This is a very good historical romance.
I like the characters and Cat and Marcus’ relationship is brilliant and fun to follow. I like that Cat is such a strong character. I love Marcus. He’s a good egg even if he is a Duke.
The plot is interesting but at times I felt like the curse was a bit much and the story went in circles around it. I’m glad everything turned out good in the end.

The first book in the Spinster House series. This book follows the daughter of the vicar, Cat, who is attempting to capture the honor of the Spinster house in Loves Bridge so she can spend her life writing away from her nine siblings. Of course, when the Duke arrives from London to settle the Spinster house, things take a turn. The Duke of Hart is not looking to marry thanks to a curse upon his family that no duke shall live to see his heir's birth.
I felt it was a fun lighthearted novel and perfect for a summer afternoon read.

I read this book when I first received it from the publisher, but for some reason completely forgot to write the review for it. There is such charm in reading a Sally Mackenzie novel, they are so balanced with emotional depth and fabulous humor that lightens the mood of the reader in such a vibrant way. There is such beautiful chemistry that builds between our pairing. This book delivers in so many solid ways, so if you are a fan of Tessa Dare of Sarah MacLean, this is a book for you. Highly recommend.

I can not review this title as I did not finish it.

When it comes to historical romance, I look for one of two things: one, a compelling love story with some scenes that make me blush and fan myself; or two, a light and fluffy clean romance, sometimes with a touch of humor. What I demand from all historical romances is for both the romance and the setting to be believable. I’ve started to wonder if my standards are too high. When I went into this book, with the cute cover and hints at a curse, I figured this one might fall on the fluffy side of the spectrum (the cat on the cover may have influenced this assumption). I was sadly mistaken.

The characters seem so non-committal, not just with each other, but with upholding any of the values they claim to have. Catherine was constantly complaining about how she needed peace and solitude to write, but in the first half of the novel whenever she had it she didn’t do it. She blames family for her difficulties with not being able to be the next great novelist, but the problem was really with the fact that she was not all that committed to doing it. Just like she apparently was not all that committed to being a spinster, despite preaching about it constantly. I found Catherine’s character to be frustrating at every turn and had a hard time rooting for her.

Unfortunately, the other half of this love story was hardly any better. Marcus is dreamy for all of a few minutes, until he started talking about his cock. Which he proceeded to do all the time. Every time the narration would switch to him, inevitably a thought would end with some note about what his cock wants. I suppose Marcus’ raw desire was supposed to be tantalizing, but I honestly just found it vulgar. It didn’t help that everything about Marcus and Catherine’s romance was a lust at first sight sort of scenario. I didn’t feel any real chemistry between them, even by the end when they are apparently in love with each other I still wasn’t feeling it. Literally everything always boiled back down to sex. The rest of the story and dialogue was not even all that funny, clever, or witty, it was just two stubborn people wanting to get in each other’s pants the entire book while being really over dramatic about, well, everything.

Then there is the curse plot line, which I could suspend my belief and go with it for a while, but even that felt like it was poorly thought out. Marcus has to control his desires and avoid marriage because he’s fearful of accidentally impregnating a woman, thus ending his life. Though somehow, he has no problem with brothel women and the risk of impregnating any of them? Because bastard children can’t be heirs? Sure, at that time period they certainly had a harder go of it, but it wasn’t unheard of. And even if that was the case, didn’t the curse start with an illegitimate child born to a woman jilted by her lover? The number of plot holes was staggering and it wouldn’t have been such a big deal if it wasn’t the central plot to the story.

I also didn’t buy the mildly magical ending with the cat. No I don’t hate the cat, on the contrary the cat was perhaps the best character in the entire book. It just seemed too convenient, too hastily put together. I was also bothered by the fact that, in order to I guess create some tension, Marcus had absolutely no interest in finding out the truth about the curse. That alone basically undid all of the effort, all of the worry, all of the focus this character had on this family curse that has weighed so heavily on him for his entire life. It made absolutely no sense for his character. I won’t even go into how he contradicts himself again once the mystery is solved.

I almost put this book down after the first couple of chapters, but things picked up around the half way mark. After one scene that actually made me chuckle with the eye brow waggling old ladies, I had hope that maybe the story would redeem itself with the added bit of comedy. I was disappointed that things started to go downhill again once the book attempted to flesh out the curse and develop the romance between Catherine and Marcus. Which, while I’m on that subject – I absolutely hated how that turned out. Catherine spends the entire novel preaching about never wanting to get trapped in a marriage and to never have children, then finds herself trapped. It wasn’t romantic, it was just frustrating.

On a slightly random note, I also noticed at one point an expletive is used that I was fairly certain did not exist in the context that it was used during that time period. After looking it up my assumption was correct – while the word had existed in the more vulgar sense that it is commonly used, as a curse or slang word it didn’t come about until the 1920’s. I know it’s being overly nit picky, but things like that really ruin the immersion in the time period for me.

Strengths: Mild humor
Weaknesses: Unstable plot, frustrating characters