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zanna83's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
idgetfay's review against another edition
3.0
Meh. I was looking for a festive bit of fluff and that’s what I got, but it didn’t entertain me as much as I hoped it would. A regency era young adult romance set at Christmas checks almost all of my boxes and yet the execution just wasn’t great. There was no sizzle or banter to the romance. If the author had written the book as if the main characters were already a couple it would have been fine, but she tried and failed to create a picture of them falling in love and it just didn’t spark. In her defense, I appreciated that the characters realistically stopped swooning when their lives were in danger. Mostly. I’m glad I read this in the right season because otherwise it would have been 2 stars. But it’s Christmas and this is a Christmas book, so 3.
maryhannawilson's review against another edition
4.0
It is Christmas time, December 1817 and a party is being hosted at Shackleford Park. Kate Darby, the lady's maid at Shackleford is clearly happy to see Matt Harlow, Ben Steeples' valet, among the guests. As they begin to reconnect, Matt's friend Johnny disappears under mysterious circumstances. Matt and Kate set out to find Johnny, but instead, unravel a much deeper plot happening in the town.
I read this book on my quest to find Christmas books for young adults and it did not disappoint. The romance remains PG and is sprinkled throughout the story. The historical setting was reminiscent of my time watching Downtown Abbey and I loved it. Finally, the mystery adds quite a bit of action to this story. It does include some violence, but nothing seemed too intense for young adults. You should be aware that there is a kidnapping and some hand-to-hand fighting.
While the book was a great read as a young adult holiday book, I did find the immediate romance a bit unbelievable and overdone. Then I learned that this is a companion book to another book, Suitors and Sabotage. I suspect the history of these characters would have made some of the relationships a bit more clear but I was able to enjoy this book without reading the other one.
Overall, I recommend this one as a great addition to a holiday booklist for teens.
I read this book on my quest to find Christmas books for young adults and it did not disappoint. The romance remains PG and is sprinkled throughout the story. The historical setting was reminiscent of my time watching Downtown Abbey and I loved it. Finally, the mystery adds quite a bit of action to this story. It does include some violence, but nothing seemed too intense for young adults. You should be aware that there is a kidnapping and some hand-to-hand fighting.
While the book was a great read as a young adult holiday book, I did find the immediate romance a bit unbelievable and overdone. Then I learned that this is a companion book to another book, Suitors and Sabotage. I suspect the history of these characters would have made some of the relationships a bit more clear but I was able to enjoy this book without reading the other one.
Overall, I recommend this one as a great addition to a holiday booklist for teens.
kaatiba's review against another edition
3.0
Read it while bored at work. Quick, easy, charming read. Did feel it went on a bit too long though? Like the action was dragged on a bit unnecessarily. Also I still don't get why her friend was always in such a bad mood, though there seemed to be some sort of hinting about it, it was never resolved. (I thought maybe it was just her personality, but there was a mention that when she was cheerful she was super cheerful, and when she wasn't she sucked, basically). Still it was nice to read a Regency (?) book about the staff rather than the genteel! Very cute.
sreckard's review against another edition
2.0
I am making my way through Cindy Anstey's books and by far, this is my least favorite. I enjoyed Sabatoge and Suitors because I loved Imogen and Ben!! I am so sad that they got reduced to barely tertiary characters :( I would much preferred a story from Emily's POV then at least Ben and Imogen would have been in the story more. I did not care for the characters in this story. Gave up reading about 100 pages in, skipped ahead to see if it got any better. The last three chapters were interesting and exciting but not enough for to back track and resume where I had left off.
I would say skip this story and read Cindy's other books.
I would say skip this story and read Cindy's other books.
iamtheraeven's review against another edition
3.0
I decent read that didn't require much brain power. Which around this time of the year is a good thing lol
zombehdoll's review against another edition
3.0
2.5 stars. As a fan of historical fiction and crime stories looking for a fun holiday read, this book sounded like it would be right up my alley. The blurb on the back of the book compares it to Jane Austen, but Jane Austen this definitely is not. There were aspects of the book that I liked, and I think the author had some good ideas and good intentions. Unfortunately it suffers from many problems that a good editor would have been able to help solve, and there were many many places in this book that I found myself cringing, or rolling my eyes, and long stretches where I grew bored and had to force myself to keep reading.
First, the good. The cover is very pretty. I like that the chapters are given pithy little captions. The festive elements of the setting were vividly described, particularly in the first half of the book. I think the story idea had a lot of potential, and making it a YA novel was a good choice for this genre-blending cozy holiday historical mystery romance. It was lighthearted and mildly amusing in parts,, and the characters were lively and animated.
Now for the not so good - this is where a good editor could have elevated this book to a 4 star read. The author was clearly attempting to emulate an Austen-esque narrative style, but unfortunately the prose and the dialogue often came across as clunky and awkward. The sentence structure was often fragmented and did not flow smoothly. There were many instances where the author used words incorrectly, such as wearisome vs weary, or when a character "engendered" someone's name instead of spoke/said/uttered/whispered etc. There were a lot of weird word choices as well, such as frequently describing a character "lifting their cheeks" to mean that they are smiling (I could not stop picturing Jim Carey in Ace Ventura Pet Detective asking for a mint). Some of the characters' mannerisms were a bit off-putting - it seemed like someone was always snorting, or huffing, or huffing through their nose, whenever they weren't lifting their cheeks. Being dragged around roughly with a knife at your throat is merely "tiresome". And my personal favorite, "The proceedings proceeded in a great procedure." I know it was meant to be cute, but it didn't work for me. The writing wasn't all bad by any means, but a lot of it was downright grating.
This book also struggled badly with pacing. It took a long time for anything to happen (it felt like the mystery didn't begin until at least halfway through the book), and it really dragged in places. Some readers wished for more dialogue, but to be honest, I would have preferred less - or at least for the dialogue to actually advance the plot, when a lot of it felt more like filler. Scenes felt dragged out unnecessarily when they should be propelling the action forward, and I found myself losing interest even during ostensibly crucial plot points. This book could easily have been 50-80 pages shorter without sacrificing anything essential, but for a book of this length I expected more substance. Also, there is a lot of space devoted to developing the festive setting in the first half of the book, but it kind of fizzled out and by the time Christmas actually gets close it feels rushed and anticlimactic.
There were issues with historical accuracy that a better understanding of the period and place and its social and cultural norms could have avoided. The main characters are all employed in domestic service, but enjoy a LOT of leisure time and don't seem to spend much time working. The wealthy employers frequently fend for themselves while the staff are relaxing, exploring, having parties, or off having fun. I mean, sure that would have been nice, but it bears no resemblance to historical reality, as workers in domestic service had demanding jobs with long hours, low wages, and very rigid rules for conduct which are not accurately reflected in this book. Similarly, social and class hierarchies are inconsistently portrayed in this book, and the power dynamics the author tries to describe, explain, and portray are a bit of a hot mess. The head of the household has no right to summon or question the servants of a houseguest, but the butler has jurisdiction to withhold pertinent information from his employer and their houseguests at his own discretion? Servants are free to come and go at will, only working when it suits them, constantly abandoning their work to run off without consequence and are never reprimanded or let go? None of the staff worked on Christmas? Seriously? Also, the accents were all over the place. Kate is an uneducated working class girl who's been in domestic service all her life, but she sounds nothing like her mother, and uses such stilted, formal, and rarefied speech that she sounds more posh and pompous than the gentry she serves.
Finally, the romance. I'm not a romance fan.This was no exception. Characters whose autonomic nervous systems check out whenever they're in the presence of their love intest to the point where they regularly forget to breathe are a pet peeve of mine. Kate and Matt frequently contradict themselves from moment to moment, and what they think and what they say don't always seem to match. The same character would be like, "Let's kiss! Oh no wait, it's not wise, we must stop! Wait, why did you stop kissing me when I told you to stop? Nevermind, we must explore the wonder of your lips, no no we mustn't, I'm definitely not going to do that again, it's a terrible idea, okay I must kiss you now!" And on and on and on.They're also pretty indiscreet considering the risks to their employment and social position, which they keep mentioning and then forgetting completely.
I kind of wish I could edit this book. There's some fun potential here that didn't really materialize, and a lot of awkwardness that could be easily fixed. It dragged in several places, the characters weren't particularly likeable or realistic, and it felt like there were a million little annoyances that kept pulling me out of the story and had me thinking more about how I plan to review it than what was actually happening on the page. A lot of the story was inconsistent and didn't follow a common logical thread. Why did it take an hour to teach someone to say comment allez-vous? Why would you need to teach someone to ignore final consonants in French words that are spoken but never read and they can't actually see? Why does Kate "know" something won't be fine but "think" it will? How does her brain do that? Better word choices here could differentiate between what she suspected or feared and what she hoped or wanted to believe. There are so, so, so many little things that essentially boil down to weak writing, and a lack of familiarity with the Regency period, with the UK, with domestic service, and with the social dynamics of the setting and context the author has chosen for her story.
Kate and Matt and Johnny would have worked most of the day, for most of the week. If they hoped to keep their jobs, they would have been deferential to their employers and conducted themselves discreetly and with decorum, and they would not have had the run of the house to sit and chill in any room the want as if the place belonged to them. Camille would not ride in the family coach like visiting royalty. The Beeswangers and the Steeples would have treated them like staff, no matter how kind they were, because they were staff. Not guests. Not family. Not peers. They were there to do a job, and the family would not have just given them free rein to come and go, work or not work as it pleased them, not show up for days at a time, or feel a sheepish need to ingratiate and explain themselves to their own servants. Kate and Matt wouldn't have long full volume conversations and make out in the hallway right outside their employers' bedroom doors in the middle of the night. "Has Johnny ever pulled an irresponsible stunt like this before? We didn't check his references or anything." "Oh no, not at all, not for at least the last three months." "OK cool, so then this is completely out of character for him. I will lie to cover his absence until he decides to show up, no biggie. Tell him I might fire him if he doesn't hurry back, but lol jkjkjk!"
It's a 2.5 star read at best, but with a half star bump because it's the holidays and I'm feeling festive. However it irritated me so much that I'm pretty sure I'll drop this rating in the new year. I think it has the potential to be a better book, and I appreciate what did work. Unfortunately, a lot of it just didn't really work for me. If you're a fan of Jane Austen movie interpretations, you might enjoy this book. If you're a fan of Jane Austen books, probably not as much.
P.S. I kind of want to smack Johnny. And Kate's mom. With a giant bowl of oatmeal. With honey. Right in the face. The rest of the characters can get in line.
First, the good. The cover is very pretty. I like that the chapters are given pithy little captions. The festive elements of the setting were vividly described, particularly in the first half of the book. I think the story idea had a lot of potential, and making it a YA novel was a good choice for this genre-blending cozy holiday historical mystery romance. It was lighthearted and mildly amusing in parts,, and the characters were lively and animated.
Now for the not so good - this is where a good editor could have elevated this book to a 4 star read. The author was clearly attempting to emulate an Austen-esque narrative style, but unfortunately the prose and the dialogue often came across as clunky and awkward. The sentence structure was often fragmented and did not flow smoothly. There were many instances where the author used words incorrectly, such as wearisome vs weary, or when a character "engendered" someone's name instead of spoke/said/uttered/whispered etc. There were a lot of weird word choices as well, such as frequently describing a character "lifting their cheeks" to mean that they are smiling (I could not stop picturing Jim Carey in Ace Ventura Pet Detective asking for a mint). Some of the characters' mannerisms were a bit off-putting - it seemed like someone was always snorting, or huffing, or huffing through their nose, whenever they weren't lifting their cheeks. Being dragged around roughly with a knife at your throat is merely "tiresome". And my personal favorite, "The proceedings proceeded in a great procedure." I know it was meant to be cute, but it didn't work for me. The writing wasn't all bad by any means, but a lot of it was downright grating.
This book also struggled badly with pacing. It took a long time for anything to happen (it felt like the mystery didn't begin until at least halfway through the book), and it really dragged in places. Some readers wished for more dialogue, but to be honest, I would have preferred less - or at least for the dialogue to actually advance the plot, when a lot of it felt more like filler. Scenes felt dragged out unnecessarily when they should be propelling the action forward, and I found myself losing interest even during ostensibly crucial plot points. This book could easily have been 50-80 pages shorter without sacrificing anything essential, but for a book of this length I expected more substance. Also, there is a lot of space devoted to developing the festive setting in the first half of the book, but it kind of fizzled out and by the time Christmas actually gets close it feels rushed and anticlimactic.
There were issues with historical accuracy that a better understanding of the period and place and its social and cultural norms could have avoided. The main characters are all employed in domestic service, but enjoy a LOT of leisure time and don't seem to spend much time working. The wealthy employers frequently fend for themselves while the staff are relaxing, exploring, having parties, or off having fun. I mean, sure that would have been nice, but it bears no resemblance to historical reality, as workers in domestic service had demanding jobs with long hours, low wages, and very rigid rules for conduct which are not accurately reflected in this book. Similarly, social and class hierarchies are inconsistently portrayed in this book, and the power dynamics the author tries to describe, explain, and portray are a bit of a hot mess. The head of the household has no right to summon or question the servants of a houseguest, but the butler has jurisdiction to withhold pertinent information from his employer and their houseguests at his own discretion? Servants are free to come and go at will, only working when it suits them, constantly abandoning their work to run off without consequence and are never reprimanded or let go? None of the staff worked on Christmas? Seriously? Also, the accents were all over the place. Kate is an uneducated working class girl who's been in domestic service all her life, but she sounds nothing like her mother, and uses such stilted, formal, and rarefied speech that she sounds more posh and pompous than the gentry she serves.
Finally, the romance. I'm not a romance fan.This was no exception. Characters whose autonomic nervous systems check out whenever they're in the presence of their love intest to the point where they regularly forget to breathe are a pet peeve of mine. Kate and Matt frequently contradict themselves from moment to moment, and what they think and what they say don't always seem to match. The same character would be like, "Let's kiss! Oh no wait, it's not wise, we must stop! Wait, why did you stop kissing me when I told you to stop? Nevermind, we must explore the wonder of your lips, no no we mustn't, I'm definitely not going to do that again, it's a terrible idea, okay I must kiss you now!" And on and on and on.They're also pretty indiscreet considering the risks to their employment and social position, which they keep mentioning and then forgetting completely.
I kind of wish I could edit this book. There's some fun potential here that didn't really materialize, and a lot of awkwardness that could be easily fixed. It dragged in several places, the characters weren't particularly likeable or realistic, and it felt like there were a million little annoyances that kept pulling me out of the story and had me thinking more about how I plan to review it than what was actually happening on the page. A lot of the story was inconsistent and didn't follow a common logical thread. Why did it take an hour to teach someone to say comment allez-vous? Why would you need to teach someone to ignore final consonants in French words that are spoken but never read and they can't actually see? Why does Kate "know" something won't be fine but "think" it will? How does her brain do that? Better word choices here could differentiate between what she suspected or feared and what she hoped or wanted to believe. There are so, so, so many little things that essentially boil down to weak writing, and a lack of familiarity with the Regency period, with the UK, with domestic service, and with the social dynamics of the setting and context the author has chosen for her story.
Kate and Matt and Johnny would have worked most of the day, for most of the week. If they hoped to keep their jobs, they would have been deferential to their employers and conducted themselves discreetly and with decorum, and they would not have had the run of the house to sit and chill in any room the want as if the place belonged to them. Camille would not ride in the family coach like visiting royalty. The Beeswangers and the Steeples would have treated them like staff, no matter how kind they were, because they were staff. Not guests. Not family. Not peers. They were there to do a job, and the family would not have just given them free rein to come and go, work or not work as it pleased them, not show up for days at a time, or feel a sheepish need to ingratiate and explain themselves to their own servants. Kate and Matt wouldn't have long full volume conversations and make out in the hallway right outside their employers' bedroom doors in the middle of the night. "Has Johnny ever pulled an irresponsible stunt like this before? We didn't check his references or anything." "Oh no, not at all, not for at least the last three months." "OK cool, so then this is completely out of character for him. I will lie to cover his absence until he decides to show up, no biggie. Tell him I might fire him if he doesn't hurry back, but lol jkjkjk!"
It's a 2.5 star read at best, but with a half star bump because it's the holidays and I'm feeling festive. However it irritated me so much that I'm pretty sure I'll drop this rating in the new year. I think it has the potential to be a better book, and I appreciate what did work. Unfortunately, a lot of it just didn't really work for me. If you're a fan of Jane Austen movie interpretations, you might enjoy this book. If you're a fan of Jane Austen books, probably not as much.
P.S. I kind of want to smack Johnny. And Kate's mom. With a giant bowl of oatmeal. With honey. Right in the face. The rest of the characters can get in line.
emmirosereads's review against another edition
1.0
Yeah, I did not like this one at all. 😬 I would have DNFd if I hadn't been buddy reading this with someone.
For the most part it was just extremely boring to me. Like that's my first and biggest complaint. When things did happen I just found I could care less. It felt way too over dramatic for the circumstances and just put there last minute. The whole book really just felt like it wasn't thought out very well. Like those Wattpad stories or fanfictions where they know the general idea but are writing/updating chapter by chapter and then just need something to spice it up so they throw some random plot twist that kind of fits the story. An oddly specific example but like you know. 🤷🏻♀️😂
This also did not feel very authentic to the time period. It's hard to explain what I mean or how I felt but it didn't suck me into the world and time period like I was hoping to. It was a historical fiction that just felt way too modern.
My other complaint is simply the characters. To be honest they were all extremely bland and had no depth or real character development in my opinion. The romance was way too insta lovey and felt like it had no substance. I'm really wondering if we get to know these characters more in another book because I think this is a companion novel and it feels we're missing out on something. I'm not sure though. It had potential and the writing was okay in my opinion but everything else was just mehh.
For the most part it was just extremely boring to me. Like that's my first and biggest complaint. When things did happen I just found I could care less. It felt way too over dramatic for the circumstances and just put there last minute. The whole book really just felt like it wasn't thought out very well. Like those Wattpad stories or fanfictions where they know the general idea but are writing/updating chapter by chapter and then just need something to spice it up so they throw some random plot twist that kind of fits the story. An oddly specific example but like you know. 🤷🏻♀️😂
This also did not feel very authentic to the time period. It's hard to explain what I mean or how I felt but it didn't suck me into the world and time period like I was hoping to. It was a historical fiction that just felt way too modern.
My other complaint is simply the characters. To be honest they were all extremely bland and had no depth or real character development in my opinion. The romance was way too insta lovey and felt like it had no substance. I'm really wondering if we get to know these characters more in another book because I think this is a companion novel and it feels we're missing out on something. I'm not sure though. It had potential and the writing was okay in my opinion but everything else was just mehh.
ksanders013's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5