On Second Thought - - Wicked Wyckerly

Wicked Wyckerly

By Patricia Rice

Publisher: Signet

Release Date: July 6, 2010

Reviewed by Janga

 

John Fitzhugh Wyckerly is the younger son of a drunken, irresponsible earl who has mostly ignored his spare. Fitz, a mathematical genius with an interest in insects, has used math skills to support himself through gambling and stayed out of the orbit of his father and older brother since he left home at seventeen. But when his brother breaks his neck in a drunken fall shortly after inheriting the title, Fitz finds himself the seventh Earl of Danecroft, heir to a crumbling estate, overwhelming debt, and creditors eager to see someone suffer for their losses. Fitz’s sole resource is a stallion he won in a bet. On his way to collect that resource, he also collects his six-year-old illegitimate daughter, Penelope, whose unruly behavior gets them tossed off the stagecoach. Fitz is in desperate need of an heiress to wed.

Abigail Meriweather, daughter of a magistrate, owns the small farm that had been part of her mother’s dowry. After the deaths of her stepmother and father, she had been content to run the small holding and care for her four half-siblings: Tommy, 10; Jennie, 6; and twins Cissy and Jeremy, 3. But her father’s solicitor decided the children needed male guidance and had them sent away to a childless couple who would act as their guardians. Abby has vainly petitioned a distant relative, a marquess, for help, but in the face of his silence, she has decided that her only hope of reclaiming custody of her young siblings is to find a wealthy, influential husband.

When Fitz and his daughter are dumped almost on Abby’s doorstep, she offers them shelter despite her misgivings. Young Penny quickly wins her heart, and Abby and Fitz, both determined to ignore the attraction between them, are beginning to become friends. That budding friendship is tested when the widow of the silent marquess shows up and Abby learns that Fitz is an earl. The marchioness plans to dower Abby and take her to London to find a husband, thus enabling her to insist on the return of her siblings. Fitz and Penny follow them to London where Fitz finds fault with all the candidates for Abby’s hand. Practicality and the marchioness say Abby and Fitz are all wrong for each other, but their hearts carry a different message.

This first book in Rice’s Rebellious Sons series was named one of Booklist’s Top Ten romances of 2010 and included in an impressive field of Rita finalists for Best Regency Historical in 2011. It is one of my all-time favorite Regency-set historicals. Abby is a delight with a strong will and a tender heart, but it is Fitz who makes the book for me. He has none of the arrogance so often found in romance heroes.  In fact, he has quite an humble view of himself. He also has some memorable lines about heroic expectations.

“We are not all of us born heroes, I fear. Women expect us to be wealthy and well-mannered and sophisticated. To be witty and thoughtful and honest. To be tender to children, loving to spouses and parents, and tough to bullies. Veritable saints, but...” He slanted her a look. “Pardon my bluntness, but women also expect us to be exciting, mysterious devils in the bedroom. Perhaps a contradiction?”

The children are mischievous, vulnerable, and endearing. The financial problems Fitz faces are real, and Rice does not trivialize them. The relationship between Fitz and Penny and between Abby and her siblings and the relationship Abby develops with Penny and Fitz with the young Meriweathers are important and believable. Another of the best things about the book is that there is no fairy tale solution to the burden that Fitz inherited. There is hope, but the resolution falls within the bounds of reason. Best of all, the reader is left with the happy conviction that Abby, Fitz, Tommy, Jennie, Penny, Cissy, and Jeremy will live and love together in familial harmony that will doubtless gain from new additions over the next few years.

I sound one note of caution. If you are a reader who dislikes children in romance novels, you will want to give Wicked Wyckerly a pass. But if you like romance that is humorous and substantive, romantic and real, I highly recommend this book. I just read it for the fourth time, and this time I am following the reread with rereads of the other three books in the series: The Devilish Montague, Notorious Atherton, Formidable Lord Quentin. All are good, but The Wicked Wyckerly is the best.

Review - - Magic in the Stars

Magic in the Stars

By Patricia Rice

Publisher: Bookview Cafe

Release Date: March 29, 2016

Magic in the Stars launches the new Unexpected Magic series, which features Patricia Rice’s Malcolm and Ives families. Rice has already explored these families’ lives in early Georgian England and in our contemporary world. Now we move to the end of the Georgian era with a story set in 1830.

Lady Azenor “Aster” Dougall is a talented astrologer who lives in exile from her family because her star charts show that she poses a danger to those she loves.  The charts are reinforced by the death of a younger sibling in Aster’s arms.  As the story opens, she comes to Iveston Hall, home of the Marquess of Ashford, a distant relative, with a grim warning.

The marquess is not at home, but his younger brother and presumptive heir,  Lord Theophilus Ives, admits the visitor. In introducing Theo, Rice also introduces his boisterous but charming pack of brothers and half-brothers.  Theo wades through them to greet the unexpected guest.

As is usual with a Rice heroine, Aster has a great deal of poise.  Entering a hall where young men wander about dressed so casually as to be slightly improper and dogs have the run of the place doesn’t rattle her.  She delivers her warning in the face of Theo’s skepticism. As an astronomer, Theo considers himself well versed in all true science about heavenly bodies and scoffs at Aster’s prediction.  He does warn his brother, however, but in vain.

The disaster that befalls the marquess puts Theo, as heir presumptive, in a difficult spot. He’s an astronomer with plans to manufacture new glass that will improve magnification in telescopes.  Estate management has never interested him but has now become his duty.  Because the marquess is not married, the begetting of an heir falls now to Theo, who figures that he may as well find a bride who can manage the estate. Then he’ll have time for manufacturing his glass and studying the sky.

In desperation, assuring Aster he doesn’t believe in astrology, he asks her to use her charts to find a “useful” woman. Aster agrees to help him, ignoring her own attraction to him as he is ignoring his to her.

Aster helps Theo arrange a house party consisting of suitable women at Iveston Hall.  Before the party is to begin, however, she goes there to start putting the house to rights.  Prior Ives fiancées have decamped in haste, and the disarray of the house is one reason.

As Aster works on the house, the attraction between her and Theo grows.  Her astrological charts say they are compatible, but she resists because the charts also warn that she’s a danger to anyone she loves.  She even plans to move her companion to a new job because they’re becoming attached to each other.  Yet she cannot quite resist Theo, who loses interest in pursuing anyone else.

Rice skillfully weaves issues of the period into the story, such as the hostility of farm workers to machinery and land enclosures and the concern for children working in dangerous jobs in textile mills.  The workers’ anger provides an escalating threat and leads to a fiery confrontation in which Aster uses the agitators’ suspicions against them.

I’ve known Patricia Rice for some years and would have passed on reviewing this book if I didn’t feel I could do so fairly.  After reading it, I found it to be what I expected, an interesting plot with engaging characters, sizzling attraction, and a fully textured world.  Aster and Theo are a charming couple it’s impossible not to root for, and the story held me all the way through.

~ Nancy Northcott

Review -- The Devilish Montague

The Devilish Montague
The Rebellious Sons, Book 2
By Patricia Rice
Publisher: Signet Eclipse
Release Date: July 5, 2011

An Inconvenient Marriage of Convenience

He thinks he can save all of Europe from a tyrant. She's just trying to rescue a stolen parrot. Marriage is the farthest thing from their minds---until they realize they each have what the other wants...

Blake Montague is recovering from war injuries he incurred while fighting on the Continent. When he approaches the Secretary of State for War about a position in the War Office, Blake is denied. In fact, he is basically told to forget all about code breaking and war and get married. But since Blake is the youngest son of a baron, he must marry for money. A marriage of convenience that will give him the funds that he needs to buy a commission. One night at the Duke of Fortham's mansion Blake finds just the woman he needs....and wants.

Jocelyn Carrington misses her family's estate. Harold, Viscount Carrington, her wretched older brother lost it in a foolish wager with Blake's father. Wanting nothing more than to have her home back, Jocelyn agrees to marry Blake when his father agrees to give them the house. But Jocelyn and Blake are both in for a surprise where their marriage is concerned. First, Jocelyn steals a profanity-spewing parrot named Percy from the Duke of Fortham, but it's justified because Percy belongs to Jocelyn's younger brother Richard. Then Blake is subjected to multiple "accidents", which lead him to believe that maybe someone thinks he would be better off dead. These newlyweds have quite a bit to deal with, including their growing feelings for each other, which neither one is planned for.

I'm a big fan of the marriage of convenience trope and The Devilish Montague is just that but with a delightful twist. Jocelyn and Blake are thrust into this marriage, each hoping to gain something they want. Blake needs the money that Jocelyn brings in order to buy his commission, and Jocelyn wants her family estate. Ah, if only it was that simple. Jocelyn and Blake do move into her family's estate, but her mother, brother and a menagerie of pets also take up residence. I thought Blake would lose his mind with such a zany band of misfits under one roof, but his patience and caring are evident, and that just made me fall in love with him. It's no wonder Jocelyn falls for him just as hard as he does for her.


So he sought the one solace he longed for---her beautiful mouth. Jocelyn's sweet, eager kisses sang songs in Blake's misbegotten soul. His wife had become like a drug in his veins, one he could not resist. He despised weakness and would work to overcome this once---later, when he was less frustrated.


Laugh-out-loud funny, charming, and utterly delightful, The Devilish Montague is the perfect book if you're looking for an escape. It has romance, intrigue, humor, and engaging characters---what's not to love??

~ Gannon


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Today's Special -- Patricia Rice

We are thrilled to have New York Times and USA Today best selling author Patrcia Rice joining us at The Romance Dish today! Patricia, a former CPA and author of forty-seven books, is a firm believer in happily-ever-after. She is married to her high school sweetheart and has two children. A native of Kentucky and New York, a past resident of North Carolina, she currently resides in St. Louis, Missouri, and now does accounting only for herself. Her newest, The Wicked Wyckerly (out today!), is the first book in her new regency series entitled The Rebellious Sons. Please help us welcome Patricia as she talks about quirky characters!

I have been told that I write quirky characters. I’m not sure where anyone gets that idea. To me, my characters are real, but then, I suppose I’m not exactly normal, so maybe quirkiness is in the eye of the beholder. I personally know math geniuses who can sum long lists in their heads, so the hero of THE WICKED WYCKERLY isn’t odd as far as I’m concerned. Perhaps a charming math genius may be stretching reality a little, but that’s how Fitzhugh Wyckerly survives in his aristocratic world. Earls without fortunes have to have some reason for existence, and being a pleasant dinner companion and a good hand at cards suits his talents.

Abby, my heroine, is a bit shy since she’s never lived outside her small rural town. Who among us wouldn’t be a wee bit timid if presented with a dashing aristocrat—literally dashing, as in running—down the drive? But she recovers quickly once she’s on the familiar ground of childcare, because she’s been caring for her four half-siblings the better part of her life. Maybe wanting to get them back from a guardian who thinks they ought to be raised by a man is a touch quirky. I’m not sure I would have gone looking for my brothers had they managed to find another home, but I was pretty young then. Abby is older than her siblings, they’re her only family, and she desperately wants them back. A bankrupt gambler like Fitz is useless for her purposes.

I think the real quirkiness of my characters is that they’re always dreadfully mismatched but still seem to bring out the best in each other, even if one is pushing the other in the Thames and calling them a beetle-brained catchfart. Abby doesn’t stay shy for long!

What do you consider to be a quirky character—in your life or in books? I once had a teacher who looked like a cow and told me I couldn’t start a sentence with a conjunction, until I pulled out Austen and Bronte and proved her wrong. We all have stories to tell, what’s yours?



The Wicked Wyckerly by Patricia Rice

When he becomes seventh Earl of Danecroft, rakish John Fitzhugh Wyckerly also inherits a crumbling estate and massive debts. Determined to do right, he reclaims his illegitimate daughter Penelope and heads to London in search of a very rich wife.

Abigail Merriweather's farm has been quiet since she lost custody of her four young half-siblings-until a roguish gentleman named Fitz stops for a rest, his rebellious daughter in tow. His etiquette is questionable, his parenting deplorable-so why does Abby delight in his flirtations? And when she seeks a suitor to help her regain the children, why does Fitz keep popping up?


For more information on Patricia and her books, please visit her at http://www.patriciarice.com/