she certainly ranked well above average in prattling and well below average in ACTUALLY LISTENING. Dear God, you throw yourself into a completely unknown situation and then proceed to tell all the people who hold authority over you that they are wrong? Mind you, Nathaniel was not great at communicating either, given his expectation to be instantly obeyed as captain, but yikes.

The writing style also had a tendency to pull me out of the story, which didn't help. Overall, a big floating disappointment. 2.5 stars rounded up.

Thank you, Montlake and NetGalley, for providing an eARC of this book. Opinions expressed here are solely my own.

This book is an adventure to read!
I love Christi Caldwell’s writing style, her prose flows so well and I was able to sink into the story immediately. The heroine, Cassia is a self-described average woman who is longing for adventure, so disguised as a boy, she becomes a stowaway in a ship thinking it belonged to a family friend. Fortunately for the reader it is a privateer ship that belongs to Nathanial, the Duke of Roxburghe. Nathanial is an adventure loving man who doesn’t want to settle down. However, once he realizes his stowaway is a woman, sparks fly and both Cassia and Nathanial second guess what their dreams for the future entail.
The writing is fluid and captured my interest right away. Caldwell writes dialogue extremely well, she knows when to add flourishes and visual cues, with out bogging down the scene. There are times when she uses the same word quite often, enough to take me out of the story for a bit, but it wasn’t enough for me to dock any stars from my rating.
My main issue with the novel was Cassia. She was written to be a complete imbecile. So many times while reading I literally groaned out loud while wondering how she could be so stupid. I think she would have been a much more interesting and relatable character if she either did her research before departing on this adventure, and knew about working on a ship (but could still be bad at executing all the skills). OR if she made an extremely rash decision while passing the ship and jumped on board spontaneously. But either way, her inability to read people, her lack of danger awareness (she was the ONLY woman on board a ship and she never realized what danger she was in), and her lack of respect for absolutely anyone on the ship at first made it extremely difficult for me to want to root for her. Cadwell tried to redeem her, but in my opinion that never fully happened. I had trouble believing in the romance because Cassia was self-absorbed and unintelligent and I didn't fully understand her appeal to Nathanial. If she was written with more brains, this could have easily been a 4 or 5 star for me.
As I’ve said before, I really enjoyed the actual writing and I was able to read this book within one day! I will definitely be reading more of Christi Caldwell's books.

I enjoyed this book. The characters were well written, there was a good plot, there is a twist that you might not see coming and it was not overly sexy, it actually has a plot that captivates your attention. I did stay up waaaay past my bedtime to finish it! 😂

I loved it, the character development was great, from the understandable naive young lady who thought going to sea was fun and easy and the brutish marquise who only cared for the sea and his freedom to such a great matching pair. My only critique would be that it was not as spicy as I thought it would be. But that is a personal preference and did not diminish everything else great about that book!
I am looking forward to reading more from the author!
Thank you NetGalley for this ARC!

5 stars

A delightful story and so funny. Cassia wants an adventure. Her younger sister, because she's so bright got sent to a finishing school. (Her story is in The Duke Alone...a sort of Home Alone vibe). Her brothers sail and have adventures. Cassia is just middle of the road at all things but painting. So she decides to stow away on her brother's friend ship. She finds her way down to the docks and then is taken aboard the Flying Dragon. She doesn't realise she's on the wrong ship/boat until getting fed up with all the back breaking work asks to see the Captaiin. It's not Jeremy but Nathan, a duke's heir who is desperate to come away from his controlling father and score one more French enemy ship as a registered Privateer. The dialogue is amusing. Cassia makes some bad enemies in the crew. Luckily she has another skill that comes in handy. Nathan is attracted to her but theoretically should be marrying his father's choice to protect his career. It's a clean read really. I especially liked the denouement of Jeremy near the end as Cassia naively thinks he's just a trader. I hope we get more of these type of stories and heartily recommend.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

A lovely clean, historical romance, with likeable characters. My only complaint was that the ending seemed to finish mid scene, as though another paragraph needed to be written, but otherwise a very enjoyable read

An enjoyable book that has an interesting plot for the most part, but the writing felt quite flat near the last 1/3rd.

I felt the characters had the same issue, the premise of their personalities was interesting but in the story itself it felt like they were stuck repeating the same things and it got boring quickly.

Overall still a fun historical romance, but could’ve been much more interesting and captivating.

Not usually a sea private historical romance fan but Christi Caldwell write terrific books so decided to give this one a try. Lady Cassia wants an escape so she dresses up a lad and stows away on a ship. There she meets the Nathaniel, the Duke of Roxburghe, who wants to go on one last mission before he fulfills his ducal duties. Of course, they fall in love....

Love Nathaniel and Cassia. The characters are charming. Cassia is sassy and bold.. She has terrific chemistry with Nathaniel. It's exciting and romantic and passionate.

Thanks to the publisher for the arc.
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I love Caldwell’s stories, and this book was no exception. Hidden identity stories always intrigue me, and there was plenty of action and excitement in this seafaring tale. Cassia was smart and vivacious, and she had a wonderfully romantic relationship with Nathaniel. While he was quite surly at first, she truly brought light to his life, and it was heartwarming to watch the two of them slowly fall in love with one another. Cassia also had a sweet relationship with some of the crew members, and I particularly enjoyed Hayes and Shorty.

It took a while for Nathaniel to fully embrace Cassia’s peculiarities, but once he did, he was adorably fascinated by her. I loved how protective he was of Cassia and jealous over her time. There were plenty of humorous moments thrown in as well. My only complaint was the ending. While it was sweet and romantic, it was incredibly abrupt. After all Cassia and Nathaniel went through, I thought we would get a bit more time to truly enjoy them as a couple, perhaps through an epilogue, and I was disappointed that this was not the case.

Overall, this was a funny, passionate, and adventurous tale. I highly recommend it.

*I received an ARC of this novel. This is my complete and honest review.*

Thanks NetGalley for this book!

I was conflicted about this one. Elements of it, like the overly pathetic and abrasive on occasion FMC, were around 3 stars for me, but other things like the frankly gorgeous MMC, the setting and the side characters were 5 stars, so I split the middle and gave it 4 stars! Would recommend for any lovers of relatively but not overly spicy regency romance stories.

It’s about a Duke who doesn’t want to be a Duke or get married he wants to sail the sea. And it also is about a lady who for 2 seasons couldn’t find a man so she sneaks on a ship to look for her brothers best friend and ends up on the wrong ship with the Duke who is a captain and she disguised herself as a man on his ship. It’s really good! I loved when they find out she’s not really a boy. And both characters want the same thing and like ran from their duties. This has a happily ever after, I loved everything about it.

I throughly loved, loved reading the fabulous and fantastic romance story. Nicholas has one last seafaring mission to complete before fulfilling his duke duties and an arranged marriage. Lady Cassia wants a seafaring adventure, dresses up as a boy, and plans to board her friend and brother's ship, but ends up on Nicholas's ship. Read the highly recommended, wonderfully written, and a riveting must read love story that captivates and engages the reader from the first page of the story until the last page of the story. Can't wait to read another story by the phenomenal and amazing author, Christi Caldwell.

This was a pageturner from start to finish! I love me a good grumpy/sunshine pairing. The romance between Cassia and Nathan was swoon-worthy and absolutely heartwarming. This book manages to be both engaging, touching, and hilarious. The writing was clear and the plot was captivating. The character dynamics are intriguing and all the characters are fleshed out pretty well. I highly recommend this if you’re looking for a lighthearted, fun read to devour in one sitting!

I devoured this book by Christi Caldwell. I have been searching for a good historical romance to read and this was everything I wanted. "The Heiress at Sea" was funny, interesting and so heart warming. I adored Cassia and her constant chatter, she was so likeable. Nathan was so endearing and I love a good grumpy/sunshine romance. These two were the perfect pairing. There were so many sweet moments and I loved how Cassia got under Nathans skin. The book had a solid plot, it was well written and made me laugh. The supporting characters were great and the romance was perfection. I would absolutely reccomend this novel to historical romance lovers, grumpy/sunshine lovers, and romance on the high seas readers!!!!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Montlake books for allowing me to receive an ARC of this novel in exchange for my honest review. Thank you to Christi Caldwell for delivering an exciting and fun romance.

I loved Nathan the hero. Underneath his gruff exterior he cared deeply about his crew and Cassia. Cassia however though probably more true to the times in that she was pretty inept, cried a lot, and just seemed completely at a loss, was harder to engage. I think the couple had chemistry. However, even considering she got on the wrong boat, the adventure she went on seems to require more internal fortitude than the character had on page. For this to work she needed more than that one skill which surprised Nathan.

The writing, the plot, everything was in place for a romp. Unfortunately for me the heroine fell flat.

I did love the final scene between the two of them. I laughed at his line.