Blog Tour Book Review: The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels by India Holton

The Princess Bride meets Kingsman in this fantastical romance debut about a delightfully proper young Victorian lady's quest to save her kidnapped aunt while navigating magical hijinks. 

Cecilia Bassingwaite is the ideal Victorian lady. She's also a thief. Like the other members of the Wisteria Society crime sorority, she flies around England drinking tea, blackmailing friends, and acquiring treasure by means far more interesting than purchase. Sure, she has a dark and traumatic past and an overbearing aunt, and no, she's not technically an official member of the Society yet, despite years of petitioning--but all things considered, it's a pretty pleasant existence. Until the men show up.

 

Ned Lightbourne is a sometimes assassin who is smitten with Cecilia from the moment they meet. Unfortunately, that happens to be while he's under direct orders to kill her. His employer (one of them, anyway) is Captain Morvath, who possesses a gothic abbey bristling with cannons and an unbridled hate for the world. He intends to rid England of all its presumptuous women, starting with the Wisteria Society. Ned has plans of his own. But both men have made one grave mistake: Never underestimate a woman.

 

When Morvath kidnaps the members of the Wisteria Society, Cecilia is forced to team up with her devilishly handsome would-be assassin (who seems quite inept indeed), face her demons, and risk her life to save the women who raised her--hopefully proving, once and for all, that she's as much of a scoundrel as the rest of them.

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This book was EVERYTHING I needed! It’s a lovely historical romance disguised as a whimsical fantasy adventure à la The Princess Bride with a good amount of puns. The main character, Cecilia, is a pirate and first-rate scoundrel. Cecilia comes from a long line of cunning lady pirates. She hopes to build a reputation as a swashbuckling pirate and ultimately earn membership into the Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels. After interning under another pirate, Cecilia has not made much progress towards her goal. While Cecilia aspires to carry on her family’s legacy, she is also the epitome of a proper Victorian lady with a moral code. This duality of Cecilia’s character serves as a plot device that confounds Ned Lightbourne, a Victorian-era James Bond, who falls in love with Cecilia. Ned is an interesting character. He’s a jack of all trades. He’s a pirate, sometimes assassin, and courier to the Queen. Ned is under orders to kill Cecilia, but ends up falling in love with her. This certainly puts a damper on their budding romance. For me, romances with “instant love” plotlines have lost their appeal, but for this book, I stuck it out and was glad I did. Captain Morvath, one of Ned's employers, has a vendetta to settle with the ladies of the Wisteria Society. After members of the Wisteria Society are kidnapped, Cecilia teams up with Ned to rescue them. Overall, the writing flows well, the characters are interesting, and the pace was perfect for this madcap romp.

4 stars

 

About the Author

India Holton is the author of The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels, a fantastical rom-com set in an alternate Victorian era. She lives in coastal New Zealand, where she grew up running barefoot around islands, following ghosts through forests, and messing around in boats. She spent several years teaching and now writes about plucky girls, unconventional women, and the men who love them. India's writing is fuelled by tea, buttered scones, and thunderstorms.

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Blog Tour Promo Post: Match Made in Paradise by Barbara Dunlop

 

Supermodel Mia Westberg finds herself on the run from the paparazzi after the death of her much older husband. In order to stay out of the public eye until the fate of her late husband’s fashion house is decided, Mia leaves behind her lavish Los Angeles lifestyle for the wilderness of Alaska—a place where no reporter would follow. It’s immediately clear that Mia isn’t ready for everything Paradise, Alaska has in store for her: the wild animals, insanely harsh weather, and a gorgeous no-nonsense bush pilot who is immune to her charms.
 
When pilot Silas Burke flies a beautiful blonde into town, he thinks he has her all figured out from the jump. She’s a city girl who has no business in the rough Alaskan terrain. Silas decides against his better judgment to help Mia acclimate to life in Paradise after seeing her struggle. But he’s an impatient teacher and she’s a frustrated pupil—and nothing gets them more fired up than each other. Can these two polar opposites find common ground and let their hearts soar?

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Magnificent was the first word that came to Mia’s mind. If she was casting a model for a rugged, outdoors spread to attract women from far and wide, inspiring them to buy something for their own man from a new Lafayette wilderness clothing line, this would be her guy. There was a hint of irony in his half-smile, a hint of mischief in his blue eyes. He was fit and tall and confident enough to take on the wild. They’d make a fortune.
He looked her over from head to toe. Then he moved his attention to her luggage.
The five men rolled to their feet.
“Hey, Silas,” one of them said.
“Ricardo,” the man, obviously a pilot, and apparently named Silas, said in return.
“How’s it going?” another of the men asked Silas.
“Welcome back to the grind,” Silas said.
The other man grinned and nodded.
They all hoisted their backpacks and lifted their compact duffle bags to head for the door.
Silas, the pilot, stepped to one side, out of their way, while Mia sat down to wait.
“I take it you’re Mia,” Silas said.
She looked up, met his bright blue eyes and felt her chest tighten and her toes tingle in recognition of his sex appeal.
Yeah, she was a woman and she was alive, and he was a perfect specimen of a man.
Then it hit her. He knew her name.
“You’re here for me?” she asked. She’d thought he was here for those men.
“I’m from Paradise.”
“But?” She looked through the glass to where the five men trooped to a small airplane parked on the tarmac.
He waited.
“What about them?” she asked.
“We’re dropping them off.” He moved toward her, nodding at her luggage. “Raven didn’t tell you to pack light?”
Mia looked at her things. “This is light.”
“Lady, we’re getting into a Navajo PA-31 with five other passengers who, as you can see, are heavier than the average weight.” He picked her bags up one at a time, seeming to test them for weight. “They’re my paying cargo. You’re a ride-along.”
“I’m going with them?” Mia was still getting past that information.
Silas pulled her biggest roller-bag to one side. “You have to leave this behind.”
“What?” Was he insane?
“Becky?” he called over his shoulder. “Can you store this bag?”
“Sure,” the woman named Becky said.
“No!” Mia cried out.
Silas gave her a glare of impatience. “Okay, then these two.” He pointed to her garment bag and her carry-on.
“No way.” She shook her head. She could not leave her carry-on behind. “I’ll put this one on my lap.”
“It’s a weight issue, not space.”
“But . . .”
“Those two?” He pointed to her smaller roller-bag and the garment bag.
That was a bit better but still not doable.
Becky joined them, obviously waiting to see which bags she’d be storing in the FBO.
“There must be some other way?” Mia tried her ice-princess look, the one that usually got her what she expected. When that didn’t seem to move Silas, she changed her expression, hoping to appeal to his compassion. “Maybe one of those guys could . . .”
“Those guys are heading to a drilling camp for three weeks. They took exactly what they needed.”
Mia didn’t have an answer for that.
Silas folded his arms over his chest, his expression implacable. “I am not crashing the airplane so you can bring your makeup and evening gowns.”
“My . . .” She started to be affronted but then dialed it back. Okay, she had brought one dress that could be considered an evening gown. It was a gown, and she could wear it in the evening, not to a super-formal event, but surely to anything that happened in Alaska.
“You coming or not?” He looked fully prepared to leave her behind.
“Fine. But I have to rearrange a few things.”
Silas muttered something under her breath.
Before he could tell her no, Mia quickly crouched and unzipped her smaller roller-bag. She pulled out the essentials: panties, bras and nighties. It figured he’d have to get a look at her underwear. But that was the kind of day she was having.
 
From MATCH MADE IN PARADISE published by arrangement with Berkley, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © 2021 by Barbara Dunlop.
 

About the Author

Photo Credit: CATHIE ARCHBOULD

Barbara Dunlop is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author who has published more than fifty novels. Her stories have ranged from lighthearted comedies to family sagas. Barbara is a four-time finalist for the RWA RITA award, and her Tule novel His Jingle Bell Princess has been optioned by Motion Picture Corporation of America for a Hallmark movie. Barbara resides in Yukon, Canada with her bush pilot husband. You can find her at www.barbaradunlop.com. 

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