Disclosure: Bear in mind that some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you.
About the Book
Title: A Proper Scoundrel Author: Esther Hatch Genre: Regency Romance Release date: May 10, 2021
His scandals were right on track until she derailed everything.
As the successful owner of multiple railroad lines, Diana Barton is all too accustomed to fending off suitors seeking to stake their claim on her wealth. In order to keep the wolves at bay, Diana has contrived the perfect plan: appeal to the most notorious rake in London, the Baron Lord Bryant, to ruin her reputation and scare off the worst of the time wasters. The ruse will be no hardship—she’s secretly been fascinated by the man for years.
Lord Bryant is well aware of his questionable reputation. Indeed, he has cultivated the image carefully, and the last thing he wants is a wife. When he’s approached by the younger sister of a business associate, he tells her in no uncertain terms that he cannot help. However, when he sees for himself what she is up against, Bryant grudgingly offers his assistance. Faced with his most complicated entanglement yet, Bryant is firm in his conditions—and Diana knows that to get romantically involved with Bryant would spell certain heartbreak. But as the counterfeit couple grows ever closer, the line between truth and lies becomes blurred, threatening both Lord Bryant’s well-laid plans and the future of Diana’s railroad business.
Esther Hatch grew up on a cherry orchard in rural Utah. After high school, she alternated living in Russia to teach children English and attending Brigham Young University in order to get a degree in archaeology. She began writing when one of her favorite authors invited her to join a critique group. The only catch was she had to be a writer. Not one to be left out of an opportunity to socialize and try something new; she started on her first novel that week.
A Proper Scoundrel by Esther Hatch Book 3 in the Proper Scandals series Rating: 4.5/5
Who doesn’t love a bad boy with a heart of gold? Who doesn’t love Han Solo? Esther Hatch delivers a fun and swoon-worthy regency romance that is sure to make you smile and root for the entertaining couple. Although this is book three in the series, you can still read this one as a standalone.
Diana Barton is the woman running multiple railroad lines and loves her job. She has no intention of marrying soon, but many suitors start to disrupt her work so she has to find a solution. Desperate for some relief, Diana goes to see Lord Everton Bryant who has a carefully preserved reputation as a scoundrel and cad. She needs someone to ruin her reputation so she can stop fending off would-be callers and do her job. Lord Bryant is hesitant to get involved but he eventually acquiesces and can’t seem to get the lovely Diana out of his head. She is headstrong and likes to push back against him. He enjoys provoking her and getting a rise out of her. Will Lord Bryant’s past and reputation prevent him from having a future full of life, hope and love? Can Diana trust that Lord Bryant won’t derail her plans?
The chemistry and banter between the two main characters is so good and should not be surprising if you’ve read anything from the author before. She has a talent for strong, female leads – I loved how smart and resourceful Diana was as a businesswoman. She was more like Lord Bryant’s equal. I think what Lord Bryant was trying to do to help young women was admirable but he definitely deserved his own HEA.
Highly recommend this fantastic read if you enjoy clean regency romance with some spice and a lot of heart!
My thanks to the author and publisher for providing me with an ARC of the book. All opinions expressed here are entirely my own. No positive review was expected and no compensation received.
Giveaway Time!
Win a free paperback copy of A Proper Scoundrel by clicking on the link below. Sorry – U.S. addresses only.
It’s been so fun being a part of the launch team for Becky Wade’s second book in the Misty River Romance series, Let It Be Me. Below you’ll find my review, info about the author, blog tour dates, free giveaway and the author chat party. Don’t miss this brilliant read from Becky Wade!
Disclosure: Bear in mind that some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you.
About the Book
Book: Let It Be Me Author: Becky Wade Genre: Christian Contemporary Romance Release date: May 4, 2021
The one woman he wants is the one he cannot have.
Former foster kid Sebastian Grant has leveraged his intelligence and hard work to become a pediatric heart surgeon. But not even his career success can erase the void he’s tried so hard to fill. Then he meets high school teacher Leah Montgomery and his fast-spinning world comes to a sudden stop. He falls hard only to make a devastating discovery — Leah is the woman his best friend set his heart on months before.
Leah’s a math prodigy who’s only ever had one big dream—to earn her PhD. Raising her little brother put that dream on hold. Now that her brother will soon be college bound, she’s not going to let anything stand in her way. Especially romance… which is far less dependable than algebra.
When Leah receives surprising results from the DNA test she submitted to a genealogy site, she solicits Sebastian’s help. Together, they comb through hospital records to uncover the secrets of her history. The more powerfully they’re drawn to one other, the more strongly Sebastian must resist, and the more Leah must admit that some things in life—like love—can’t be explained with numbers.
During her childhood in California, Becky frequently produced homemade plays starring her sisters, friends, and cousins. These plays almost always featured a heroine, a prince, and a love story with a happy ending. She’s been a fan of all things romantic ever since.
Becky and her husband lived overseas in the Caribbean and Australia before settling in Dallas, Texas. It was during her years abroad that Becky’s passion for reading turned into a passion for writing. She published three historical romances for the general market, put her career on hold for many years to care for her kids, and eventually returned to writing sheerly for the love of it. She’s delighted to be penning warm, wry, and heartwarming contemporary romances for the Christian market. She’s the Christy and Carol award winning author of My Stubborn Heart, the Porter Family series, the Bradford Sisters series, and the Misty River Romance series.
These days Becky can be found failing but trying to keep up with her housework, power-walking her neighborhood, carting her kids around town, hunched over her computer, eating chocolate, or collapsed on the sofa watching TV with her husband.
Let It Be Me by Becky Wade Book 2 in A Misty River Romance series Rating: 4.5/5
Ready for a swoon-worthy romance with sass and banter? Becky Wade delivers her second installment in Misty River that does not disappoint. Reading in order is recommended but not necessary.
As a rule, Sebastian didn’t form attachments. One, he didn’t like to rely on people. Two, he didn’t want the fear and potential loss that came with loving people.
Despite his difficult and miraculous past, Sebastian Grant has become a successful pediatric heart surgeon. Although he is a dedicated surgeon, he still struggles with feeling like he belongs and opening up to people. When someone comes along who he decides might be worth becoming vulnerable with, he discovers that she is off-limits since his best friend, Ben, is already in love with her. Sebastian is devastated but tries his best to push the lovely Leah Montgomery into Ben’s arms.
While Leah values Ben’s friendship, she does not feel anything more for him; however, there’s something about his friend, Sebastian, that draws her in. She doesn’t want to ruin a friendship, but she cannot get over how different she is with Sebastian – how much she can be herself with him. However, the math prodigy who sacrificed her Ph.D future to care for her younger brother has a bigger problem – Leah’s genealogy DNA results are back and disturbingly different than she anticipated. Leah seeks Sebastian’s help to discover what happened on the day that she was born, but can she keep her distance from the one man who actually stirs her heart and excites her more than algebra?
Not only does Becky Wade weave an interesting mystery into this story but she is able to incorporate her faith in a very meaningful way. Leah and Sebastian both have their issues and insecurities but the banter they share is irresistible and will make the reader smile (or laugh out loud). I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know Leah and Sebastian and their story. I appreciated the work that the author did to make her characters believable. I’m not the greatest fan of love triangles, but I really liked how the author dealt with this love triangle in a very realistic way.
“The day they’d met, he’d thought she had the face of a world-weary angel, but he hadn’t known the half of it. He’d had no idea then of her quickness, feistiness, fairness. He hadn’t known what it felt like to kiss her. Or how one look from her blue eyes could set his world on fire.”
Highly recommend this Christian contemporary romance with sass and mystery.
My thanks to the author and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of the book. All opinions expressed here are entirely my own. No positive review was expected and no compensation received.
More from Becky
What inspired the plot line of Let It Be Me?
A few years ago, I had my DNA tested at Ancestry.com. At one point in the process, they gave me a warning along the lines of, “DNA test results can be confusing or upsetting.” Basically, they made me aware that I might learn something shocking and they wanted to make sure I was ready for that possibility. In my case, my results turned out exactly as I expected. However, my imagination started percolating. The two words that begin every story idea entered my head. “What if?” What if a woman sent in her DNA and learned that the parents who raised her were not her biological parents, as she’d always believed?
The hero, Sebastian, is a pediatric heart surgeon. How did you prepare to write a character with that profession?
For research, I read a non-fiction book that detailed many months in the lives and careers of the people (doctors, nurses, patients, families) who populated The Cleveland Clinic — one of the foremost pediatric heart centers in the USA. I became so involved in these real-life people and the harrowing situations they faced, that I couldn’t put the book down. I spent a weekend reading and highlighting passage after passage. I referred back to that book dozens of times while rewriting. It was a fantastic resource!
Your recent books weave together romance, faith, and mystery. How did you come to that recipe?
Trial and error! I’ve always considered myself to be a romance novelist because I delight in the emotional journey the two characters take as they fall in love. After I had children, I felt led to write Christian romances that honored God. The scenes when God displays His love are the scenes that make me cry! Several books back, I began adding mysteries because concrete story goals (for example, What happened to the missing woman?) gave me a clearer path to follow when writing and also, hopefully, keep readers turning pages in order to uncover the secrets embedded in each book.
What challenges did you face during the writing of this novel?
The pandemic! I wrote most of Let It Be Me during the height of Covid. For six weeks of my deadline, my husband and three kids were all home with me. Many times, I tried to escape to the backyard with my laptop to find spaces of quiet in which to concentrate. It never worked. They always found me!
What blessings did you discover during the writing process?
I think God knew that a difficult and headstrong novel paired with a pandemic was more than I could have managed. Let It Be Me required a great deal of work, just like all my novels do. But it was also a delight. I had so much fun pairing a determined hero with a math genius heroine uninterested in romance. Given that this novel came out of 2020, it will always remind me of God’s faithfulness and provision. This book is a testament to the fact that God equips those He calls and provides joy in the work… regardless of the challenges.
Leah, the heroine of Let It Be Me, loves 1980’s music! We asked readers on Facebook to name their favorite 80’s songs and then Amy compiled them into an amazing playlist! You’ll find the playlist on Apple Music here and on Spotify here.
Disclosure: Bear in mind that some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you.
Never Miss by Melissa Koslin Rating: 4.5/5 Release date: May 4, 2021
Wow. What a debut for Melissa Koslin! If you enjoy Christian romance with lots of action and suspense, you will not be disappointed. The author is able to keep a steady pace of action and intrigue with mostly our main characters throughout the entire book. It keeps you guessing as the reader.
When you’re born into a family of assassins, you’d think you’d be used to getting shot at, but for former CIA sniper, Kadance Tolle, she does what she can to save the life of a stranger who ends up being a highly intelligent and capable partner, Dr. Lyndon Vaile. With their lives hanging in the balance as people keep shooting at them, this unlikely pair must discover the truth of what’s happening regarding the Ebola virus and its use in bioterrorism.
I loved Kadance and Lyndon. As a medical student, I was impressed with Lyndon’s character and jealous of his photographic memory. Kadance’s skills were exceptional and I loved the shooting range scene. The message of hope and light in the darkest of times was beautiful and I loved how Lyndon explained his logic about believing in a Higher Power – a Designer. The author is incredibly talented in weaving an exciting adventure with high stakes and swoon-worthy moments.
Highly recommend this book if you enjoy inspirational romance with action and suspense with some biological warfare thrown in.
My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with an ARC of the book. All opinions expressed here are entirely my own. No positive review was expected and no compensation received.
Hello. This blog is all mine and I will do my best to post what interests me and what books I read with honest reviews. I am a lover of good Christian fiction with a touch of romance, mystery, intrigue, humor, fun, etc. I invite you to join me as I read my way through books and life. I am currently pursuing my residency training as a family medicine physician!!! I have to carefully choose what I want to read for fun. My name is Kim and you are entering the Wong Mind.
