REVIEW: A Christmas Gone Perfectly Wrong by Cecilia Grant
B- ReviewsChristmas / England / Georgian / historical romance / virgin hero25 Comments
Dear Ms. Grant,
I’ve been waiting for your 62,000 word novel, A Christmas Gone Perfectly Wrong, for a while now, so when I saw it had come out, I snapped it up.
The book is about Andrew Blackshear, the oldest of the Blackshear siblings, three of whose stories appeared in your earlier novels. Andrew’s sister is about to marry, so the Christmas of 1807 may be the last, at least for a while, that he and his siblings will spend together. To mark the occasion, Andrew has decided to get Kitty a special gift—a hunting falcon from Lord Sharp’s mews.
On his way to Lord Sharp’s manor at Mosscroft, Andrew is caught in a rainstorm. Having insisted on taking the reins from his coachman in order to find the place, he is stunned when he comes upon a young lady in the lane. As he halts the carriage, he sees that—even more shocking—her hair is down.
Shock sparked at the nape of his neck, followed by a faint, irrational prickling of shame, and an impulse to avert his eyes.
Not only did the girl wear no hat or bonnet, but her hair—pitch dark masses of it—fell straight down, unbound and ungoverned, for some scandalous number of inches before it disappeared into the collar of her cloak.
Andrew has never seen a woman with her hair down, and he can’t help but feel an attraction, but his shame at being drawn to the girl quickly merges with disapproval of her. Nonetheless, he offers to convey her wherever she is going to keep her out of the pouring rain. The girl declines his offer, but they later meet again, when he discovers that she is Lord Sharp’s daughter, Lucy.
Lucy was raised by her widowed father and has had an unconventional upbringing. Although she understands the same social strictures Andrew observes religiously, to her they are remote concepts, rules she was told about by her governesses and her aunt, but not actually made to follow.
The only young people near her own age whom Lucy has met are her cousins and those men who stop at her father’s estate to purchase hunting birds. Lucy finds Andrew attractive and is charmed by his thoughtful desire to acquire a falcon for his sister so that she’ll have something all her own. Lucy’s father, however, is particular about only giving his birds to those who will know what to do with them and provide them with a good home.
To keep Andrew at the house a little longer, Lucy tells a white lie or two, earning her more of Andrew’s disapproval. But that is nothing to the disapprobation she garners when her plans to arrive at a Christmas house party at her aunt’s home the next day are foiled by her coachman’s injury and she contrives to get Andrew to take her and her maid so she’ll be able to attend after all.
On the journey, everything that can possibly go wrong does, and by the time Andrew and Lucy are stranded near a small village along the way, circumstances force them to pose as man and wife.
Will Andrew find a way to set aside his disapproval of Lucy? Will Lucy come to see that Andrew means well and isn’t entirely lacking in self-awareness? Will they find some Christmas cheer in their holiday and perceive that sometimes, when everything goes wrong, some things go right?
Initially, Andrew comes across as dour and joyless, and I found him hard to relate to, especially since his attraction to Lucy made his disapproval come across as hypocrisy. But this impression eased some when his reasons became evident. His behavior was connected to his mother’s death in childbirth and his feelings of responsibility for his four younger siblings. What drove him was understandable even if his insistent adherence to the rules was not.
Lucy was much easier to understand, sympathetic despite her small lies and manipulations. Her intentions were good, and she’d grown up in isolation, never even attending a party or a ball before, so her desire to be among young people her own age at Christmas for the first time was very easy to grasp.
The novel was painful to read for a good portion – first because Andrew starts out so disapproving of Lucy, and later because so much goes wrong and you write acute misery so well. I wanted more joy amid the misery, and it does finally come at the end, which is absolutely lovely.
The book also had me convinced of Andrew and Lucy’s incompatibility for a while. He cares so much for the rules, and she flouts them so easily. By the end of the book I felt that their relationship could work, that they will complement each other where rules are concerned, but more admiration from each to the other, and from Andrew to Lucy especially, would have helped convince me of that sooner.
The novel’s opening scene reminded me just a tiny bit of one of my favorite Balogh novels, Snow Angel, and indeed A Christmas Gone Perfectly Wrong captures the bittersweetness of the holiday season almost as well as a good Balogh. But it also quickly diverges to its own path, one that feels fresh and new.
I appreciated the way the novel captures the characters’ youth and inexperience. There’s even a section in which something of a sexual nature happens that I haven’t seen happen in a romance before, and it reminded me a little of my favorite awful, embarrassing sex scene from A Lady Awakened.
The writing is very strong in this book, as in your others. There is a scene in which Lucy takes the falcon to hunt its supper which is so starkly beautiful that I’m sure it will stay in my mind for a long time. I also loved some of the metaphors, like this one:
A glance across the table found Miss Sharp beaming unabashedly in Andrew’s direction. Her pleasure leapt over the plates, the glasses, the cloth, like a presumptuous cat determined to land in his lap.
There was one turn in the storyline that I found hard to credit:
Spoiler: Show
I was also left with a few unanswered questions, none of which were crucial to answer, but still I was curious about them:
Spoiler: Show
Answering my questions might have taken something away from the heartwarming ending, though, and the book answered some of the questions I had left over from the earlier books in this series, about the Blackshears’ childhoods.
A Christmas Gone Perfectly Wrong is a great depiction of what it feels like when everything that can possibly go awry does, but I felt it needed more joyous moments. The storyline was fresh, moving, and well paced, though, and by the end I liked both of the main characters and could believe they’d make their marriage work. At its current price of less than a dollar, this novel is a bargain. B-.
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I just want to note that I provided some editorial feedback on this story.
@Robin/Janet: Thanks, Robin.
As usual, I agree with your analysis, @Janine. I think my initial and slightly continued dislike of Andrew really hindered my enjoyment of this one. Although he does soften, and although I usually love a slightly priggish hero who gets his comeuppance, methinks the gentleman protested TOO much.
On the positive side, this was a very long novella, and it is definitely a bargain for the price.
I also liked Lucy, but wanted a bit more of her thoughts.
And now I’ll go reread a Christmas Balogh, thanks to the power of your mention of T”Snow Angel.”
I enjoyed this book perhaps a bit more than you did. I felt that only your final question was left unanswered (Andrew and Lucy actually had some conversations about the other two, and she explained her intentions). Because she had obviously given it some thought, I did not have trouble believing the premise in your spoiler. I was reminded of Planes, Trains and Automobiles on several occasions; even though this was a romance rather than a buddy comedy, there were some definite parallels in the characters and situations.
@Tanya: Yes, we are on the same page. “Slightly continued dislike” captures how I felt about Andrew in the middle section of the book.
I know Grant refers to this as a novella, but I think of 62,000 words as novel length. It is longer than a Harlequin Romance or a Harlequin Presents — those are 50,000 words long according to the guidelines I found on Harlequin’s site. This is a short novel, yes, but still a novel.
Have you read A Christmas Promise? It’s one of my favorites among her Christmas books. I wish Snow Angel would be reissued. I remember it as one of Balogh’s best.
@Elinor Aspen:
True, but once they came to the decision they came to at the end, I didn’t see how her original plan could still be pulled off.
SPOILERS
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She can’t both allow Andrew to court her, with an eye to the possibility of marrying him, and pass him off to her aunt as a servant (if Andrew would even agree to that. I wasn’t sure he would and we didn’t see him agree that he would be able to to act that role). When the time came to introduce Andrew as her beau, wouldn’t her aunt recognize him?
This was also the reason for my second unresolved question, because if the aunt recognized Andrew Lucy’s beau as Lucy’s coachman or groom from the Christmas trip, then it stands to reason she might say something to Lucy’s father about it.
I actually thought Andrew and Lucy might be better off to go back to her father’s and confess (although then Lucy would miss the party). Lucy’s father seemed easygoing enough and he trusted Lucy so he might have gone along with the idea that Andrew should give her time to get to know him better.
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END OF SPOILERS
These thoughts may also reflect my feeling there was so much emphasis on the impropriety of their situation in the story that it seemed like the truth was bound come out in some fashion. Hence the reason the spoiler seemed unconvincing as well.
@Elinor Aspen: I forgot to add that I’ve never seen “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” so I didn’t pick up on that allusion. Did this book strike you as a comedy though? It seemed mostly serious to me.
I’m in the middle of reading this now, and I’m beyond frustrated with it – its almost turning into a hate-read for me. I keep trying to stick it out but I just don’t know… I think I’m gonna have to DNF this one, which makes me sad. I’m having no luck with my holiday stories this year which is a bummer ’cause I LOVE HOLIDAY ROMANCES!!
@Jewel: FWIW, I thought the second half was better than the first. What is the source of your frustration?
I had kind of the reverse response … I thought Andrew was a bit of a prig but a nice young virgin overall. I felt for his desire to get home to his family. There he is, just trying to get his sister a gift (admittedly a weird one) and be home in time to participate in his family’s Christmas, and Lucy keeps delaying, waylaying, and compromising him. Lucy struck me as rather manipulative and not very bright. I kept reading and thinking “What did you think would happen?” and “Really!? You don’t think that will compromise you!?” and “Exactly how are you going to explain this to your Aunt? You’ll be lucky if she doesn’t kick you out in the snow!?” As it was, I thought her obligatory refusal to marry him after being compromised (not ruined) was hypocritical at best, and she was lucky he didn’t accuse her of trying to trap him.
62,000 words? That would explain why it seemed so long! I kept expecting it to end, and instead one ridiculous thing after another kept happening. I didn’t believe in their HEA, although I could picture them, decades later, he a staid, hidebound moralizing bore who would offensively lecture the rector, and she as a brainless yet manipulative mother who will do anything to get her children good marriages, ala Mrs. Bennett.
@Janine
Regarding Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, I did not get the impression that Grant was trying to duplicate the comedy, but I think the movie may have partly inspired the characters and plot. In the movie, Steve Martin’s character is a person with rigid boundaries who is stranded on his way home to his family for Thanksgiving. He at first wants nothing to do with the chance-met stranger who imposes on him to share a rental car for the rest of their journey. John Candy’s character is a lonely people person who desperately needs a friend and craves a warm family holiday celebration. Their misfortunes continue, including totaling the rental car and having to share a motel room (and a bed), leading to some comic discomfort.
SPOILERS
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Regarding your continued questions about how their plan would work, why would her aunt recognize a hired coachman who only stayed long enough to drop off Lucy and her luggage? It’s not like they would be introduced. And I thought they already decided to tell her father the truth about the break-down and overnight(s) stay with the Porters, except for the part about sharing a bedroom. I found it more convincing than you did.
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END OF SPOILERS
No, @Janine, I haven’t read Balogh’s A Christmas Promise. I will look for it at the library.
And for @Shaheen who wrote the Mrs. Bennett comment….I am dying with laughter. Thank you.
Thanks for the review, Janine. I keep meaning to pick this one up. It looks good! I will be forewarned that the hero takes some warming up to.
@Shaheen: Yeah, I can see that point of view except that Andrew was judgmental right off the bat, before Lucy had done any of those things to him. He saw her with her hair down and he started making judgments. So he and I did not get off on the right foot. I did warm to him in the last third though. I think it was that scene where he broke down laughing and then kissed Lucy that was the turning point for me. Lucy made a lot of mistakes but she seemed more human and relatable.
Like you, I expected a more typical novella length and thought it seemed long. One of the reasons I mentioned it was 62,000 words in my review was so readers would approach it expecting a work of that length.
@Elinor Aspen: Thanks for explaining regarding the movie. I can see the parallels.
Regarding the SPOILER
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Even if the aunt didn’t recognize him, surely her servants would, the first time he visited again? After all there was mention that he would be asked to sit in the kitchen with the servants and warm up. And if the servants recognized him, the aunt or someone else in her immediate family would likely hear about it from one of them.
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END OF SPOILER
@Tanya: You are in for a treat! It’s a classic trad regency but it was reissued a few years ago so it shouldn’t be hard to find.
@Jennie: I’d be curious to hear what you think of it.
Can I just say I really dislike the cover? It’s looks contemporary. If I didn’t know the author wrote historicals, I would never have guessed this was contemporary. Even then, a lot of authors like to do both. Just not my style for a historical.
I slogged through this as well. I don’t think I’ve read the author before, and I really admired her writing, but it almost felt like reading the “wrong side” or negative space of the story–all the stress and guilt and then it jumps right over the resolution into the epilogue. I think I would rather have read a comedic take on what happened after they got to the aunt’s house as a holiday story.
@Emily: Comments on the covers are always welcome here. And I agree that it looks more like a contemporary cover than a historical one, although it does have a nice tie-in to the covers of her Random House or Bantam (can’t recall which) historicals’ covers which also feature the characters on bedsheets.
@Christine: Her earlier books, A Lady Awakened and A Gentleman Undone are both really good. I can’t guarantee they would appeal to you but they really worked for me so I say don’t give up on the author on the basis of this one.
I had some trepidation when I first heard about this book months ago. I really enjoyed Grant’s Blackshear novels, but the glimpses of Andrew in those books did not make me eager for his story, especially since this was a prequel and therefore he presumably already had his HEA when the other books took place. I feel like characters with their own HEAs should be sympathetic to the plights of characters in the process if achieving their own HEAs. I don’t remember him much from the previous books, but I had the impression that he was unsupportive at best.
ACGPW succeeded in making me like Andrew a bit more, but I think I’m more likely to reread the other Blackshear books than this one.
Also, I agree that there is something inexplicably modern looking about the cover model.
@Andrea D: That’s an interesting point about Andrew’s lack of support for his siblings in the stories that were written and published earlier but come later in the chronology. As I was reading this one, it gave me hope that Andrew might come around to being more supportive of Will and Lydia’s marriage a few years down the road, like Nick did.
I always believed that Andrew’s disapproval of his sibling’s scandalous marriages and their subsequent estrangement was largely motivated by fear for Nick’s career and marriage prospects. With all of his siblings well-settled, it seems more likely that Andrew would bend a bit, although he must still be concerned about his own children’s futures. It puts me in mind of some modern individuals who reject gay family members. Some of those people, even some of the rigidly conservative ones, eventually come around.
I haven’t read this yet, but I have to say that I’ve loved Grant’s other books and “virgin hero” is basically my favorite trope. So I have Very High Hopes! I hope I like it better than you did!
@Elinor Aspen: Yes, I saw it in the same light in the earlier books. In this book, I felt that he was also concerned about setting an example of proper behavior to the rest of them, so that they would grow up to have happy and successful lives, and that made me wonder if that was also a factor in his disapproval.
@Interrobanged: I hope so too! I would love to hear what you think of it, too.
I just finished the book and enjoyed it as it was a good Christmas story. However, I wasn’t happy with the jump in time to the Epilogue! I understood Andrew and liked his development through the story, and finally, his own acknowledgement of his libidinous nature. He was lucky to have found Lucy.
@LauraL: I thought the epilogue was interesting in that it was a bit different than the usual thing (I’m trying to avoid spoilers but it was interesting to me that they chose to celebrate Christmas the way they did). I often dislike epilogues because I don’t feel the need for assurance of the couple’s happy future but here it helped.
I agree Andrew was lucky to have found Lucy! But then Shaheen views it differently. Isn’t it interesting how we sometimes side more with one character when we read, and it can be a different one for different readers?
I really liked this one. I felt the Christmas/winter & village setting was vivid and gave a great sense of time and place. I agree that Andrew was ultra stiff, but thought the better of him for his struggle between who he thought he was and should be, vs. what he was when challenged on his rote adherence to the rules. Lucy – again, I thought the author explained her circumstances well; at least, well enough for me to cut her a lot of slack in the way she took advantage of Andrew.
I was confused by the quick jump to the epilogue, and in it, by … maybe spoiler …
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the fact that they were with the village couple again. Did Andrew and Lucy let them in on the true circumstances? Wouldn’t the couple have known that Andrew and Lucy got married after the visit?
@shelly: That’s a great point about the setting. It was very well handled. Re. the epilogue
POSSIBLE SPOILER
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I was confused by that at first too, but then decided that rather than having an ongoing relationship with their village hosts, they must have just stopped to visit for the first time since being stranded, on their way home after having celebrated the holiday with Lucy’s father. An explanation would have been helpful, though.