u/aloha-cowboy

Hi, guys, I am searching for a Kate/Anthony fic I read like 1 year ago or something?

It was a modern AU and had Kate owning her own teashop in England and it was just her working in her shop by herself and Anthony was some city worker who would stop by her shop. I know there might be a lot of them like this but I am certain there was a small detail in this fic where Eloise made cookies and Anthony thought about how to combine Kate's tea with Eloise's cookies and sell them together? He definitely brought Kate some of Eloise's cookies to taste too.

I started reading it yesterday and I like it so far- the fmc is someone who I actually want to root for while I'm reading it? And the writing style is more show than tell which is really good to be reading after the many 'newer' hrs I've tried which are written like they think their readers are not...able to read? It's insulting when a writer does that and they go in my writer-not-for-me pile when they do that.

But I'm talking about this one which is actually really nice! Does the story get even better? I've just read the part where Elizabeth meets Ian at the party and I'm enjoying it and interested to see what happens next which is a feeling I've not had for awhile with the hrs I've been reading. So- does the story get even better? I'm going to continue reading it so no spoilers- just wanted to hear if there are any people who generally gush/rave about this hr :-)

dnf'ing this one at 54%

i really like a good dark hr (apparently this genre is called regency noir which is the only cool thing i got out of reading this hr) so i pushed through reading this- spoilering for tw and hr spoilers>! until the point where the fmc reveals her past trauma where she was assaulted at 15 years old to the mmc who is currently raping her so that the writer can show the mmc be hypocritically sympathetic and protective over her on his Journey to Becoming a Reformed Rapist. like, bffr! (compare this to 'to have and to hold' where the fmc never says a word to the mmc who is raping her about her previous brutal rape by her husband)!<

>!also really hate this thing in hrs where we're supposed to sympathise and like the awful rapist mmc because he has Trauma^(TM)- especially when that Trauma^(TM) was put on him by another man (his daddy). it's such pathetic beta behavior for the mmc to then turn around and take out his daddy issues on an innocent woman! go put that on your daddy, you disgusting mmc, go put that on your other gross ton pals by hurting/killing them in dumb duels!<

>!ugh!<

I know this is the historical romance genre and I do like it a lot but...............does anyone occasionally get really frustrated by the lack of equality between men and women in historical romance? I don't mean all the time- I've read so many historical romances and it hasn't annoyed me before but I started Lady Kathryn today and >!the part where Kathryn gets torn apart for starting a 'kissing game' where she dares other girls and herself to kiss men to win points for the dare really annoyed me? When we know the men in the historical romance were mistressing, debauching, orgy-ing, drinking to excess, cadding, cheating, dueling, etc!<

I mean aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I understand it's historically accurate and I do not want the opposite of this where suddenly women are treated the same as men but I also don't want a plot to be based on a girl being practically>! sent to the Inquisition for a mostly mischievous 'kissing game'!<

Like I said before this doesn't usually bug me because it's what was normal back then but also do other people get annoyed sometimes by it?

Today was a 'what did i even read?' day because I started and dnf'd Moonstruck Madness and then I did the same for a cr but for very different reasons.

Moonstruck Madness was just so incredibly blah? The Duke mmc was disgusted by just about everything? Nothing seemed to make him react? Which I think makes it in-character for someone of nobility at the time but it also only seemed to drive home the point that nobility were effin boring people.

The FMC was an annoying wide-eyed 'ingenue' who also liked dressing up as boy and waving a gun and a sword at people even though she probably couldn't lift the weight of a sword considering she is tiny-handed and a tiny person. Also I hate how beautiful fmcs 'don't know' how beautiful they are and go AM I REALLY? AM I BEAUTIFUL?- there were a few descriptions of 'how delectable' the fmc looked with her curls of black hair, wide violet eyes and miles of smooth skin. I mean I definitely like a beautiful fmc but not when they're fake-vain about it.

There was so much telling and not showing in this hr. I dnf'd at 20%. The cr I stopped reading because the non-con in it made me go 'waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah what am I even reading?' in a very confused way....but the confusing cr was still more interesting than 'Moonstruck Madness' and I say that as someone who prefers hr over cr almost everytime.

Anyways, anyone else not like Moonstruck Madness?

https://preview.redd.it/kmbx5e4qw8gh1.jpg?width=285&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c9947a2147b6f2f83b829e4ef09b10b7a27351a6

So many readers complain about how books should be accessible to everyone- historical romance covers have art like this which is accessible to everyone and yet people want to ridicule it? I look at the above image and I compare it to the art below and I see no difference in the creative value and actually prefer the above art because it tells a story that I like to listen to-

Mona Lisa

I know there are lots of Lisa Kleypas hrs where the fmc wears glasses and the mmc thinks it's so sweet, but today I'm looking for hrs where the mmc puts on his glasses and every single reader and fmc goes OH NO HE'S EVEN HOTTER (bonus if the mmc is a villain- something about him putting on glasses when he's a villain is making me laugh because it's adorkable to me!! sebastian st vincent IN GLASSES, valentine napier IN GLASSES.....you know what i mean)

Any recs for where the mmc ruins the reputation of the fmc by saying things about her that are really mean. He does it because he actually really likes her but because he's a stupid boy he doesn't know how to show that so instead he 'pulls the fmc's pigtails' by saying something in front of the ton/family/friends and it hurts the fmc a lot. Years later, the mmc comes back as a mature man and is very uncomfortable and saddened at how much he actually hurt the fmc with his words and he now knows he did it because he was infatuated with the fmc and still is to this day.

I don't want this to be a mmc ruins the fmc so she has to marry- I want it to be more that he verbally hurt the fmc so badly she never forgets what he said about her and it has made her an object of ridicule among the ton/family/friends.

Some I know are-

{A Foolish Flirtation}

{Unlocked}

I really want to curl up with a sweet, soft fmc and a mmc who is wicked and smart- with a plot too! And spice too!

Any recs that are something like Tom and Cassandra from {Chasing Cassandra by Lisa Kleypas}?

any hr recs for mmcs who are like mr rochester from 'jane eyre'? i don't need it to be like the 'jane eyre' plot but i do need a guy like mr rochester- he has a secret that he knows would make the fmc refuse him but he still doesn't tell her anyways. i need it to be spicy too.

Has anyone heard anything about her recently? She wrote some of my faves but she hasn't written anything since 2018- is she coming back?

How has half the year already happened?

I've read 55 hrs so far (I don't count re-reads)- I think 4-5 of them novellas. I think my 'non-fave' favorite is Lieutenant Mayhew's Catastrophes by Emily Larkin which was one of the novellas- it was just so light and almost childish, in a good way! There is a sex scene spoiler>!but it's so loving and respectful that I was almost aghast because I need me some SPICE but this was just right for this hr; I!<>! actually liked that the sex was introduced as something as relaxed and natural in a loving relationship, it's the kind of sex-positivity that you don't often see in hrs!<. I would almost say that this could be a kid's version of hr if it didn't have that scene in it? It's definitely something you could give to a 15-16 year old if you wanted to introduce them to hr- I know there were some moms on this subreddit who were requesting hrs like that on this subreddit awhile back (but obviously read the sex scene yourself spoiler>!which is towards the end!<to see what you think first)

Anyways wanted to know how many hrs you’ve read and how many you had expected to read before the end of this year? And out of the ones you've read which one is your 'non-fave' favorite- meaning a hr who is NOT by one of your usual fave writers?

Do you feel like you've 'outgrown' some hr writers (even though you may still re-read)- I feel like many of us have!

Mine is Alice Coldbreath- I feel like if you've read one of hers you've kind of read them all. I think someone on here mentioned that her writing style is really bland and I think this must be part of it because I think some writers will have the same sort-of characters/themes but if the writing style is snappy you can look past it.

I started with 'His Forsaken Bride' and 'His Foolish Flirtation' both of which I liked, although, parts of it dragged. But now any other hrs I've read of hers I've dnf'd I've even tried her newest one and I can't finish it.

For me, it's medieval because I've dnf'd so many of them not because I have any tw/cw but because I feel- for example- that after the mmc has killed the fmc's relative (whom she was fond of) in the beginning of the story the fmc then falling in love with mmc later in the story makes me feel like the fmc is someone whom I would not admire (I understand she might not have any other choice and this is a hr hea but it's still a no from me). The other one is when it is made so obvious that the fmc's body is the mmc's property- I know other settings have this too, but I feel like medieval shoves this in your face. I understand this is in part historical accuracy as well as tropes/kinks- this is not a yucking others yum post!

I feel like some might say their unfave is regency because it's been done over and over again, and worse and worse. And there's always a duke.

I still like regency, though, and all the other settings- renaissance, georgian, victorian, gilded, western, world wars, and the few ones that I've read that are set outside of Europe and Westerns.

Any of these- or others that I have not mentioned- that you guys do not like, and why?

reading a cr at the moment and it has a mmc who is in his own words 'a sucker for a crying woman' and then he bearhugs the fmc who is crying 🥰- i just need more of that in my life but in hr.

i know there are some men who roll their eyes at this 'female behavior' but i just like it when men are naturally inclined to Comfort a woman when they see her crying. i also think devon in 'cold-hearted rake' by lisa kleypas does the same for kathleen spoiler >!when they're in the stables after getting out of a storm- there's even some story about how when devon was a little boy he wanted to comfort his own mom who was crying but she would not allow him to hug or comfort him!<. i know there are a lot of lisa kleypas hrs with this so i don't need any recs of her hrs because they're all on my tbr already 😂

anyways more hrs with mmcs who are desperate to comfort crying fmcs? thanks!

- does anyone else not like winterborne? like, i have no tw/cw but this mmc squicked me real bad?

otherwise i did end up liking kathleen quite a lot- she absolutely was in the right to protect helen from winterborne being nasty and a predator to child-like helen? helen saying she was disgusted by winterborne french kissing her and yet winterborne still continued to kiss her with tongue? made me think about how fmc body betrayal might actually be better than a mmc continuing an intimate act that the fmc actively dislikes to the point that she is child-like crying because she doesn't understand why a man is doing this to her. i usually also like age gap but although this wasn't age gap and helen was 21? she acted like she was 14-15, and winterborne was not gentle- even cold-hearted rake devon was gentler with kathleen.

let's not even get into the whole thing where winterborne was ready to have helen's sister, kathleen, as his bride it didn't matter to him whether it was helen or kathleen as long as it was an aristo lady that would give winterborne the aristo kids that would make people 'beg to marry a winterborne'- his jealousy of the aristocrat was really ugly and gross because he hated them (which i can understand) but yet he somehow also wanted to be them? there's a word for that.

so yeah i'm not happy that we're supposed to be shipping winterborne/helen because it's helen's "Grown-Up Choice" to choose him, she had no other choice (this is not true because devon was able to give her a dowry at the end of 'cold-hearted rake'). and, for what? taking care of her little orchid- big whoop.

and the next hr in the series is called 'marrying winterborne'? 😂

after asking all you guys what kleypas is the one that fits most with faving married by morning, devil in winter and hello stranger (where i met west first!)- i decided to choose the west one.......but then got told by u/oznz that it's better to start with 'cold-hearted rake' to get the WESTON RAVENEL ARC EXTRAVAGANZA

and honestly? i'm about halfway through and have to say that while the writing is very good i'm not enjoying the 'cold-hearted rake' story that much- devon and kathleen are fine i don't find them terrible but i also don't find them interesting? but WEST keeps cracking me up and every time he leaves the pages i'm like where that boy at, and pulling on his shirt tails to get him back>!the thing where he brings his girlcousins gifts, and then manages to find himself a piglet which he made a pet because IT SMILED AT HIM, and all his little zingers too!<

anyone else read 'cold-hearted rake' like this- for the west?

i also don't think i've seen any west hate- fans either just love him or they're meh-whatever about him, and for once i like that. i feel like most of my other fave mmcs are divisive.

anyways i'm gonna go back to 'cold-hearted rake'- need plenty more of west!!

Those hrs were my favorites of Lisa Kleypas so far, so I wanted to know if people who liked those novels also liked any other Lisa Kleypas?

I haven't read many others of her other hrs but I know I didn't like Dreaming of You and Devil in Spring as much.

I wanted to know what other fans of Devil, Married and Hello liked as well in the rest of Lisa's hrs? I don't have any tw/cw.