u/LAffaire-est-Ketchup

I’ve been thinking about a lot of the “oh no we can’t get married” plots, and frankly a lot of them can be solved by the couple getting on a boat and moving somewhere else (not an EASY option, but definitely an option),

But the only book I can think of that has this plot is !>Truce by R.L. Mathewson!< in this book it happens later in the book, hence spoiler tag

Are there any others? Maybe even ones where that’s how the book starts?

Please no cheating

I want a story where one of the MCs has ALWAYS had someone else chosen first. Maybe it was the older brother who always got the ladies, maybe it was the sister/cousin who all the men preferred to dance with.

And then I want the OTHER MC to choose them first. Not second. First.

Can you recommend a book like this? Any pairing (m/f, m/m, f/f, nb/?) but no cheating and no polyamory (because it’s hard to put one person first that way)

Thanks!

{Duke with a deception by Scarlett Scott} came out today and I just finished reading it and OH MY GOD. This book has the bonkers plot of Lady Verity gets amnesia (after being rescued from a fire by the Duke of Kingham in the previous book), and then she is confused and believes that she is in love with and engaged to Kingham (King) instead of her late beloved Lord Leopold who has been dead for a decade.

I love amnesia plots. My mum is obsessed with them, so I’ve been exposed to them from a very early age.

- King does the ultimate conversion from rakehell to loving and devoted “anything for her” husband.

- he feels guilty, but that doesn’t stop him from getting married to her and accepting her “love”

- I honestly expected a “omg did you cheat on me?” Scene and it was kind of refreshing that there wasn’t one

- the subplot of the orphan Emma and >!King’s late baby daughter Daphne!< made me cry

- when >!she remembers the truth, he falls apart. Stops eating, stops allowing his valet to groom him, and is a total mess!< this often happens to the heroine but not as much to the hero!

Anyway, I’m a sap, but I loved this book.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ out of ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I found a book I *thought* I hadn’t read titled {Lord of Wicked by Bronwen Evans} but I thought “gee, I should look at the trigger warnings” and one rabbit hole later on romance.io I realized that it was ORIGINALLY titled {Invitation to Ruin by Bronwen Evans} and I have read it before and gave it ⭐️ out of ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ because it was AWFUL and rape-apologist. (My rant in the review included telling myself to never read the author again, so I guess I need to be more on top of that kind of note, because I did keep trying to read this author and I really didn’t like her stuff, like {Lady Courtney’s second chance by Bronwen Evans} and I feel like a masochist that I didn’t remember I didn’t like this author!!)

Was the title changed because too many people hated it? You tell me.

OK I’m stuck in an obsessive reading path of ONLY books where the MMC does something absolutely cruel (said something mean, made it appear like he was into another woman, courted her as a joke/wager, revenge etc)

But there cannot be any physical cheating. He can emotionally cheat but I cannot cope with him actually having an affair with someone else. (Including when they are separated)

Some examples I’ve read are:

Most of Aydra Richards, but especially {Exit, pursued by a Baron by Aydra Richards} and {my deceitful duchess by Aydra Richards}

{An Earl like you by Caroline Linden}

He marries her for her money but convinces her it’s a love match because her father blackmails him

{Poison Heart by Mae Pierce}

He marries her to get contact info for a poisoner (which he doesn’t know is her)

Again, please no cheating. But what have you got?

I was motivated to write this when I read {Fake Empire by C.W. Farnsworth} and there is a scene where the heroine is in labour >!and when they tell her that she needs an emergency c-section!< they tell her that under no circumstances can a husband be present for that! the thing is…I’ve been in that position, and this is wrong. Unless you’re going under, they allow a support person.

I cannot remember the titles but the following Bad Anatomy pregnancy fails have been in romances I read recently:

- an abdominal ultrasound at 6 weeks

- morning sickness starting the MORNING AFTER the only sex

- the midwife deliberately tearing the placenta from the uterine wall to “induce labour” after spending MONTHS reading up on delivery

The thing is, I know not everyone knows much about pregnancy, but would it kill these people to GOOGLE or visit a library?

I am interested in relationships (especially marriages of convenience — at least on one side) that have come about due to some sort of wager.

Like for example, {My once and future Duke by Caroline Linden} (book one of an amazing trilogy btw) where the FMC gambles to sustain herself, and winds up gambling with the Duke and unexpectedly loses. He gets her for a week. If she had won, she would have had enough money to live for some time.

Please no cheating (or sexing up other people during a breakup!!)

Whyyyyyyyyyy is it in first person??

Is it just me? I feel like books written in first person feel too “contemporary” and I dislike it greatly.

What is pushing this change? First there was {Gilded Age by Joanna Shupe} and now {The Last Lady B by Eloisa James} is in first person!!

What do you think of first person? Do you like it? Dislike it? Why?

I absolutely love these scenes. I can’t cope if the person physically cheated in any way, but I really really love when they do something just stupid enough to make their partner THINK they’ve cheated and they have to grovel.

An example: in {How to deceive a Duke by Lecia Cornwall} the Duke gives his mistress (that he has NOT slept with since he met and married FMC) her congé >!but manages to do this in front of the entire theatre, including his wife!<

Please rec these to me?

I’m cool with historical, contemporary, and even some fantasy, but NO CHEATING, no “fucked others while broke up”, no RH, and no poly please.

My favourite himbo is of course Ashmont from {Ten things I hate about the Duke by Loretta Chase} and of course I enjoyed {Mr Impossible by Loretta Chase} for the himbo, but there has to be good Himbos written by someone else. Right?

Please no cheating and just because he’s a himbo doesn’t mean that there’s NO area of his life that he’s intelligent.

I reserved this one and then they changed the time in the app the next day, and I went there when both times overlapped — and they weren’t open.

I called them and the guy who answered basically implied that I was an idiot for trying to come at that time. That time that was listed. Had to get a refund but it was a big waste of time (especially given their location)

I’ve noticed that certain keywords in blurbs make me either IMMEDIATELY nope out, or immediately borrow or buy the book. (Not TWs!! Just regular words)

Which ones are they for you?

My nope words:

- clean : I nope out not because I need spice, but because usually if they say “clean” instead of closed-door or glimpses and kisses, it means it’s going to be a very judgey, very religious book imho.

- Austen : any time a book is compared to Jane Austen in any way in the blurb, I feel like maybe the author has an inflated sense of their own writing. Also, because of this, I don’t like Jane Austen AUs.

I have been reading a lot of “bully” MMC books lately and I want to see a book where the FMC is warned off “he’s leading you on” “it’s a prank” etc, but MMC is honestly head over heels and HE knows it even if no one else does.

I read a bit of {Never the best by Maya Alden} (because I’m a masochist obviously) and that’s what made me want something different!!

I was wondering if anyone has seen an HR where a marriage is arranged between people who know each other

- arranged by family/parents/siblings and NOT the couple

- neither FMC or MMC are secretly in love with the other

- they are kind of weirded out but feel compelled to follow through.

NO CHEATING. (That includes no betraying of the wedding vows!!!)

…does this exist?

If it weren’t a plot point it wouldn’t matter so much to me but I’m reading {A lady for all seasons by TJ Alexander} and Verbena (FMC) asks her friend to take her to a club for poets and artists. Her friend is visibly with child and proclaims that she cannot “[be seen] at public gatherings of any kind”

Dear reader, SHE IS WRONG!!

Ladies could and DID attend balls right up to their due date!! We know for a fact that Frances, Lady Churchill was attending balls and parties in her 9th month, and even attended the opera on June 11, and gave birth June 28th, 1805!!!

Lady Jersey herself was *criticized* for going into early confinement (to be fair, she had previously suffered a miscarriage and was likely just being cautious. I know the feeling).

Anyway, that is my ridiculous rant for this evening: The Regency period is not the Victorian period.

I found my holy grail: SHE is a psychopath, and a murderer!! And there’s a scene where she overhears

{Poison Heart by Mae Pierce} is set in 1962 (so it is way way later than most of the stuff I read, but still historical!!) and is about Romeo Orazio (a mafia princeling), who marries Anita. He courted her hard, and she had always hid away from people before so she fell fast. But then she heard him telling her cousin that he only married her to get the name of an elite poisoner, The Gardener. Her cousin told him he would tell him how to get The Gardener if Romeo married Anita. What Romeo doesn’t know? Anita is The Gardener. And now that she knows he lied to her, she’s VERY VERY ANGRY.

This book has poisonings galore >!including giving Romeo and her cousin terrible stomach aches as revenge!< and Anita is not the sweet, innocent housewife her husband takes her for.

I’m reading {King’s Queen by Marie Johnston} and I’ve just started so I have no criticism of the plot (yet….) but the FMC is a librarian *because she’s not a people person* and she likes quiet and frankly, as a librarian, it’s really weird to become a librarian if you want quiet. Unless you’re a cataloguer you’re going to be doing a lot of work with your patrons.

There has to be romances where the librarians are portrayed more realistically. Haaaalp.

Please no cheating.

We all know that there are bad boy MMCs, but I keep coming across women who either change their minds and don’t kill after all, or who feel BAD after they get rid of their friend’s abusive husband/their abusive husband.

Give me FMCs who aren’t afraid to get rid of bad people, and have the same kind of attitude that say Valentine Napier or Sebastian Moncrieffe have towards it!!

I have had this book waiting for me for a while, and I don’t know why I didn’t read it sooner because the second I finished it, I thought about reading it AGAIN.

{Smuggler’s Temptation by Mina Ashford}

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ out of ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This rating from me means the following:

- it’s an automatic reread

- this book made me feel deeply

- it is romantic as hell

Eve, a young lady who was ruined by a jerk, and decided that no one gets to tell her she should be ashamed of sexuality owns a brewery in Boston with her brother. She is also a midwife.

Quint has inherited casks of whisky from Scotland, he’s half-Scottish, half-English and he’s been a smuggler so he has smuggled his whisky into the states for Eve to distribute.

Their banter is AMAZING. I found their first meeting >!in the middle of the night, him drunk off his ass and fighting in her warehouse, and she has to patch him up.!<

The stakes start to MATTER. I don’t want to spoil it, but this was a hell of a roller coaster!! They really go through it before they get their happy ending.

I laughed, I got angry >!Tommy, the Reverend, and Ann all made me mad at points!< and I CRIED SO HARD wanting these two together.

Anyway, go read it right now