Jul 26 2011
Dear Ms. Neville: When I was offered the chance to review The Amorous Education of Celia Seaton I had no idea what to expect. I’ve had mixed reading experienced with Avon historicals, and while I have enjoyed our few brief exchanges on Twitter, I really had no sense of where your books fit in within [...]
Feb 16 2011
Dear Readers, I don't know if it was Jayne's recent review of the Merchant-Ivory film adaptation of this novel, or a discussion of Forster's works that some of us on Twitter got into a while back. There's also the fact that every time I see Jennie do one of her classics reviews, I think to [...]
Feb 2 2011
Dear Ms. Milan: I have heard such good things about your early Victorian-set novels that I kept meaning to read one. When the controversy over the Publisher's Weekly review erupted, I knew I would have to read Unveiled. While more confused than ever about that infamous review, I have been thinking a lot about the [...]
Nov 19 2010
A Room with a View (1985) Genre: Romance/Drama/literary adaptation Grade: A This is one of those movies I knew immediately was destined to be among my favorites. I remember having my sister tape it for me then, after watching it for the first time, immediately rewinding the tape to watch it again. Now, over twenty [...]
Nov 15 2010
Janine: It's been roughly four years since the first time I read Mary Balogh's A Christmas Promise. At the time, I loved the book, so when I heard it was being reissued, I thought this would be a great time to review it. I felt a little trepidation though, because sometimes books I used to [...]
Oct 23 2010
Dear. Ms. Lee, Major excitement at a lower class heroine, plus added excitement that you show a more realistic view of her social acceptance minus a hero who seems to earn a living feeling sorry for himself equals mixed feelings for this book. Scheherazade Martin was born into a theater family, raised in the theater [...]
Aug 23 2010
Dear Ms. Fraser, When I saw your book featured in the upcoming releases at Netgalley.com, I was intrigued. Although the Napoleonic War is pretty heavily mined territory for historical romance novelists, the prospect of a cross-class romance appealed to me, and I’m always on the lookout for new authors. While the story starts out much [...]
Jun 16 2010
Dear Ms. Johnson, I’ve made no secret of my general malaise when it comes to the urban fantasy genre. I overloaded on it during its boom period, and I still don’t think I’ve entirely recovered. That said, I’m always willing to give a book a chance, especially when it tries to do something different with [...]
Dec 5 2009
Dear Ms. Wolff: I am ordinarily not a fan of the holiday focused book although I know that these are popular with many many readers (including my dear blogging partner, Jayne). However, I did enjoy your first book with Harlequin, A Christmas Wedding. That book contained quite a few out of the ordinary elements including [...]
Nov 20 2009
The Swan (1956) Genre: Historical Dramedy Grade: B- Here’s a golden oldie, or moldy oldie if you don’t care for it. The movie is based on a play written by Ferenc Molnar and was filmed twice before this final one was made. It’s Grace Kelly’s next-to-the-last film made before her marriage to a real Prince [...]
Jul 1 2009
Dear Ms. Hart, Bess Walsh needs time away from her unhappy marriage. She finds it at the beach house she inherited from her parents. There, in the water, Bess fantasizes about Nick, the boy she loved and lost twenty years before. She touches herself and soon she feels Nick touching her. The lovemaking is intense, [...]
May 13 2009
Janine: When Jaili (Maili) and I recently found out we were reading the same little-known book from 2008, Dru Pagliassotti’s Clockwork Heart, we thought it would be fun to discuss it here at Dear Author. But first, a plot synopsis: Clockwork Heart takes place in a fictional Industrial Age city-state called Ondinium. One of Ondinium’s [...]
Feb 20 2009
Dear Ms. Pappano, One thing I’m trying to do this year is expand my reading horizons. I usually stay within my favorite genres of fantasy, paranormals, and young adult, but sometimes you need variety to keep things interesting. So when I was glancing through the eHarlequin website earlier this month, your book caught my eye [...]
Oct 3 2008
Dear Ms. Kleypas: Some have told me that Seduce Me at Sunrise was as good as Kleypas’ penultimate book, Dreaming of You, featuring Derek Craven and Sara Fielding. The book had some similar underpinnings with the hero being of the lower class with a grotesque background who feels completely unworthy to be loved by the [...]
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