Review - Scandal of the Season

Scandal of the Season
The Spinster Club – Book #4
By Christie Kelley
Publisher: Kensington – Zebra
Release Date: October 1, 2010

In the first three books of Kelley’s Spinster Club series, Anthony Westfield, Viscount Somerton has been the willing, if somewhat reluctant, assistant to Sophie's matchmaking schemes. At the end of the third book we discover why: Sophie is Somerton’s illegitimate half-sister and also holds the answer to the identity of the woman for whom he has spent the past ten years searching. Now, in Scandal of the Season, the time has come for Anthony to confront the guilt of his past and the sweet orange seller who touched his heart and whose innocence he believes he stole by force on the night of his eighteenth birthday.  He sought her out following the greatest betrayal and pain of his young life, in a drunken haze and looking only for comfort, and never saw her again after that night.  But he's never forgotten her gentle touch and lives with the guilt of what he believes he did to her. 

Orphaned at a young age and forced to work as a pickpocket and orange seller, Anne Smith was used to the lewd stares and comments from pompous lords but the young gentleman she knew only as Tony was different from the rest, treating her with kindness and respect. She knew she could never mean anything to someone of his stature but, when he came to her in obvious emotional pain, she chose to comfort him by giving him her innocence…and then she disappeared. Now, ten years later, with a new name and running a home for orphaned children, Victoria Seaton (formerly Anne Smith) finally re-enters Somerton’s life when, to get money to feed the orphans, she lifts a ruby necklace from his pocket at a christening party. Unfortunately, for Victoria, Somerton not only figures out who stole the necklace but also that she’s the woman from his past.

But Victoria isn’t the only one who’s hiding secrets. Somerton, it seems, has a secret life as well – working for the government. He blackmails Victoria into attending a rather disreputable house party as his mistress in order to help him uncover those behind a plot to assassinate the regent. In return he promises to not expose her as a thief and will give her 5,000 pounds to care for the orphans. Sounds like a sweet deal, right? But, of course, nothing is ever as easy as it seems. The longer Victoria and Somerton are together, the more their feelings for one another grow but secrets, misunderstandings and, especially, Somerton’s inability to trust, threaten to keep them apart…not to mention the villains who have set their sights on Victoria.

Kelley has penned another deeply emotional story with multi-layered characters and sub-plots layered within the main one.  There's quite a lot going on involving Somerton and Victoria, Sophie, Somerton’s family, occasional appearances by the couples from the previous books and, of course, the mystery/suspense plot.  It could easily become cluttered but the other characters, and their stories, are necessary to fully understand the motivations of both Somerton and Victoria and Kelley does a good job of keeping the story focused and the action moving forward. I have to admit that I figured out the villain pretty early on so I wasn’t surprised when the person was revealed. I was, however, surprised, and unsettled, by a scene near the end of the book, shortly after the reveal. Without giving away spoilers, I’ll just say that I understand the necessity of the encounter but I had a hard time handling the severity of it. Overall, though, I enjoyed the book, as I have the others in this series, and am looking forward to Sophie’s story next year.

~PJ 

Today's Special - - Christie Kelley

It's our pleasure to welcome back historical romance author, Romance Bandit and Dish favorite, Christie Kelley!  Christie is celebrating the October 5th release of the fourth book in her Spinster Club series, Scandal of the Season.  It's the story fans of the series have been waiting for and features the unlikely pairing of "bad boy", Anthony Westfield, Viscount Somerton with shy and quiet Victoria Seaton.  But, as you can see from Christie's blog there's much more to these two characters than what their surface images would have you believe. 



Merry Christmas, dishes!

Oh, wait, it’s only October. Well, let’s start the holiday season early. When I heard that my editor wanted me to write a Christmas book with an October release date, I thought he was crazy. I never realized that many October books have holiday themes. The original book that the editor slated for October was my April release, Something Scandalous. Now that would have been an easy book to add in some Christmas. In the story, my hero brings seven of his younger siblings over from Canada so with all those children around during the holiday season would have been simple!

Instead, they moved Something Scandalous to April and Scandal of the Season became the Christmas themed book. Hmm, my darkest hero now is in a Christmas book! Okay, my heroine does take in orphans so I suppose that might help. Of course, the orphans are all from the “ladies” in the brothel next door. And quite honestly, I always imagined my hero and heroine away from the orphans during most of the story.

Another complication to this was the time period. During the Regency, Christmas wasn’t celebrated as in Victorian times, which is where we get many of our current customs. Christmas was much more solemn. While Christmas trees weren’t completely unheard of, it was not an accepted Christmas custom. And if they were used at all, it was just a small tree that fit on a table. Basically, it was off to church in the morning followed by a large meal and maybe a gift or two exchanged.

So now what do I do? I can’t tell my editor no to adding Christmas to the story.

I worked around the situation.

I had my heroine, Victoria love December because people are more generous to the orphans and less likely to be angry if she happens to pinch a little change from them. (Did I mention she’s a pickpocket?) While my hero, Somerton despises December, and Christmas because of several bad things that happened to him during that month in the past. Then I decided to have a secondary character invite my hero out to a country party in December. The host loves Christmas and wants everyone to be in a Christmas mood. I was able to add a tree but have my hero and heroine talk about how strange that is and discuss how it will never become an accepted custom. There also was a belief that it was bad luck to bring evergreen cuttings into the house before Christmas Eve. So little by little, I was able to add enough Christmas into the story to satisfy my editor.


I guess it all worked out.

So what do you think about holiday themed books? Do you love them and rush out to get them as soon as they’re released? Or do you dislike them? 

Thank you so much for having me today! This is one of my favorite sites!

We love having you visit with us, Christie!  For more information about Christie, please visit her website or friend her at facebook.  And be sure to check out the Contest tab at Christie's website.  She's holding a new website contest every week during the month of October!