The Sergeant's Lady
"Whatever shall I do? I’m powerless against the wiles of my mighty Southron captor." You know a book is good when the heroine can say that and the dialogue tags don't even have to tell you she's laughing when she says it.
What makes you like a book? I can tell you this is a WAY better book than some romances I've read, but I can also tell you that I can't give a very objective opinion of it, in part because it's three in the morning. I can explain how I came to read it but not tell you whether I like it. A lot of my enjoyment of it came from context rather than, um, text.
I like it when the internet gives me free romance novels, because they're not generally very re-readable and I'm poor, making them a vice rather than merely a luxury. Twitter informed me that Carina was doing a random drawing based on commenting on a post, for which each of six winners would receive a free ebook. Sweet, I thought, I can leave a comment. (I won a totally SWEET tote bag from Leah Braemel, the author of my much-loved Texas Tangle, in similar circumstances--and when I saw the thing, there were only 30 comments.) So as not to be one of Those People on the internet, I read the comments posted before mine to see what people were saying. (Oh right, the prompt. "What kind of hero do you like?") Almost everyone, for reasons not totally clear to me, liked Alpha heroes (and also capitalized the term for some reason). Alpha heroes are fine, of course, especially when they're werewolves*, but not my personal favorite. I like my fantasy men the way I like my real-life men (and women)--self-conscious and brainy. So I said so. But one of those commenters said that her favorite heroes were Peter Wimsey and Aral Vorkosigan and also someone from a series I haven't read, and of course to be polite by large-group discussion rules I mentioned her when I was making my own comment. Because dude, Peter Wimsey (and he's such a perfect counterexample to drop in a discussion of alpha males!). And Bujold! Someone else likes my two favorite authors ever! (Though I take Miles over Aral--er, if I thought I could keep up, I would. Really, I'll take Cordelia.) But then I happened to glance at the books they were giving away, and--hey, that name looks familiar. The comment I was squeeing over? Posted by one of the AUTHORS. Who also has another, already-released, book available from Carina. I needed something in English to give me a break from Monte Cristo anyway, right? So here it is, 3am, and--The Sergeant's Lady.
It is sort of roughly like Shards of Honor, except a romance novel set in the British army in Spain in 1811. The hero is not, of course, a noble detective. In fact, he's an innkeeper's son. He refrains quite beautifully from being the clueless alpha, because he respects other people and is a moral human being. Like. The heroine is equally a little generically heroic, smart and self-reliant without being anachronistically liberated. Also like. She believes she's barren, which allows her some sexual liberty without painting her as a moron. Bonus. Their love story felt natural and sweet rather than tragically compelling or anything. I read it with David asleep beside me and felt all warm and snuggly.
Two quibbles. First, the word "radiant." Yes, I said she BELIEVES she's barren. Second, not the most original take on the lowborn man not wanting to drag down a highborn lady. Shut up, screw it, then shut up about it, all right? But neither of these wrecked the story--the hero was too nice and honest to be all that stupid about screwing above his station, and I'm willing to suspect a wink on the radiant thing, because otherwise the writing's pretty good. Not brilliant, but solid.
I passed on this one based on the excerpt Carina posted on their website. The writing just wasn't great enough to pull me in quickly. Knowing just that little bit about the author, however, got me over the hump and into having fun. Your mileage may vary. But if, like me, you wish Aral and Cordelia HAD managed to make the time on that memorable hike--you might very well like this book as much as I did. The worst thing I can say about it is that it's not very original, but I'm not saying that as understatement or anything. It's sufficiently original, it's just also a romance novel.
Oh, and because I know there are people reading this who know a LOT more than I do about 1811 in Spain (I'll catch up, I promise), yes she did her research, everything's quite period. But not jarring to people like me who don't particularly care. Whole separate rant later about the portrayals of the Spanish by authors writing about the Napoleonic Wars in Spain (nothing Fraser does is egregious, don't worry).
*Adam might drag me back to the Mercy Thompson books someday
What makes you like a book? I can tell you this is a WAY better book than some romances I've read, but I can also tell you that I can't give a very objective opinion of it, in part because it's three in the morning. I can explain how I came to read it but not tell you whether I like it. A lot of my enjoyment of it came from context rather than, um, text.
I like it when the internet gives me free romance novels, because they're not generally very re-readable and I'm poor, making them a vice rather than merely a luxury. Twitter informed me that Carina was doing a random drawing based on commenting on a post, for which each of six winners would receive a free ebook. Sweet, I thought, I can leave a comment. (I won a totally SWEET tote bag from Leah Braemel, the author of my much-loved Texas Tangle, in similar circumstances--and when I saw the thing, there were only 30 comments.) So as not to be one of Those People on the internet, I read the comments posted before mine to see what people were saying. (Oh right, the prompt. "What kind of hero do you like?") Almost everyone, for reasons not totally clear to me, liked Alpha heroes (and also capitalized the term for some reason). Alpha heroes are fine, of course, especially when they're werewolves*, but not my personal favorite. I like my fantasy men the way I like my real-life men (and women)--self-conscious and brainy. So I said so. But one of those commenters said that her favorite heroes were Peter Wimsey and Aral Vorkosigan and also someone from a series I haven't read, and of course to be polite by large-group discussion rules I mentioned her when I was making my own comment. Because dude, Peter Wimsey (and he's such a perfect counterexample to drop in a discussion of alpha males!). And Bujold! Someone else likes my two favorite authors ever! (Though I take Miles over Aral--er, if I thought I could keep up, I would. Really, I'll take Cordelia.) But then I happened to glance at the books they were giving away, and--hey, that name looks familiar. The comment I was squeeing over? Posted by one of the AUTHORS. Who also has another, already-released, book available from Carina. I needed something in English to give me a break from Monte Cristo anyway, right? So here it is, 3am, and--The Sergeant's Lady.
It is sort of roughly like Shards of Honor, except a romance novel set in the British army in Spain in 1811. The hero is not, of course, a noble detective. In fact, he's an innkeeper's son. He refrains quite beautifully from being the clueless alpha, because he respects other people and is a moral human being. Like. The heroine is equally a little generically heroic, smart and self-reliant without being anachronistically liberated. Also like. She believes she's barren, which allows her some sexual liberty without painting her as a moron. Bonus. Their love story felt natural and sweet rather than tragically compelling or anything. I read it with David asleep beside me and felt all warm and snuggly.
Two quibbles. First, the word "radiant." Yes, I said she BELIEVES she's barren. Second, not the most original take on the lowborn man not wanting to drag down a highborn lady. Shut up, screw it, then shut up about it, all right? But neither of these wrecked the story--the hero was too nice and honest to be all that stupid about screwing above his station, and I'm willing to suspect a wink on the radiant thing, because otherwise the writing's pretty good. Not brilliant, but solid.
I passed on this one based on the excerpt Carina posted on their website. The writing just wasn't great enough to pull me in quickly. Knowing just that little bit about the author, however, got me over the hump and into having fun. Your mileage may vary. But if, like me, you wish Aral and Cordelia HAD managed to make the time on that memorable hike--you might very well like this book as much as I did. The worst thing I can say about it is that it's not very original, but I'm not saying that as understatement or anything. It's sufficiently original, it's just also a romance novel.
Oh, and because I know there are people reading this who know a LOT more than I do about 1811 in Spain (I'll catch up, I promise), yes she did her research, everything's quite period. But not jarring to people like me who don't particularly care. Whole separate rant later about the portrayals of the Spanish by authors writing about the Napoleonic Wars in Spain (nothing Fraser does is egregious, don't worry).
*Adam might drag me back to the Mercy Thompson books someday