Showing posts with label bewitching book tours. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bewitching book tours. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Bewitching Book Tours Book Review: That Scoundrel Emile Dubois


That Scoundrel Emile Dubois
Lucinda Elliot

Genre: Spoof Gothic Paranormal Historical

Publisher: Elliot

Date of Publication: December 2012

ISBN: 9780992736101
ASIN: B00AOA4FN4

Number of pages: 371
Word Count: 127,000

Cover Artist: Streetlight Graphics

Tagline: As the companion to an elderly Countess, Sophie de Courcy longs for Gothic adventure. She gets more of it than she wishes as she joins her grand relative Emile Dubois into an occult struggle, with man vampires and time travel.

Book Description:

That Scoundrel Emile Dubois' has been honoured with the prestigious B.R.A.G medallion for outstanding fiction.

Plunge into a world of over-the-top Gothic adventure and darkly comic happenings and met the wicked Emile Dubois, and the determined Sophie, who will not let him turn into a vulpine predator.

Sophie de Courcy, living during the time of the French Revolutionary Wars on an isolated mountain in North Wales as the bored companion to a kind elderly countess, dreams of excitement and romance. When she meets her long term hero, her grand distant relative, the dashing but wicked Emile Dubois, she has more adventure than she ever wanted.

Caught up in occult happenings with predatory half vampires and time warps, Sophie finds herself living in true Gothic style in an isolated mansion staffed by Emile's villainous accomplices.

With the help of her fearless Tarot reading maid, Sophie must somehow help Emile to overcome the sinister changes that are removing his humanity, and to defeat their evil, half-human neighbours who need him to further their occult schemes.

Set largely in the remote countryside of North Wales, UK, this occult adventure is both a spoof of traditional Gothic themes and a vivid love story.

Half Vampires, time travel, highwaymen, love and dark comedy combine for enthralling adventure as two eighteenth century French scoundrels are incongruously drawn into occult adventure, while their love interests, the romantic Sophie and her loyal ally Agnes stubbornly refuse to allow them to lose their dwindling humanity.






Review: That Scoundrel Emile Dubois was nothing like I was expecting. I mean that in a good and bad way.

The story is Charlotte Bronte meets Bram Stoker.

I have to admit, I've not the love I once had for vampires, but the premise of this book caught my eye, because it was a mixture of just about everything I like.

Sophie is the perfect gothic heroine. She's a poor relation gone to be the companion to a Countess. She has very strict morals and a etiquette, though even that isn't strong enough to keep her from befriending her outspoken, tarot card reading maid, Agnes. 

Then there's Emile part Robin Hood and a little bit Marius from Les Miz (I know wrong time period but still). He is a scoundrel and at times, both when he was human and when he was a man vampire, that you wouldn't mind "staking" him.

His relationship with Sophie is a bit complex and them finding each other has to do with some wibbly wobbly timey whimey stuff, which also figures into the story with the vampires in the next estate and past events in Emile's life.

Sophie and Agnes spend the better part of the novel trying to change their man vampires back into mortals, while the man vampires well, its hard to tell what they really want.

The plot was solid and the characters fascinating.  For me, the pacing was a bit slow. It took me over a week to read this book and I'm usually a fast reader. I needed a little more action to keep my attention.

This won't keep me from finding out what happens in the next book.

Rating 4 flowers







Thursday, July 19, 2018

Bewitching Book Tours Book Review: Enchanted - The Wedding Story


Enchanted – The Wedding Story
The Sugar Maple Chronicles
Book Five
Barbara Bretton

Genre: PNR/Mystery

Publisher: Free Spirit Press

Date of Publication: February 14 2018

ASIN: B078HMCTT5

Number of pages: 201
Word Count: 48,000

Tagline: Welcome back to Sugar Maple . . . where the knitter sitting next to you only comes out at night

Book Description:
Welcome Back to Sugar Maple . . .

Sugar Maple may look like your postcard-perfect Vermont town but that’s where the similarity ends. Our librarian is a beautiful Norwegian troll. The funeral parlor is run by a family of vampires. The Sugar Maple Inn is owned by Fae while the werewolves keep our hardware store well-stocked. For centuries we have been home to house sprites, witches, selkies, spirits, shapeshifters, and elves.

And who could forget Forbes, our lovable Mountain Giant?

I’m Chloe Hobbs, the half-human/half-magick owner of Sticks & String, the most popular knit shop in New England, where your yarn never tangles, you always get gauge, and the knitter sitting next to you only comes out after dark. And did I mention that I’m almost thirty, single, and with no prospects in sight? My friends and neighbors have been casting spells to help me find Mr. Right but so far their efforts have been all wrong.

Who'd have guessed I'd find my soulmate in Luke MacKenzie, a cop investigating Sugar Maple's very first murder? Bad news is he's 100% human which could spell disaster for a normal future with a paranormal woman like me--in love, in danger, and in way over my head.

So here we are, two years and one baby daughter later, about to get married. They say nothing good comes from unions between mortals and magicks, but Luke and I are determined to prove them wrong.

But a beautiful antique ring may hold the key to a promise that could tear us apart forever.



Review: I can't believe I've never read Barbara Bretton before Enchanted. This is the 5th book in The Sugar Maple Chronicles. This book is definitely one that has a continuity thing going on, however, I didn't have any issues with the story, except for having a longing to read the other 4 books.

In this installment of the Sugar Maple Chronicles we approach Chloe and Luke's wedding and all the craziness leading up to it. If you haven't visited Sugar Maple before (like me) the town is a haven for paranormal types. Chloe, the owner of Sticks and String yard shop is part human and part magick. I absolutely adore her. She's cast a spell over the town so that non residents of the paranormal variety can't break on through.

Chloe really has a lot on her plate, trying to keep her soon to be in laws from discovering the truth about the town. On top of it all her future mother in law has found a distant cousin of Chloe's and has invited her to the wedding. 

Wendy is a fabulous character, and she really feels like a great fit into Chloe's world, even though she's a mortal.

All of this should make for a very happy time leading up to her wedding, but a box containing memories of her parents and a strange ring start a strange string of events that started just before her parents died and an arrangement they made for her marriage.

All these things come to a head in this book, as Gavan is sent to stop the wedding.

I loved the characters in this book and I loved how things weren't all that they seemed. Chloe's daughter stole the show in all the scenes that she was in, and there were some pretty good laugh out loud moments with her.

Gaven is a perfect almost baddie, but by the end of the book, there's a certain mortal that you really hope he finds happiness with in a future book.

I really loved this story, and I want to go back and read the series from the start now.

Rating: 5 flowers





Tuesday, October 3, 2017

Bewitching Book Tours Book Review: Halloween Is Murder





Halloween is Murder
McKinley Mysteries
Book 11
Carolyn Arnold

Published by: Hibbert and Stiles
Publishing Inc.

Genre: Cozy Mystery

Pages: 154
Word Count: 38,534

Release Date: October 3, 2017

Book Description:

Beware of all that goes bump in the night…

Sean and Sara McKinley are excited about the haunted house they’ve set up as a Halloween charity fund-raiser, but things take a ghoulish turn when the reporter covering their story is found dead. With the media keeping mum about how she died, Sara’s curiosity is piqued, and she convinces Sean to take on the investigation through their PI firm.

But this case is not without its challenges. The police are actively investigating it, as well, and it’s not even clear that the woman was murdered. It will take a little cloak-and-dagger, dress-up, and finesse for the McKinley’s to get to the bottom of it, but they aren’t the kind to give up.

As they troll for leads and work through the skeletons in the reporter’s closet, they unearth a few suspects, but they’ll need to carve out the whole truth if they’re going to find her killer. If they do so fast enough, there might even be time for a little trick-or-treating.


Kobo             Google Play          Goodreads



Excerpt from chapter 2 of Halloween is Murder (McKinley Mysteries)

Chapter 2

SHOCKING TURN OF EVENTS

IT WAS NEARING SIX O’CLOCK in the evening, and Sean and Sara were home in their media room on a large sectional couch, getting ready to watch their spotlight on the evening news with some friends and colleagues. They’d left the haunted house in the hands of some capable employees, who would be posted there until closing at eight.
Jimmy Voigt, their former sergeant when they worked for the Albany PD, also worked for them at the PI firm. He was on the couch next to his girlfriend, Meredith, for the viewing. Sara had told Sean more than once that it was a match made in heaven. He was pretty sure he’d rolled his eyes every time. Not because he didn’t believe in love—he was married to his soul mate—but he just found it hard to picture his former boss whispering sweet nothings to a lady love.
Helen was seated at the other end of the sectional, and Mia was on the floor at her feet, still dressed up as a princess. She really was a good kid—as far as kids went anyway. And it’s not that Sean had anything against children, but for now, he and Sara had decided they weren’t going to have any. And honestly, it was probably for the best, as they traveled a lot and solving crimes didn’t leave much free time.
“I’m going to be on TV.” Mia’s face lit up as she grinned. “I can’t wait!” She seemed more excited about this than she had been at the announcement that pizza was for dinner. Mia stared at the muted television. “That lady was so pretty.”
By “that lady,” Sean assumed she meant Chloe Parsons. Sean had to agree that based on appearances and initial impressions, she was good-looking. But he didn’t understand why she took such issue with Susannah when she didn’t want to talk.
Mia turned to Sara and flashed another smile. “You looked great, too.”
“Thank you.” Sara returned the smile and swept her long brown hair over her left shoulder. “Did you have fun today?”
“Oh yeah. My favorite part was the mummy.”
“That didn’t scare you?” Sara laced her voice with concern but couldn’t hide the underlying amusement.
Mia’s expression faded, and her eyes enlarged. She nodded. “I was, but I like to be scared. And I love mummies!” She bounded to her feet and jumped onto her mother’s lap. Helen let out a whoosh of air but quickly recovered.
“It’s the other kind of mummy, though, sweetheart.” Helen ran a hand over her daughter’s silky hair.
“Oh, it’s almost time,” Meredith said, obviously getting swept up in Mia’s enthusiasm.
Sean looked at the digital clock on the cable box: 5:59.
“It’s on!” Jimmy said, sitting up straighter.
Sean turned up the sound and sank back into the couch, putting an arm around his wife.
Mia wriggled on her mother’s lap.
“Come on, honey, back on the floor.” Helen’s voice strained with the desperation of her plea.
Sean smiled, not because of the woman’s discomfort but because he loved seeing how excited Mia was.
“My costume was the best. They have to show me!” The little girl’s eyes were wide and fixed on the screen.
“You are a beautiful little princess,” Sean said.
Mia glared at him. “I’m not little.” She held up both hands, fingers splaying as she counted them off. “I’m six.”
“My apologies,” he said with a slight bow of his head.
Sara laced her fingers with his, and he met her gaze, which said, You’re aren’t the best with kids…
Message received.
“Shh.” This came from Jimmy, and when Sean turned to look at him, he shrugged. “You want to hear it, don’t you?”
Sean increased the volume a bit more.
“We have some somber news this evening,” a chic reporter announced from the news desk. Based on the set of her mouth and the sad look in her eyes, she wasn’t reading from a script. “Your Source has just received word that one of our own has died.”
Sara tapped her fingers on the back of his, leaned in, and whispered, “I have a bad feeling about this.”
He didn’t look over at her, but his wife had this way of sensing things. He wouldn’t label her clairvoyant, but she certainly had strong intuition.
“Tonight, we say good-bye to”—the reporter, while she kept her tone modulated, was clearly battling with her emotions—“Chloe Parsons.”

The news was a sledgehammer to his chest, knocking the wind out of him.



What to Expect from the McKinley Mysteries

Romance. Humor. Murder. Are you looking for a murder mystery without all the graphic violence and foul language? Something that you can enjoy in an afternoon and walk away feeling good about afterward? How about a dash of humor and romance? If so, meet former detectives Sean and Sara McKinley. When a billionaire leaves them all his money, they no longer have to work, but they find themselves sticking to what they’re good at—solving murders. Undercover, off the books, and around the world, they’ll get to the bottom of things…and romance it up along the way.

About the Author:

CAROLYN ARNOLD is an international bestselling and award-winning author, as well as a speaker, teacher, and inspirational mentor. She has four continuing fiction series—Detective Madison Knight, Brandon Fisher FBI, McKinley Mysteries, and Matthew Connor Adventures—and has written nearly thirty books. Her genre diversity offers her readers everything from cozy to hard-boiled mysteries, and thrillers to action adventures.

Both her female detective and FBI profiler series have been praised by those in law enforcement as being accurate and entertaining, leading her to adopt the trademark: POLICE PROCEDURALS RESPECTED BY LAW ENFORCEMENT™.

Carolyn was born in a small town and enjoys spending time outdoors, but she also loves the lights of a big city. Grounded by her roots and lifted by her dreams, her overactive imagination insists that she tell her stories. Her intention is to touch the hearts of millions with her books, to entertain, inspire, and empower.

She currently lives just west of Toronto with her husband and beagle and is a member of Crime Writers of Canada and Sisters in Crime.

Connect with CAROLYN ARNOLD Online:





And don’t forget to sign up for her newsletter for up-to-date information on release and special offers at http://carolynarnold.net/newsletters .


Review: I love seasonal books. I really love Halloween stories, cos I love mysteries and spooky stuff. 

This was a fabulous cozy.  It was a quick and fun read that is perfect for lovers of the genre. Its the kind of book you can read easily in an afternoon, and it will definitely get you in the mood for the holiday.

Rating: 5 flowers

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Bewitching BookTours Cover Reveal: Two Princes

Two Princes: The Biker and The Billionaire
Sons of Sanctuary
Book 1
Victoria Danann

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Publisher: 7th House Publishing,
Imprint of Andromeda LLC

Date of Publication: June 16, 2015

Number of pages: 300
Word Count: 90,000

Cover Artist: Victoria Danann

Book Description:

Brigid Roan is a graduate student at the University of Texas. She had no trouble getting her thesis approved, but finding a Hill Country motorcycle club willing to give her access to their lifestyle had started to seem impossible. Then she got a lead. A friend of a friend had a cousin with ties to The Sons of Sanctuary.

What she wanted was information to prove a proposition. What she didn’t want was to fall for one of the members of the club. Especially since she had set out to prove that motorcycle clubs are organized according to the same structure as primitive tribal society.

Brash Fornight was standing in line at the H.E.B. Market when his world tipped on its axis. While waiting his turn to check out, his gaze had wandered to the magazine display and settled on the new issue of “NOW”. The image on the cover, although GQ’d up in an insanely urbane way, was… him.

After reading the article, Brash threw some stuff in a duffle and left his club, The Sons of Sanctuary, with a vague explanation about needing a couple of days away. He left his Jeep at the Austin airport and caught a plane for New York, on a mission to find the guy who was walking around with his face.

Two brothers, one a player, one a playboy, are on a collision course with destiny and a woman who thought she won a prize when she was allowed a look inside the Sons of Sanctuary MC.

Excerpt:

“Sir?” Brash Fornight gradually became aware that someone behind him in the grocery checkout line was trying to get his attention. “Sir?” He refocused and glanced behind him. The woman leaning on a cart overflowing with chip bags and cookie boxes nodded toward the cashier indicating that it was his turn to move forward. Brash looked her in the eye and had to give her props. Most people wouldn’t have the balls to try to herd a guy wearing Sons of Sanctuary MC leather.
The club employed a woman who cooked and did grocery shopping several times a week as part of her job description, but Brash didn’t like to explain his relentless craving for peanuts and he liked being teased about it even less. He didn’t know whether it was the Vitamin B or the fat or just because he liked the taste, but he couldn’t imagine going a day without them.
That’s how he came to be standing statue still In the grocery checkout line, being prompted by some woman with more nerve than sense. While he was waiting, his eyes drifted over the magazine display and settled on the cover of “NOW”, on the Most Eligible Bachelor edition no less. The debonair figure staring back was wearing Brash’s own face and body. He looked different with short hair and a four thousand dollar suit with the shirt fashionably open at the neckline, but the similarity was inescapable.
On impulse he grabbed the magazine and tossed it onto the conveyor belt with his week’s stash of peanuts.
He stuffed the bags into the saddlebags of his bike and roared toward home, nervously tapping his fingers on handlebars at red lights, riding on shoulders to keep from slowing down. He was anxious to get to the privacy of his own room and read about Branach St. Germaine.
Two beers, one jar of peanuts, and one “NOW” article later, Brash was sitting on the edge of his bed looking at the wall, seeing nothing but his own heavy thoughts. He pulled out his phone, looked up a website, and waited on hold for ten minutes to hear the time of the next flight from Austin to New York.

There was a flight to Newark in a little over three hours. He looked at his watch and calculated the time it would take to drive from Dripping Springs at that time of day. As he booked the flight, he stood up, walked to the small closet, grabbed a duffel bag, and began shoving stuff into it. Ten minutes later, he closed his door and locked it, threw the duffel over his shoulder, and headed straight for the office downstairs. He dropped the duffel on the hallway floor beside the closed door and knocked.
“Yeah?” Brash looked inside, glad that his dad was by himself, and stepped in. “What’s up?”
“I’m takin’ personal time, Pop. Gonna be gone for a couple of days.”
“What the hell is ‘personal time’?”
The gruffness made Brash smile. “It means I’m not gonna be here if you call and I’m not tellin’ you why.”
The Sons of Sanctuary President looked up at Brash, over the top of his readers, and narrowed his eyes. “You got a secret?”
“Everybody’s got secrets.”
Brandon Fornight studied his son for a minute. “True enough. Is it the kind of secret that could affect this club?”
Brash shook his head. “Don’t see how.”
“Well, then. See you… When did you say you’d be back?”
“I didn’t.”
“Bein’ purposefully vague, are you?”
Brash grinned. “That’s why they call it personal time. But I expect to be back Friday.”
“You gonna have your phone with you?” When Brash nodded, Bran looked back down at his ledger in a deliberately dismissive gesture. “Well, get outta here then.”
Brash parked his bike in the airplane hangar. The structure had already been on the property when the club had bought it and turned it into a compound twenty years earlier. They used part of it for vehicle maintenance and repair and part for parking.
Some of the guys who were working looked over and shot curious glances his way when Brash threw his duffel into his pickup and started it up, but it wasn’t their way to ask questions. The Sons figured that if somebody wanted you to know something, they’d tell you.
Brash took a cab to a midtown hotel, wondering all the way why human beings would choose to live in such a place. As he slid his credit card across the hotel counter to the agent on duty, he glanced at the name, Brandon Fornight. It seemed unlikely that it was a coincidence that that the mysterious look-alike’s first name began with the same four letters. He ordered room service and pulled out his laptop.
Getting intel on the guy didn’t take advanced ops. Within an hour Brash knew where Brannach St. Germaine worked, what kind of car he drove, what kind of women he dated, who his tailor was, and where he liked to dine. There was no shortage of photos online, but the one that grabbed his attention wasn’t one of the many with starlets or debutantes on his arm. It was the one taken with his arm around his mother as they were arriving together for some red carpet fundraiser. Brash had an almost irresistible compulsion to reach up and touch her face on the screen in front of him.
The knock on the door signaled that room service had arrived. It cost a fortune, but looked and tasted like shit. So he closed the computer and went out for a walk to clear his head and find something edible.


About the Author:

USA Today Bestselling Author, Victoria Danann, is making her debut into Contemporary Romance with releases in May and June 2015, after taking the world of PNR by storm.

Her Knights of Black Swan series won Best Paranormal Romance Two years in a Row (2013, 2014). ~Reviewers Choice Awards, The Paranormal Romance Guild.

Victoria’s paranormal romances come with uniquely fresh perspectives on “imaginary” creatures, characters, and themes. She adds a dash of scifi, a flourish of fantasy, enough humor to make you laugh out loud, and enough steam to make you squirm in your chair. Her heroines are independent femmes with flaws and minds of their own whether they are aliens, witches, demonologists, psychics, past life therapists, or financial analysts from Dallas. Her heroes are hot and hunky, but they also have brains, character, and good manners – usually – whether they be elves, demons, berserkers, werewolves, or vampires.

The first book of the Knights of Black Swan Paranormal Romance Series, My Familiar Stranger, was nominated for Best Paranormal Romance of 2012 by both Reviewers’ Choice and Readers’ Choice Awards. All of her books have opened on the Amazon Best Sellers list and earned Night Owl Reviews Top Pick awards.

Many have appeared on Listopia Book of the Month as #1 across all genres.

For books published in 2013, Black Swan won three awards.

1. Best Paranormal Romance Series
2. Best Paranormal Romance Novel – A SUMMONER’S TALE

3. Best Vampire~Shifter Novel – MOONLIGHT.

In 2014, Solomon’s Sieve won Best Vampire Novel.

Photo- If you’re interested in me personally, I am also a classically trained musician who defected to Classic Rock and that’s my first love. Yeah. Even more than writing.

This is Roadhouse, the very best in Classic Rock, taken near The Last Concert Cafe, Houston Texas, 2011. I was the utility player which means I played rhythm guitar, keyboards, sang backups and a few leads.





@vdanann






Tour giveaway


NOTE: This is the celebrity featured on the cover of TWO PRINCES.

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Thursday, October 9, 2014

Cover Reveal: Under His Touch

Under His Touch
Falling Under
Book 2
Jeffe Kennedy


Amber Dolors knows better than to get involved with her boss. Devastatingly handsome in his sharp suits, sexy beyond belief, he possesses an air of command that fuels her darkest fantasies. But being the assistant to his assistant’s assistant represents an opportunity golden enough to outweigh other considerations. Even if his way of giving orders and demanding her best performance gives her delicious warm shivers inside.
Alexander Knight prides himself on his integrity and self-discipline. After all, he hasn’t risen to the position he enjoys by indulging his whims over ambition. He also isn’t blind. He’s certainly noticed his sharp, young assistant is hot as hell. His self-imposed sexual hermitage doesn’t stop him from watching her. And fantasizing.
The day Alec’s cool reserve cracks and Amber catches a glimpse of something simmering beneath his apparent indifference is the day everything between them changes. Alec gives her what she’s been looking for sexually—as masterful in the bedroom as he is in the boardroom. But what will it take to soothe his wounded soul?





About the Author:

Jeffe Kennedy is an award-winning author with a writing career that spans decades. Her works include non-fiction, poetry, short fiction, and novels. She has been a Ucross Foundation Fellow, received the Wyoming Arts Council Fellowship for Poetry, and was awarded a Frank Nelson Doubleday Memorial Award. Her essays have appeared in many publications, including Redbook.

Her most recent works include a number of fiction series: the fantasy romance novels of A Covenant of Thorns; the contemporary BDSM novellas of the Facets of Passion, and an erotic contemporary serial novel, Master of the Opera, which released beginning January 2, 2014. A fourth series, the fantasy trilogy The Twelve Kingdoms, hit the shelves starting in May 2014 and a fifth, the highly anticipated erotic romance trilogy, Falling Under, will release starting in July.

She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with two Maine coon cats, plentiful free-range lizards and a very handsome Doctor of Oriental Medicine.

Jeffe can be found online at her website: JeffeKennedy.com, every Sunday at the popular Word Whores blog, on Facebook, and pretty much constantly on Twitter @jeffekennedy. She is represented by Foreword Literary.






Monday, December 2, 2013

Bewitching Book Tours Book Review: Six Of One



Six of One, a Tudor Riff
JoAnn Spears

Genre:  Historical fiction, satire, women's fiction, chick lit, alternative history, historical fantasy

ASIN:  B006OPKZE6

Number of pages:  304
Word Count: 79,000


Book Description:

“Six of One” is the ultimate ‘girls’ night in’…with the six wives of Henry VIII. It’s the most fun you can have with your nightdress on!  Join Dolly, the Tudor-obsessed heroine of “Six of One”, on a Yellow Brick Road journey to the alternate reality of an all-girl Tudor court.

It all begins when Dolly loses consciousness on the eve of her marriage to the six-times- divorced Harry.  She awakens in the company of the Tudor women she’s studied all her life. They have a mission to accomplish, and Dolly may be just the girl who can help them do it.

As a warm-up to her life-changing interview with the six wives of Henry VIII, Dolly gets to dish with lots of the other fascinating females of the Tudor era. She learns things she never guessed about the Princes in the Tower from their sister, Elizabeth of York…Henry VIII’s mom.  She talks sex with Henry’s sisters and scholarship with his daughters. She even gossips with the help, since Kat Ashley and Bess of Hardwicke are among the ladies on hand.

Of course the heart of the story is in Dolly’s interview with the six wives of Henry VIII. It turns out there’s something to each of the wives’ stories that’s been held back all this time.  You won’t believe what really happened…or will you?

“Six of One” offers no tragedy, no excuses, and no apologies. It does have lots of broad humor, not to mention tons of puns. And—for a change—a happy ending


Excerpt from “Six of One”: Chapter Nineteen, Of Real Estate Celestial and Terrestrial

It was hard to imagine the woman who was facing me at any kind of rest at all. Hers was not the tremulousness that enervated Jane; the edginess that snapped, crackled, and popped from Elizabeth; or the self-fueled neurosis of Arabella. This woman radiated energy that was pure, simple, boundless, and efficient—it was as if she had a nuclear reactor under her farthingale.

“What, still in your nightdress, Dolly? You are quite the slugabed!” the woman said. “Perhaps I am a slugabed, but I’m very properly attired for a honeymoon, don’t you think?” I asked, in what I hoped was a roguish manner. (You have to be very careful with roguish when you are over forty.)

“I should say that you are, with nothing but a nightdress on!” the woman answered. “Most of our guests request panties as soon as they get here. Of course, I don’t feel the need for them, myself.” At first, I admired how well this woman did roguish, but then I remembered that panties did not hit the fashion scene until well after the Elizabethan era.

“And I notice that you are still fixed on that honeymoon with your Harry, Dolly. You won’t be, once the wives have declaimed themselves. Or perhaps you will be. I have learned the hard way never to underestimate human frailty or human stupidity. After all, we women of the court are all still here, aren’t we? Each of the guests we have entertained here over the centuries was an opportunity, a squandered opportunity. Six wives! You would think that between them, or should I say amongst them, they could get it right.”

I would have cast my vote for amongst, but was unable to get a word in edgewise.

“Six fools!” the woman continued. “Like so many cats in a sack! Squalling, clawing, fur flying, wound licking, but not one iota of effectual sense! So here they stay. Here we stay.”

I had learned from the younger Tudor contingent what the mission of the women here was. What they hadn’t told me was exactly how or why the ladies who were here came to be here, and it was something I wanted to know. I was sure it would be useful information to have. It might keep me from putting my foot in my mouth and spare the bedpost any more abuse because of my blunders. And if the six wives were as cantankerous as this woman claimed they were, it might spare me some abuse as well.

“There’s not much any of them can tell you about success at matrimony; you ought to listen to me, Dolly, dear,” she went on. “I’ve had four husbands: one or two missteps along the way, but success overall and no regrets. My head stayed on my shoulders, and my feet stayed squarely on the ground—of which I had plenty; I saw to that.”

Does she mean plenty of feet or plenty of ground? I wondered. On the other hand, perhaps she meant plenty of feet of ground. Maybe she meant plenty of square feet, but that would surely have made purchasing shoes difficult. A woman as enterprising as this one seemed to be probably dealt more in acres, if not miles, than square feet, and the silken espadrilles that peeked out from beneath her gown appeared to house well-shaped feet. The woman above the feet was likewise well-shaped and not at all unattractive—if you like the spiky type.

“I needed the ground, you see, for my building,” she explained. “Bricks and mortar, my dear, bricks and mortar—the best insurance for a woman’s security and a woman’s standing. A woman needs a place to keep her people and her possessions safe and secure under her weather eye.”

Under her weather thumb is more like it, I thought. This building fool could only be Bess of Hardwicke, a woman whose name is seldom seen in print without the word “redoubtable” in front of it. I wondered if anyone ever called her redoubtable to her face. I redoubted it.

Review: Don't come into this looking for a deep, thoughtful read. It isn't that. It is silly and fun and a great read for those of us that like to geek out on Tudor history.

Dolly is a history professor who concentrates on The Tudors! She's getting married to a Harry, who has been married 6 times before..Wait doesn't that sound like a song too...

Then something happens at her bachelorette party...and that's when all the fun ensues. 

I absolutely adored this book. It was a quick fun read..a little bit like A Christmas Carol only with Henry VIII's wives and some of the other women that were important to him. 

Each of Henry's wives are sharing a secret with Dolly about themselves. These secrets will really get you giggling. Some are realistic, some aren't so much, but they all make for a fun read.

I love how Dolly's life and her soon to be husband Harry's life parallel's Henry's. The only thing about Dolly that I wasn't too keen on were her rhymes! But even that endears her to you after awhile.

It is a pretty quick read and totally fun for anyone that likes a quirky read and this particular period in time.

Rating: 5 flowers




About the Author: 

JoAnn Spears spent a lot of time trying to figure out whether she wanted to major in English or History in college.  Life stepped in, and she wound up with a Master’s Degree in Nursing instead.  A twenty-five year nursing career didn’t extinguish that early interest in books and history. It did however stoke a decidedly gallows sense of humor.

The story of the six wives of Henry VIII was JoAnn’s favorite piece of history.  She read the classic variations and the feminist variations, the tragic spins and the vindicating spins.  She witnessed the success of the pop culture, soft-core Tudor offerings of recent vintage. It occurred to her that the one thing that hadn’t been brought to a full length novel about the Tudors was a gallows sense of humor. The Tudors certainly qualified for it, and JoAnn had plenty to spare.

The first ‘real’ book JoAnn ever read was “The Wizard of Oz”.  She returned to the Yellow Brick Road for inspiration for a new kind of Tudor novel, and “Six of One” was born.

“Six of One” was begun in JoAnn’s native New Jersey. It was wrapped up in her new Smoky Mountain home in northeast Tennessee, where she is pursuing a second career as a writer. She has, however, obtained a Tennessee nursing license because a) you never stop being a nurse and b) her son Bill thinks she should be sensible and not quit her day job.

While “Six of One” is a different kind of historical fiction novel, JoAnn is a downright stereotypical lady author.  She admits to all of the cats, flower beds, needlework, and obsessive devotion to Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott that you’d expect.

Twitter:  @joannspearsrn






 
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