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A review by the_rabble
A Lady Awakened by Cecilia Grant
emotional
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
She's an uptight widowed newlywed out to save her servants, he's the rake exiled to the countryside she hires as a sex worker.
3rd person past tense, early 1800s UK, rural slowburn romance with good pacing, characters are 21 and 26, spicy (sex first, feeling later)
This book is wild and very funny. Grant writes two very different and opinionated characters. She's a humor sniper on every front- prose, POV thoughts, dialogue. It balances the serious issues very well.
Martha is not super likeable, but she is funny and interesting. She's religious and lightly demi-coded. In her charitable planning, we don't hit poverty tourism- she's doing the work, but you get some of that "I'm a rich lady who knows how to make life better"/"non profit employee willing to sacrifice everything" energy.
Her big goal in the book: stop a serial rapist from inheriting her husband's country estate full of servants and tenants she wants to protect. So she makes a sex deal.
Theo is a charming fuckboy who finds himself in a sex deal with a woman not interest in sex- just results. He's very funny and affable. He's also in an environment that has no interest in making things easy on him (nor should it)- he gets frustrated. A lot. And his side commentary is excellent.
The relationship pacing is really good. It's a fast paced slowburn. Everyone is growing as people. Physical intimacy is technically immediate, but Grant is a pro at showing you something that should be intimate as not really- while turning more chaste gestures into big moves. The result gets surprisingly swoony.
Sex Scenes: [15% in]There is a lot of rout, lackluster sex in this book, early and often. Grant's descriptions (very intentionally) turn potentially spicy Lady Chatterly-esque liasons into viscerally boring chores. It is very different than most romances and stylistically interesting on top of being a great setup. Theo's POV/problem solving is fun and thoughtful.
Book has sometop notch cunnilingus - Grant puts it in the place of the Act 3 big (usually PIV) "we're on the same page" scene and it's an excellent choice.
There's also very funny pillow talk and a lot of "seed" talk.
Narrator: This is an older recording/book, so earlySusan Eriksen has a bit of a German accent in the read during this performance and it threw me every now and then. Pacing was perfect. Dialogue voices were great.
3rd person past tense, early 1800s UK, rural slowburn romance with good pacing, characters are 21 and 26, spicy (sex first, feeling later)
This book is wild and very funny. Grant writes two very different and opinionated characters. She's a humor sniper on every front- prose, POV thoughts, dialogue. It balances the serious issues very well.
Martha is not super likeable, but she is funny and interesting. She's religious and lightly demi-coded. In her charitable planning, we don't hit poverty tourism- she's doing the work, but you get some of that "I'm a rich lady who knows how to make life better"/"non profit employee willing to sacrifice everything" energy.
Her big goal in the book: stop a serial rapist from inheriting her husband's country estate full of servants and tenants she wants to protect. So she makes a sex deal.
Theo is a charming fuckboy who finds himself in a sex deal with a woman not interest in sex- just results. He's very funny and affable. He's also in an environment that has no interest in making things easy on him (nor should it)- he gets frustrated. A lot. And his side commentary is excellent.
The relationship pacing is really good. It's a fast paced slowburn. Everyone is growing as people. Physical intimacy is technically immediate, but Grant is a pro at showing you something that should be intimate as not really- while turning more chaste gestures into big moves. The result gets surprisingly swoony.
Sex Scenes: [15% in]
Book has some
There's also very funny pillow talk and a lot of "seed" talk.
Narrator: This is an older recording/book, so earlySusan Eriksen has a bit of a German accent in the read during this performance and it threw me every now and then. Pacing was perfect. Dialogue voices were great.