"The Last Heiress" is Worth Your Time

I will not elaborate and include spoilers, but I am happy to report that "The Last Heiress," by Bertrice Small, is a fine ending to "The Friarsgate Inhertance" quartet. While the first book in the series, "Rosamund," will remain my favorite of the four, "Heiress" is a close second. Elizabeth is a wonderful heroine, who only for a brief couple of chapters displays anything close to TSTL behavior. As I wrote elsewhere, Small's heroines are rarely in the TSTL neighborhood, which is why I was so disappointed by the third book in the series, "Phillipa," as that heroine not only visited the neighborhood, she moved in for most of the book!

The book opens with Elizabeth being sent to court, under her mother's orders, to find a husband in order to produce an heir for Friarsgate. For reasons too complicated to relate here, only an offspring of Elizabeth will be able to inherit Friarsgate. Elizabeth is at heart a country lass, although a rich one, who resists the allure of the court while at the same time becoming friends with Anne Boleyn. Elizabeth meets two handsome, hunky Scotsmen under different circumstances and is strongly attracted to both. Loose ends from previous books are tied up, the interesting secondary characters are allowed to have their brief hour, and my favorite character, Cousin Tom Bolton, again plays "fairy god-father" in furthering the romance of a favorite niece.

The Original Cover of "Cross Stitch" AKA "Outlander"

"Cross Stitch" is the title of the UK edition of "Outlander," the first book in the series of the same name by Diana Gabaldon. The cover art is far superior to that of the US edition that was pubished in mass market paperback under the title "Outlander" in 1991. I even did a minor rant on this blog about ugly cover art, using the first US edition of "Outlander" as the hedious example. This cover depicts a Claire whom I feel somewhat resembles the character as I have pictured her in my mind's eye for 14 years. She is perhaps more mature appearing (mid-30s than late 20s?)for the first book, but I think this is how the later Claire would look.

"The Last Heiress" Has Arrived

"The Last Heiress" is the last book in Bertrice Small's mini-series known as The Friarsgate Inheritance. The four books that encompass the series are in my opinion a mixed bag. The first book, "Rosamund," was by far the best of the first three books, which was due to the fact that Rosamund herself was the primary focus of that book. So far she has proven to be a more interesting character than her two eldest daughters: Banon, who has made primarily token appearances, and Phillipa, the oldest child, who skirted dangerously close to TSTL territory. Now at last comes Elizabeth, the youngest girl, who may be prove to be as interesting as her valiant mother.

In a nutshell, The Friarsgate Inheritance is the story of a woman who is determined to keep her hard-won northern England estate within the family. The first book in the series relates the trials and tribulations of Rosamund's life from the age of three into adulthood, as she fights to keep her lands out of the hands of some of the greediest and obnoxious relatives a lady in Tudor England has ever encountered. And by the end of that book, Rosamund has been married three times -- I am not sure if that is a personal best for a Small heroine or not, but I am sure it comes close.

The second book follows Rosamund to a mythical European country where she indulges herself with a much older man who may be the absolute love of her life. Not as complex a novel as the first, "Until You" is still superior to Book Three in the series, which is the story of "Phillipa," the original Friarsgate heiress. Ms Small seems unable to decide if Phillipa is a lightskirt or a prude, and this makes the heroine seem "addlepated," especially when she attempts to impose strict rules about what she and her husband may and may not (mostly may not)do in the bedroom.

The newly arrived fourth book starts out in a promising fashion with the arrival of the most appealing secondary character of the series, Rosamund's cousin Tom Bolton. The fact that Tom is as gay as a party hat seems to have escaped the notice of almost all of the other characters..a couple of the more astute men seem to be hip to the cut of his jib, but the women are clueless! Tom is a wonderful character & I hope that Rosamund's concern about his health is misplaced.

I will update the blog with my assessment of "The Last Heiress" when I have completed the novel. I am trying to clear the decks for the long-awaited release of "A Breath of Snow and Ashes," which is only a few days away!

I Love This Book!

Elizabeth Chadwick is not an entirely new author for me, but it has been years since I read one of her books -- "The Wild Hunt," which I believe was published back in the 1990. She is a British author who writes well-researched historicals set in France and England during the Middle Ages. While her books do have romance elements (the HEA ending), they are more in the genre of historical fiction than historical romance. If plenty of hot sex is a absolute reading requirement of yours, you probably will not be happy with Ms. Chadwick, as she tends to close the bedroom door very early. But, and here she parts company with most writers of romance novels, both men and women have very satisfactory sex with people that they don't love. If you only like history-as-wallpaper books, you may find Ms. Chadwick a tough go, as she brings us the past in all its smelly, dirty, sticky splendor.

"The Champion" takes place in France and England in the late 12th century. It relates the rise, the fall, and the rise again of the fortunes of two families: the de Montrois and the de Cerizys, who travel the tourney circuit, almost like modern-day rodeo riders, jousting for their living. Monday de Cerizay and Alexander de Montroi are the star-crossed lovers, but my favorite character is Alexander's brother, Hervi, who I can see in my mind's eye being played by Russell Crowe.

The only drawback to becoming hooked on Ms Chadwick's novels is that they are difficult to find in the book stores. Most of them are released in the UK, Canada, and in Europe (publisher is Time-Warner, so I don't really understand why they aren't released here as well). You can order them from secondary seller on amazon, but be prepared to pay a little more than you would for a US paperback. Many of the books also are published in the new oversized massmarket format.

When A Favorite Author Retires..

The rumor going around on several internet romance sites is that Marsha Canham's last book, "My Forever Love," is Marsha Canham's last book! Over the weekend I sent an e-mail to Colleen at "Romantic Times Magazine" to see if she could discover whether the rumor is fact or fiction (last year she verified that writer Anita Mills was alive and well, although retired, when the rumor was circulating that the author had died). Ms. Canham hasn't updated her website since the publication of "The Iron Rose," although she may have more than one site, but I am just not able to locate an alternate site. I will update this post as soon as I hear back from "RT Magazine."

When a favorite author retires, I have very mixed feelings -- I am close to retirement myself, so I understand the urge to leave work behind and strike out in a new direction, but at the same time I feel a real sense of loss. I felt that way back in the 1970s when I heard that Anya Seton was retiring after the publication of "Green Darkness." Ms Seton claimed that she was retiring due to health issues, although she was only in her 60s when she stopped writing -- according to various sources, no one was ever sure exactly what health issues Ms Seton had that percipitated her sudden retirement and she lived into her 90s. I loved the works of Ms Seton from the age of 14, when I first sat down with a tattered used copy of "The Winthrop Woman" (I have lost count of the number of times I have read that account of life in Puritan England and America). Anita Mills was an author to whom I warmed slowly, but ended up being a great admirer of her Regency, and then at the end, western romances.

If Marsha Canham is retiring, it will be a great loss to those of us who want historically accurate romance novels with heroines and heroes whose love stories thrill us with their emotional depth. In my opinion, "Midnight Honor" is one of the great historical romances written in recent memory, but few readers seem to know anything about it -- what I see as the lightweight fluff of Nora Roberts and Catherine Coulter make the best seller lists time after time, but Ms Canham seems to be known to a much smaller core group of fans. If it is true that Ms Canham has retired, we better start buying up her backlist quickly and saving the books in a special corner of our keeper shelves.

Anya Seton's Dragonwyck Re-released

I just received this lovely edition a few days ago and am saving it for this weekend. "Dragonwyck" is one of the few books by the late Anya Seton that I have not read and I am looking forward to discovering what treasures are hidden within the covers. I know that it takes place in New York State in the early to mid-19th century and is rather dark in tone, more of a Gothic romance than her later works. It seems to me that there was also a movie version made during the 40s with Gene Tierney in the role of the heroine, but I have yet to see it. I think I need something that will take my mind off of the tragedy in the Gulf States for a little while....

Donate to help the Animals in the Gulf Coast

Time to Stop the Finger Pointing & Pull Together

I don't know how many Sunday newspapers carried the picture of the 105 year old white woman in a wheelchair being evacuated from danger, holding on to the hand of a five year old black girl, the granddaughter of her nurse, but it should have been on the front page of every paper in this country. It made me weep. I'm taking it to work on Tuesday and taping it to my file cabinet, to remind me of what brings us together -- our humanity.

I don't know if this old song is in the public domain or not, but I assume it is (but just in case it isn't, I took it from the PBS web site on the program "River of Song". I added the final verse because it is one variation we used to add at my old church in California).

"We shall overcome
We shall overcome
We shall overcome someday.
Deep in my heart, I do believe
We shall overcome someday.

Black and white together
Black and white together
We shall overcome someday.
Deep in my heart, I do believe
We shall overcome someday."

My Heart is Heavy

I never got to see New Orleans in person. It was one of those things I was saving until retirement, when I figured I could take a nice trip with Elderhostel and not have to worry about going back to the real world of work when the trip was over. Now, even if the city is rebuilt, it will never be the same. I feel so much for those people waiting for help that seems to be coming so slowly. And then there are the ugly images of idiots looting..not for food, water, diapers, medicine, shoes, underwear, soap, toothpaste, or any of the other things that we deem necessities, but for plasma TVs, microwave ovens, and, ofcourse, guns. Gleefully shooting at helicopters and rescue workers shows how thin the veneer of civilization can be at times like these. I hope these ugly images of criminals are not the ones I carry with me when I think back on this terrible time for our country.

My contributions are made, but I keep feeling I could do more, but what? I work fulltime hundreds of miles away from the site of this disaster, and to be honest I don't have the kind of practical skills that are currently needed. This time money will have to be the medium, but I am going to look for volunteer opportunites close to home, and take that CPR/First Aid class at the Red Cross I've always wanted to take. And although I am not normally a praying type of person, I will pray for the people of the Gulf Coast, even, or especially, for the idiot looters.