vanessa kelly

*I got this copy via netgelly in exchange for an honest review*

“How to marry a Royal Highlander” by Vanessa Kelly is the 4^th installment in “The Renegade Royals” series. I haven’t read the other books but it’s no real problem to deal with the story.

Alasdair Gilbride fled from his family, from Scotland because of an arranged betrothal to a girl his grandfather thinks to be the perfect wife. But Alasdair doesn’t want to get married, especially to her. This was more than 10 years ago and since this moment he wasn’t back in the north for a single day.

Eden Whitney likes to get into troubles and it didn’t happen the first time but this time things went too far. She kissed a rouge on a ball, they were seen and he didn’t ask for her hand. There aren’t many things a young woman can do. Her parents only see one solution – send her to the north, with her mother, to Alasdair’s family’s estate.

Alasdair hopes that her presence will ease things up north but he knows Eden quite well and knows that she’s strong minded and always gets into troubles. Together the three of them travel north, of course not without complications.

There is something I loved about this story without knowing the other parts in this series – Eden is pretty blind without glasses. Her twin sister always wears them and isn’t a bluestocking at all but their mother doesn’t want Eden to wear them. When she sneaks into Alasdair’s house, she’s dressed as her sister with the glasses but because of her body curves he knows instantly that it’s Eden – I loved this scene – and the first thing he gets her in the North are glasses because he doesn’t want her on a/his horse, if she cannot see more than 3 feet in front of her.

Even having a busy time right now with work and so, I went through this book rather quickly and I loved it, I absolutely loved it. Of course thing get complicated in the North and there is one or the other intrigue and family quarrels. But that makes the book so lovely.

Rating: 4****

PS. The cover is much too trashy in my opinion. So 1990s like.

I got this from Netgalley for an honest review.

First of all its book 2.5 from the series “Renegade Royals” from Vanessa Kelly. Why do I mention it in the very beginning? Because I really had problems getting into this story without knowing the first two books which seldom happens.

Chloe is a woman in her very early 40s who has a complicated past. He’s mother to an adult son, she just reconnected with. In her house in the country she offers unmarried pregnant woman a chance to live while they are pregnant and take care of her children before they are able to go back to their families or she helps them to establish a new life somewhere.

Dominic Hunter on the other side a magistrate, a well-known and liked man at the royal court. He made his way being originally a butcher’s son. He knows Chloe for years, since they were children. Once they were pretty close, when they were younger, but then things changed.

A sudden attack of one of the girl’s left behind betrothed brings them together again. Dominic wants Chloe but she knows that her (let’s call it) ‘profession’ wouldn’t fit into his lifestyle. Hunter doesn’t care but wants to make her a respectable woman. But Chloe says no …

I really dislike that fact that it took me long to get me into this novella which only has about 110 pages but seems endless in the beginning. You do now know a thing about the characters or their stories but the author doesn’t tell you a lot. The moment you got into it, you seem to find bits and pieces of information here and there.

But I really liked the style of the writer and the idea of Dominic hunter searching for the illegitimate children of the royal family sounds interesting.

Maybe I will read one or the other of the series soon – in the correct order of course. There was something I really liked about the story I really liked especially about Dominic Hunter. Also the idea of having something like a battered woman’s shelter but for unmarried pregnant girls in the 19^th century is something I like to imagine to be real but probably isn’t. As far as I know were the first shelters established in the 1960s.

Anyway, a nice novella

Rating: 3 Stars***

Crossposted on Goodreads

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1089969693