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A review by ipomoea
After the Wedding by Courtney Milan
4.0
I received an advance copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
It's been a while, so if you haven't recently read Once Upon A Marquess, go reread it to refresh yourself for this one.
While I'm always game for one of the zillions of dukes lying around historical romance's England, Courtney Milan's ability to write about the everyday people is refreshing. Camilla is that poor relation that gets passed around- first to distant family, then as a "companion", and finally, as a fallen woman/maid. She carries her family's secret close to her heart, that her father was executed for treason and her sister has married into a title. After all, when she turned her back on her family at 12 for dresses and tarts, why would they want her back?
Adrian is the child of abolitionists, a black man in England, and runs a ceramics/pottery factory on his family's land. His uncle is a (I think ) bishop and, in hopes of being recognized as his family, Adrian poses as a rival bishop's valet, where of course he meets Camilla, and then there's a wedding... at gunpoint (and nobody is pregnant!).
Camilla's story and character made me cry, like maybe more than usual, because Milan is so good at writing characters that life kicks down, yet they never stop believing in their worth (har har). At points I felt like the conflict about her family was a little forced, but I'm willing to roll with it for this level of skill in writing.
I wanted to know a LOT more about Adrian, his parents, and his family-- "child of abolitionists, brothers dead in the civil war" is not a lot, and felt like it could use a whole book on its own.
I'm going to recommend this book, but only if people have read the first in the series, because I don't feel it could stand on its own otherwise, which I hate to say about any of Milan's books.
It's been a while, so if you haven't recently read Once Upon A Marquess, go reread it to refresh yourself for this one.
While I'm always game for one of the zillions of dukes lying around historical romance's England, Courtney Milan's ability to write about the everyday people is refreshing. Camilla is that poor relation that gets passed around- first to distant family, then as a "companion", and finally, as a fallen woman/maid. She carries her family's secret close to her heart, that her father was executed for treason and her sister has married into a title. After all, when she turned her back on her family at 12 for dresses and tarts, why would they want her back?
Adrian is the child of abolitionists, a black man in England, and runs a ceramics/pottery factory on his family's land. His uncle is a (I think ) bishop and, in hopes of being recognized as his family, Adrian poses as a rival bishop's valet, where of course he meets Camilla, and then there's a wedding... at gunpoint (and nobody is pregnant!).
Camilla's story and character made me cry, like maybe more than usual, because Milan is so good at writing characters that life kicks down, yet they never stop believing in their worth (har har). At points I felt like the conflict about her family was a little forced, but I'm willing to roll with it for this level of skill in writing.
I wanted to know a LOT more about Adrian, his parents, and his family-- "child of abolitionists, brothers dead in the civil war" is not a lot, and felt like it could use a whole book on its own.
I'm going to recommend this book, but only if people have read the first in the series, because I don't feel it could stand on its own otherwise, which I hate to say about any of Milan's books.