Review: Red, White & Royal Blue

Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I’m grateful for great books and great love stories. Today I revisited one of the best—Casey McQuiston’s Red White and Royal Blue. Red, White & Royal Blue is the story of first and lasting love between two impossibly handsome, intelligent and privileged young men from different countries and cultural backgrounds. Alex is Mexican-American and America's "first son," the child of the United States' first female president. Henry is a British prince, second in line to the throne.

It's an understatement to say that I'm not usually a fan of royal romance, but I love this book. I loved it so much that when I got to the end I immediately began rereading it. This book made me swoon and laugh and cry. I loved the humor, the originality, the depth of feeling and the originality in format. Texts and emails play an essential part in bridging the distance between these two men as they evolve from rivals to friends and then friends with benefits and ultimately lovers.

What makes the correspondence special is that Casey Mcquiston incorporates queer history and quotes from real love letters and poems into the correspondence between Alex and Henry. It's a key part of how the two protagonists get to know each other and come to terms with their sexuality and begin to gain confidence in how they fit into the world. And at one point this correspondence becomes a part of how they heal and find hope and give each other strength in the face of near ruin. From Alex to Henry:

p.s. wilfred owen to siegfried sassoon—1917: And you have fixed my Life—however short. You did not light me: I was always a mad comet; but you have fixed me. I spun round you a satellite for a month, but shall swing out soon, a dark star in the orbit where you will blaze.

This is just one part of why this book is so special. It's also incredibly well-written. I read this novel on a Kindle and ended up with more than 100 highlighted passages and notes. It's that well-written and that memorable.

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Review: Lord of Scoundrels

Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I love this book. This came as a bit of a shock to me when I first read it. I had a hard time just getting past the cover which for the uninitiated gives not a hint of the wickedly smart contents enclosed. As someone who had always been skeptical of traditional historical romance novels, especially those involving English noblemen, there was no bigger surprise than how much I enjoyed and admire this book.

I would love it for the complicated and convincing love relationship it builds between the two protagonists alone, but what makes Lord of Scoundrels so memorable for me is that it is also stunningly witty and well-written and surprisingly, strangely, ever so subtly, liberal. Chase's story and prose are melodramatic of course but also surprising and innovative, even poetic at times. She describes love and sex in ways that sound new even if they aren't strictly so. On top of all that, she upends the gender stereotypes that exist in western society and culture then and today while working somewhat within the mores of 19th century society.

At the center of the novel are two strikingly original multidimensional characters. To start, unlike many romances, strictly speaking, there is no confident, dashing hero here, no handsome rake merely in need of reform. Instead, the titular scoundrel is Lord Sebastian Dain, a wealthy aristocrat whose sexual exploits and bad behavior extend far beyond what's typical even for a man of his exalted stature and earn him the nickname Beelzebub. Dain's intellect and taste for culture are undeniably impressive, but his personality is off-putting in the extreme and he can be cruel and destructive. From a modern perspective, he's better characterized as a misanthrope with a chip on his shoulder and a serious Madonna whore complex.

There's also an interesting xenophobic, racial element to his outsider status. His looks, according to English standards, are offensively foreign and swarthy. Dain inherited his title from his ancient English family, but his mother was Italian and Dain's skin so dark that the boys at school call him “Blackamoor," a term that in truth means someone of north African or Arab ancestry, but which they wield here to make him feel inferior. His peers say he's hideous and a mongrel because of his dark skin and prominent nose. It’s unclear how much of his reputation derives from his behavior and how much from prejudice against his appearance and heritage. Regardless of reason, the result is that Dain is both enormously privileged and an outsider tormented by social insecurity and self-hatred. He considers himself hideous and is convinced he'll never be accepted by the society into which he was born and is certainly could never hope to find love within it. The central question is how much of Lord Dain's behavior is nature and how much is rebellion/ self-defense. (there might be a bit of Heathcliff to him?)

In great contrast, the Marquess of Dain's love interest and eventual wife Jessica is an English Rose so fair and pure she that she appears to be his opposite when in truth she is his match in intellect and spirit. She's also kind, incredibly socially adept and has great emotional intelligence. As Marchioness she understands that she as a married woman has no property and no power under the law. The book addresses how social relations are organized shapes relationships organically within the narrative. This is manifest in a myriad of ways, but perhaps most powerfully and subtly in the earliest days of their marriage when Jessica surprises her husband with a birthday present, a small piece of art she acquired as a single woman just before the start of their courtship. It’s the most valuable thing she owns and has sentimental value for them both, but she also recognizes even within the intimacy of the moment that she is giving him a gift that is already his property. As a married woman, under 19th century British law, her property become his the moment they became man and wife.

Nonethless, despite the structural constraints of gender, Jessica wields great influence within the relationship and household due to her character. So many books declare their heroines to be “badass” and independent while saddling them with the most stereotypical and obviously baseless insecurities that defy all evidence around them. That is not the case here. This is the era of Clinton, Monica Lewinsky and the faux feminist girl power of the Spice Girls, and yet Loretta Chase gives Lord of the Scoundrels a heroine who is neither cripplingly insecure nor superhuman but genuinely strong in mind and spirit. Jessica Trent is an intelligent, well-read and beautiful but normal human woman. Her husband, Lord Dain may bristle at her diagnosis that he is the high-strung and emotional one in this relationship, but he does realize that he is not thinking and behaving strictly according to logic in his interactions with her and to some extent with the world as well.

That journey of growth in response to societally ingrained anxieties is too often reserved for female characters, but in this case, Jessica/Lady Dain is emotionally self-aware, empathetic and level-headed. She’s brave in the way that counts the most— she tells the truth about her feelings, motives, and actions while Lord Dain frequently retreats from his. Jessica understands him, she helps, she draws her husband out all the while being cognizant of his limitations/willingness to accept her care both as a 19th century nobleman used to being in charge and as an overgrown, neglected, emotionally stunted little boy. She also, occasionally, loses her patience, but she harnesses her emotions and intellect to do the right thing for both of them. She breaks through, for example, Dain’s initial seemingly inexplicable reluctance to consummate their marriage despite his obvious attraction to her and in getting him to take responsibility in other ways essential to their happiness.

For these and a myriad of other details and moments involving character and language, Lord of Scoundrels stands out. In Fated Mates Podcast parlance, this is this is the book that blooded me-- it tempted, teased and initiated me into the sisterhood of the historical romance readers and left me wanting more.

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Review: Open House

Open House by Ruby Lang
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I wouldn’t have expected a love story that's set in New York and revolves around gentrification to be this sweet and realistic at the same time, but this one was and it works. I love the messy, challenging, multicultural, multiracial world Ruby Lang has created here. I like it because I recognize it.

As a struggling real estate agent trying to sell one of few open lots in a historic but still gentrifying and highly coveted section of Harlem, and a community activist trying to protect the garden currently occupying it, Magda Ferrer and Tyson Yang are natural rivals if not out right enemies. This being a romance, though, of course they eventually find common ground in addition to passion. And it all unfolds in a way that is convincing and affirming. That’s in no small part due to Ty’s boundlessly thoughtful, nurturing and generous nature.

He says something to Magda towards the end that I think is meaningful, because it represents a modern ideal of loving support for a working woman: “You may not always have time, but I have patience.”

Ty may not be the absolutely sweetest and gooey new man of every ones dreams, but he’s pretty close. It’s not as flashy as the stereotypical alpha brought to heel and grovel before the heroine, but In our current context, and given the way Ruby Lang tells the story, that’s pretty darn sexy.

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Review: Pretty Reckless

Pretty Reckless by L.J. Shen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Not a fan. I found this book deeply disturbing and not in a smart, thoughtful way. In the end I mostly felt soured by the experience of reading it. For now my concerns are primarily communicated in the highlights if you’re interested in why.

I gave it three stars for technical proficiency. The prose is fine and it tells an original story. But the morality of it. The psychology. The perspective. The warped, confounding internal logic and, most of all, the confusing characterizations all add up to a great big no. No to the rationalizations for ridiculous behavior. No to what adds up to an apologia to cruelty and privileged bitchiness.

I thought about saying nothing at all. But this book is nominated for best romance, and I do have opinions about this, and I imagine I’m not the only one. So this extremely brief review is for anyone else who read this book and said wtf.

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Review: It Had to Be You

It Had to Be You by Susan Elizabeth Phillips
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Love in the Time of Slick Willy, the Juice and the Donald.
This one was quite a throwback. Since this summer I've been making a conscious effort to better understand the genre I've been so engrossed by recently by reading some of the best known books in the romance canon, and It Had to Be You came highly recommended. It's one of Eloisa James's favorite books and appears on many best of all time lists. But reading It Had to Be You was an unsettling, frustrating experience for me. This pioneering, popular and well-received sports romance was published in 1994, the year of Nicole Brown-Simpson’s death, and former football superstar O.J. Simpson’s ill-fated low speed chase/attempt to evade arrest for killing her. It was also the second year of the Clinton presidency, two years before Monica Lewinsky burst into public consciousness, and, perhaps most important, just a few years after “Backlash” told of a powerful postfeminist reactionary political wave sweeping across America. That’s all to say it was a heady time, right on the cusp of some sort of transition in gender and racial politics.

So I should have been prepared for what a contemporary romance set in the testosterone heavy world of the NFL might look like. It shouldn’t have been a huge surprise that the sexual politics made my head spin. And yet it still threw me for a bit— the gender dynamics aren’t pretty. They’re neither reactionary nor progressive, yet unsettling all the same. It was an unsettling time. For all that’s wrong with 2019, this book made me incredibly happy that it’s not 1994 and that I could leave that world by closing the book. When I think about reading It Had to Be You I'm reminded of that terrible, scornful, old-school, Victorian set down— that someone is no better than they should be, meaning they're lacking but that's to be expected because of who they are or where they come from. This novel made me think its gender politics were awful and yet possibly realistic for the time, in other words, no better than they should be. The gender dynamics between the characters are too muddled and confused to be truly enlightening or thought-provoking, but they are unsettling. So maybe that's as it ought to be. Intentional or not, it was a terribly unsatisfying and muddled time for women. It Had to Be You certainly reflects that.

The heroine, Phoebe Somerville, is an heiress, a buxom “bimbo”, secretly celibate sex-bomb, and a kind and intelligent woman who craves the love she never had growing up. She’s also a rape survivor, who’s suffering from a great deal of trauma and tries to use her body and her sexuality as armor and as a tool of manipulation in every aspect of her life even as she feels ashamed of her body and uncomfortable and insecure about her sexuality.

When Phoebe inherits (with conditions of course) an NFL team from her horribly abusive, recently deceased father, she amps up the overt, outrageous sexuality and downplays her intelligence as she enters a new workplace dominated by men. She thinks she’s adapting to the way the world sees her and using her body and looks to her advantage, and it appears that we are supposed to understand that this is a workable strategy, but it’s also clear throughout that this strategy causes her great pain. It makes her hate herself and puts her continually at odds with her employees, other businesspeople, and her potential love interest who is also a colleague.

Is Phoebe's false sexual flamboyance and bravado a source of strength, shame, or success? Or all three? More to the point, why is this her only professional strategem? Phoebe’s choices are cringe-inducing. I found it very hard to keep reading at times. But then I questioned myself. Am I slut shaming this heroine, am I being prudish? Possibly. But I don’t think so. So the question remains: Why are bare cleavage and the sexual manipulation of men the predominant way that Phoebe uses her talents in business dealings until the very end? While she’s at it why does she not on her own at least learn something about the industry independently rather than solely relying on her burgeoning relationships with the men in her organization? And, above all, if it’s a smart strategy why is it such a continual source of pain? The workplace plotlines strained my belief in the character and the narrative as a whole.

In contrast, the love story and Phoebe’s reawakening after sexual trauma are handled incredibly well. The connection between Phoebe and Dan and how their physical relationship progresses is believable, specific, not at all cliched. Their relationship hinges on consent and trust as much as chemistry, and Phillips handles it beautifully.

It is hard to write a novel that is both sexy and gritty about social reality in that particular historical moment while avoiding being particularly political or preachy. That's a hard needle to thread with the social forces, hard choices and traps women faced navigating a still hostile working world in the wake of the women’s movement. Phoebe is navigating an unjust situation and system. That is inherently political. It Had to Be You seems to want to be on the side of gender equality but not idealistic, not too orthodox, not too feminist maybe?

But the problem with the way Phoebe's written transcends gender politics. It's more fundamental than that. People say and do disrespectful, humiliating things to Phoebe; Phoebe says and does humiliating things to herself. And that lasts pretty much throughout the book in terms of her professional persona even though she grows in her personal life. Self-objectification and playing dumb are her favorite business strategies. And that's the contradiction I couldn't quite believe. Quirks and imperfection are human. Phoebe is human and therefore an imperfect heroine. Plus, all women struggle with self definition in a world that values and condemns female sexuality, but I'm unconvinced that she would choose to be imperfect in this particularly sexually exploitative, self-sabotaging way for this long in her professional life. I don’t buy that it would have gotten her the positive results she’d need to want to stick to that strategy for well over a decade. These choices make the book no better than it should be.

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Review: Unfit to Print

Unfit to Print by K.J. Charles
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I swooned.

Wonderful combination of period detail, mystery and romance. I found myself highlighting something on every other page like a maniac. The writing is crisp and original and the relationship just made me swoon-- it's got depth and chemistry and heat.

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Review: Beard with Me

Beard with Me by Penny Reid
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Author Penny Reid issued a lot of caveats when she published this novel. It's heavier than the other stories in the Winston Brothers series. As she's written, it's a tragic love story rather than a romance that ends with a happy ever after-- at least temporarily (the story continues in the next book). I'm a fan of the HEA in love, and I tend to avoid narratives that involve abuse. But I love Reid's work and this series especially, so I took a chance and it was completely worth it. This is Billy Winston’s coming of age and origin story as well as his love story with Scarlet. It’s what made Billy a surly resentful patriarch instead of the stern but sweet hero he was growing into. It's a compelling story, beautifully rendered. For me the proof was that by the end Beard with Me made me want to reread the first 5 books, and I can’t wait to read book 7.

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Review: Get a Life, Chloe Brown

Get a Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It was clear the minute I started to read. Get a Life Chloe Brown is a different romance novel. And I was thirsty for it—I’ve read a lot of disappointing books of late.

The premise is original; the main character, a wealthy and sheltered young Black British woman who is intelligent, genuinely witty and is living with chronic health problems, has a not so near death experience and decides to radically change her life for the better. Chloe Brown doesn't look or sound like any I've seen before. Her challenges go way beyond the typical negative self talk and stubborn miscommunication I’m used to; and the writing stands out too. It’s vivid, full of rich, specific detail, crisp, and quotable. I found myself frequently nodding and highlighting passages in appreciation. Like this one:
“Slowly, slowly, she sank to the ground. Put her clammy palms against the cool tiles. Breathed in. Breathed out. Breathed in.

Breathed out, her whisper like cracking glass, “If I had died today, what would my eulogy say?” This mind-blowing bore had zero friends, hadn’t traveled in a decade despite plenty of opportunity, liked to code on the weekends, and never did anything that wasn’t scheduled in her planner. Don’t cry for her; she’s in a better place now. Even Heaven can’t be that dull.”

It got better from there. The thing I admire the most is that this book doesn’t just tell the reader how special Chloe is; it shows you. As in the passage above, Chloe’s interior monologue is funny, her voice unique. Another example, from a pivotal point early on:
“Her moment of communion with the universe rudely interrupted, Chloe hauled herself into a sitting position. Strangely, she was now feeling much better. Perhaps because she had recognized and accepted the universe’s message. It was time, clearly, to get a life.”

That sold me. Definitely recommend.

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Review: Well Met

Well Met by Jen DeLuca
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

At the risk of sounding like the grinch who killed Romancelandia, I have to admit that I don’t get this one, and that surprised me given what I’d heard. Well Met is sweet and the setting, a Renaissance Faire, and setup are original. And that is admirable and worthy of note. Yet the book as a whole still felt a bit beige, like a serviceable rather than joyful read for me. I just didn’t find compelling. It was hard to escape the feeling of wanting more.

A woman moves to a small town in Maryland and moves in with her older sister and niece to take care of them in the wake of a serious car accident. The heroine Emily is also going through a difficult time in the wake of a bad breakup. While she’s in town, she chaperones her niece as a volunteer in their local renaissance faire and instantly strikes up an intense love-hate connection with the faire’s organizer. That’s all great. But things go a little off track, veering into stereotypes and overplayed tropes from there. First and foremost this is an enemies to lovers story of the weakest form about two people who know very little about each other and have a couple really minor, tepidly unpleasant exchanges. At worst, the hero is a super watered down Darcy type perhaps. Enemies is a big stretch. The second problem is that the heroine is annoyingly insecure in a way that is frustratingly common for women in romance. When they finally connect it’s still a sweet story but a little underwhelming.

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Review: The Kingmaker

The Kingmaker by Kennedy Ryan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Lennix Moon Hunter is a passionate advocate for Native American people, women and other oppressed groups. Maxim Cade is an environmental scientist who describes himself as a capitalist crusader. Their values are actually a lot more in sync than that description implies. I won’t spoil it but they meet cute in the most woke millennial way possible.

The story is surprisingly epic. It spans two decades and four continents and involves more than a little political intrigue and suspense. But it feels intimate because it’s first and foremost a really sweet love story about intelligent and caring but extremely ambitious people who really get each other but meet in genuinely challenging circumstances. The early sequences in Arizona and Amsterdam when Lennix and Maxim are first getting to know and falling for each other are especially sweet and charming. Even when the story expands, Ryan’s writing is always lyrical, passionate, and original. The way the two main characters think and speak made me want to spend time with them for as long as possible. At the end I wanted more.

One of my favorite parts:

If a kiss has a color, this one is the muted shades of the sky overhead, a ménage à trois of midnight and indigo and moonshine silver. If a kiss has a sound, this one is the concert of our breaths and sighs and moans. If a kiss has a taste, it tastes like this. Hunger flavored with yearning and spiced with desperation. With bites and growls and tender licks and soothing whimpers. Perfectly served portions of sweet and scorching.

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