Carla Kelly is undoubtedly the best writer of the Regency genre. Her characters are well-developed and completely unlike the cookie-cutter heroes and heroines you usually find. Of all her books (and I have read all of them), Mrs. Drew Plays Her Hand is my favorite. I'm not normally a person who re-reads books, but this one is an exception. One Good Turn, her latest book, is also fabulous!

I never really thought of myself as a romance novel reader, but then, somehow, I got sucked into the sub-sub-genre of the regency romance. Ah, the hours spent trolling my local library in search of books entitled "The Rake and the Reformer!" Ah, the mocking I endured from my friends! And the truth is most regencies are pretty bad, completely innacurate, and more than likely to present a dangerously dated scenario--impoverished, weak woman saved by a dominant, rich man, while sexual attraction substitutes for genuine feeling. I don't know what need this sexist formula fulfilled in me, but I read a lot them. And then I happened onto a book called Mrs. Drew Plays Her Hand.

In Carla Kelly's works the men and women treat each other with respect. Admiration comes first, love follows. And the protagonists actually like each other before they consumate their relationship. Imagine that! In her books there is none of that "I hate him and yet I'm kissing him! Darn his maddening attraction!" There is only the believable progression from liking and admiration to love.

Roxanna Drew is an impoverished widow who loved her first husband (also something that virtually only Kelly would attempt) and has two adorable daughters. When we first meet her she is trying to avoid the ugly advances of her brother-in-law. Lord Winn is a military hero who doesn't fit in society anymore because of a disgraceful divorce. He becomes her landlord and falls in love with her and her family. As her situation becomes more desperate he offers to help. There are lots of very kind, believable moments as he gets to know Roxie and her daughters. Instead of the usual conflict consisting of contrived misunderstandings and forced bickering which hides "attraction," what threatens Roxie and Winn is her recent bereavement and reluctance to love again. As usual, it's the kind of actual human problem that only Carla Kelly would attempt in this genre. After I read Mrs. Drew I read all her other regencies and now she has effectively ruined me for every other romance writer. Darn her terrific writing ability!

Definitely not a standard Regency: if you're looking for blushing debutantes, dashing heroes and glittery balls, you won't find them here. What you will find is an earthy and very realistic story of an unlikely friendship between a courageous but despairing vicar's widow with two young daughters and a cynical, rough-and-ready marquess. Winn is no ballroom dandy; he is a disgraced divorced man with no intention of ever marrying again. Then he meets Roxanna Drew and, without even realising it at first, is drawn to her.

The story contains a number of unexpected twists, but the underlying theme is of two people betrayed by love, who find it difficult to trust, and yet learn that they need to trust each other. Kelly pulls no punches, and at times the book is earthy, shocking and tear-inducing.

I loved it, and will be re-reading it very soon.

This is a very early Kelly, first published in 1989 and, clearly, it reflects her efforts to establish herself in the Regency sub-genre. It reminded me very much of some of Georgette Heyer's more lighthearted romances as it does not, as others have said, have the angst and poignancy of some of Kelly's other works. Nonetheless, in the hero, The Earl of Collinwood, she has given us a wonderful character with whom the reader will most certainly fall in love. Marian herself is irrepressible, sweet and loving. The two of them complement each other perfectly.

There are some errors here with respect to titles (even the Divine Kelly gets it wrong!) and some sloppy editorial errors. However, this story is wonderful, as summed up elsewhere, and moves along at a cracking pace with a wonderful climax where Marian finally takes the lead in her relationship with Collinwood.

The secondary characters are, as always with Kelly, delightful and all of them add pertinence to the narrative.

Excellent; I truly enjoyed reading this one!

The old Carla Kellys are really among the best Regency romances around. In this one, which I managed to acquire second-hand, she writes a wonderful, heartwarming story which gripped me so completely that I even found myself thinking and wondering about the characters during the day, when I'd had to put the book down.

Marian, aged not quite seventeen and not out yet, is nevertheless the only 'sensible' person in her family household. It's a year after her father's death, which occurred just before Christmas the previous year, and this year she's determined to have a *happy* Christmas. After all, her family is practically bankrupt and they may have to move out of their home in the New Year.

Then her elder brother, Percy, arrives home for Christmas with two strange gentlemen in tow. One is intended as a suitor for Marian's sister Ariadne; he's wealthy, despite being obnoxious. The other is Lord Ingraham, an earl, badly scarred from a burn and clearly hiding from friends and family as a result.

Marian, with her penchant for healing sick and injured creatures, is immediately drawn to Ingraham and wants to help him; she provides him with a salve to lessen the pain of his burn, and in doing so sees the man whom she'd been warned by her brother was stiff and top-lofty actually *smile*.

Gil, as she comes to call him and think of him, joins in her amusement and seeks ways to rid the house of Ariadne's suitor. He defends her to Percy when her brother disapproves of her often unladylike behaviour. Marian is, of course, still strictly speaking, in the schoolroom, and - as other characters later remind her and Gil - is 'of the infantry'. Gil treats her sometimes as an equal, finding himself confiding in her, and sometimes as an amusing child; his most common nickname for her is 'brat'.

The story is told only from Marian's point of view, which is a fascinating device, because Gil's interest in her - not as a child, but as a woman he is falling in love with - is clearly apparent to the reader, but not to Marian. Charmingly naive as she is with regard to relationships, she misses his hints and doesn't understand his references to changing his mind about marriage and needing to speak to her brother. To the reader, Gil's intentions towards Marian are clear, and it's also clear that, in a scene we aren't privy to, he must have asked her brother's permission to court her.

It does take Marian some time - both aided and hampered by the goings-on of her family, and in particular the escapades of her younger brother Alastair - to understand what she feels for Gil, even though, right at the very start of their acquaintance, she ignored the Christmas wishes she'd intended to make for her family, and only wished instead that Gil should have the 'best Christmas ever'. By her efforts, she makes that come true for him...

...and in return, he makes all her wishes come true, and more.

A charmingly romantic book you won't forget in a hurry. One of Kelly's best, though - in the spirit of Christmas - without the heartwrenching angst of Mrs Drew Plays Her Hand or Reforming Lord Ragsdale, two of my other Kelly favourites.

I love regency romances, and Carla Kelly's wit and heart make her one of my favorite authors. Marion's Christmas Wish is charming and full of the Christmas Spirit.

I don't need to write a lengthy review of this book, because the review below from bookjunkies has done an excellent job, with the exception of one detail: we, the readers, know from the beginning the true identity of James Gatewood, since this is revealed to us in the prologue.

Kelly's descriptions of Oxford - the town and the university - suggests that she knows both places well; I've visited Oxford many times and am familiar with most of the colleges, and I found no anomalies in her depiction of the town.

I did particularly like her portrayal of Ellen's frustration at not being able to study and participate in learning, and at her brother's wasting of the opportunity he had. Ellen is so well written as a woman who desperately wants to learn and read and argue and develop her mind, and yet is forbidden by the mores and practices of her day. (Great use of St Hilda's, too, Kelly!). Ellen's debates with James on Shakespeare are very well written, and these encounters were a joy to read.

For a very different romance, even from most of Kelly's other novels, this one is well worth a look.

The editorial review is slightly misleading, as is the back cover blurb. Miss Ellen Grimsley, the heroine of this book, is not a student at Oxford University and its colleges (impossible then, in an era where women were not even allowed to listen to lectures). Rather, she is attending a rather disappointingly mediocre seminary at Oxford (the town). Whence then her Oxford career? Ah, that is another story, and one that kept me up, laughing slightly until 1 am.

The story begins with a devastatingly funny portrayal of the Grimsley family. Think the Tallant family (in Arabella) crossed with the family of the heroine in the film The Breakfast Club. The family is country-based, of moderate means, and of a farming background - very minor gentry, in fact. Ellen Grimsley's elder sister Honoria is all set to marry the nitwitted son of a pompous baronet. Her elder brother Gordon is frittering his time away at Oxford; his family has decided he is to be a gentleman, and to that end, some terms at Oxford will be followed by a spell in the army. Gordon is barely scraping through his first year as required. His younger sister Ellen and his younger brother Ralph are the oddballs, or the odd ones in this rather dull family - both have a passion for learning, and especially for literature. Ralph is a Shakespeare fanatic, and his older sister cannot but absorb some of the Bard's lines. Her fate has all but been decided for her - she is to marry suitably, perhaps a young farmer with no interest in books. Poor Miss Grimsley!

It is fortunate then that her father's aunt has the bottles of fine wine that her father had recklessly promised the baronet (future father-in-law of his eldest daughter). To obtain these bottles for the wedding, the father must promise to send his daughter Ellen to a seminary in Oxford, run by the aunt's friends. So off Ellen goes with her aunt - and near the town, she meets an untidy but interesting scholar names James Gatewood.

The seminary proves to be a disappointment. Instead of studying geometry and Shakespeare (let alone geography) Ellen is expected to stitch samplers (which she does badly) and confine herself to a smattering of French. Most of Shakespeare is not allowed in the school library, some of his plays being considered indecent. [Did you know that MEASURE FOR MEASURE was an indecent play? Ah yes.]. Well, fortunately for Miss Ellen whose tongue gets her into trouble from the outset, she has a couple of friends, the maid Becky and Mr James Gatewood who falls into the habit of sending her chocolates (a slight anachronism) whenever Miss Ellen is being punished by being forced to write out lines and thus missing her meals.

In the meantime, brother Gordon gets into trouble in London town. He is already in trouble with the warden of his college, having missed one too many lectures. And now, he has no money to pay a student to write his essays for him! Oh dear. Well, fortunately sister Ellen is in Oxford, and is persuaded or cajoled into writing a brilliant essay on Shakespeare for him - which Gordon passes off as his own at a public reading of all the students' essays. Ellen has received help, not to mention a copy of the play, from James Gatewood. Gordon is duly applauded for his sudden brilliance, and persuades Ellen to write another essay and another. The great Shakespearean scholar Lord Chesney (a pun perhaps on the Regency author Marion Chesney?) even deigns to attend Gordon's lectures and obtains the only fair copies of the essays from him. All well and good, except that Ellen is seething with fury that a) she is not allowed the education that her brother takes for granted; b) she is stuck in this miserable seminary; and c) that her brother is taking her efforts for granted and taking the praise that he has not earned. She has some vague hopes that one day her efforts will be acknowledged, but now the dratted Lord Chesney has her only copies of her essays (she failed to make copies for herself, you see).

In the meantime, Ellen has been skirmishing with her roommate, Fanny Bland, shortly to be sister-in-law to her sister Honoria. Unfortunately, Ellen has also fallen into the trap of wanting to hear her essays read out in the august halls of Oxford, and dresses up in her brother's breeches and cloak to sneak into the college. And one day, she is caught on a tip-off from someone, perhaps Fanny - and she is publicly disgraced, and taken home by her father who informs her that she is being traded (in marriage) for a couple of fields to the young farmer who has admired her.

So what happens to Ellen, next? And who is James Gatewood, with such ready access to Lord Chesney's library and with the funds to pay for chocolates and coal alike? Is he really the descendant of a long line of horse-traders? Or, as we suspect (but Ellen does not), is he someone else? And what will happen to Ellen's scholarly ambitions?

I won't tell you the rest of the story, because it will spoil a delightful book. But I strongly encourage you to find it and read it to understand what kind of frustrated aspirations dwelt in the hearts and minds of many a bright young woman whose only options were frequently governessing (for a pittance) or marriage (perhaps to a man without any love of books). This is not so much a romance as an indiction of the withering of many intellects for centuries (although it is hardly radical feminism). And yes, there is a romance. If you are not aware by the middle that James Gatewood loves Ellen Grimsley... well, your standards of romance are very different from mine.

Rating = 4.8 (taking two points off for some slowness here and there)

I need only say that Carla Kelly wrote it, that's praise enough

I've recently had the good fortune to acquire a number of books from Kelly's backlist, and Summer Campaign is the first I read. And I loved it. It's heartwarming and tear-jerking, just like all the best Kellys.

Onyx, our heroine, is - in the tradition of much of Kelly's writing - not of the best ton. In fact, she's illegitimate, though brought up in a good family. All her life, though, she's felt that she has to hide, and almost apologise for existing. Now, she has a proposal of marriage: a vicar, Andew Littlewood, has sought her hand. Grateful for the chance to escape her stepmother's tyranny, Onyx accepts.

En route to her fiance's home, however, her carriage is held up by a rough band of robbers who also threaten her virtue. Onyx is rescued by a shabbily-dressed soldier, who is shot and almost killed as a result. The soldier is Major Jack Beresford, returning from the Napoleonic Wars - and, it turns out, he knew Onyx's twin brother.

Onyx feels a definite bond with Jack, but what can she do? She's already engaged to another man, and anyway, once she discovers that Jack is the brother of a marquess, she knows that he's well out of her reach. She has to put him out of her mind, no matter how much he teases and flirts with her. And yet she knows that he needs her too, in several different ways - to help heal the wounds of war, both physical and mental.

This is a wonderful book, ranging from humorous to wistful to angsty to downright tearjerking. I couldn't help but like and feel sorry for Onyx, and who could help falling in love with Jack? And then there's Emily and Adrian, Jack's brother and his wife - also characters I loved getting to know.

A classic Carla Kelly, and well worth the collectors' price!

I read this book ages ago, years even. My apologies because I can't remember much of the plot, but I do recall that it was very good, very sweet and pure Carla Kelly.

Carla Kelly has a rare gift for storytelling. Her books are ripe with characters that are so real you can almost feel them breathe. This book is no exception. A touching and romantic tale that very well may bring tears to your eyes. I seldom make it through a Kelly novel dry eyed! The heroine, Onyx Hamilton is one you will remember. Jack, the hero, is a man any woman would want to know. Yet none of her characters are trite or typical. Good show Ms. Kelly!

My first book that I read by Carla Kelly was The Lady's Companion. I fell in love with Ms. Kelly's writing style at that time. She doesn't write a book that I wouldn't give to my girls to read. After reading The Lady's Companion, I decided to try her other books and became hooked. I then put forth the effort to get a hold of all of her works. I finally got this book, Daughter of Fortune, through Amazon's out-of-print books department. At first I was disappointed (this was before I read the book) because it wasn't a Regency romance but I decided to read it anyway. I fell in love with it and now it is one of my favorite works by this author. I think Ms. Kelly is one of those unsung authors that write excellent prose but the publishing companies want more flash than style. This book is extremely well written and historically accurate. I would recommend this book to anybody. And as Ms. Jaramillo said, if you can get a hold of this book, don't let go of it.

This is not a Regency like her later works. The book is set in the 1600's. It is extremely powerful and moving. There are some grisly scenes so beware. Ms. Kelly is one of the most talented writers around today. If you can find this book I suggest you hold on to it.

Ms. Kelly, without question, is the premiere author of the Regency novel. Her stories are fully realized; they are so "real" too. Always a reader can understand the bravery, loneliness and need for love that motivate her characters. This is a writer to be savored.

When I heard that Ms. Kelly's next publication would be a book of short stories about the post-Civil War American West, I was disappointed because I rarely find that short stories satisfy my desire for deep involvement with characterization and plot. I should not have worried. I don't know how she does it, but Ms. Kelly can say more about a character, time and place in one paragraph than most writers can manage in a chapter.

These stories are beautiful, tragic, funny and elevating. They are built around life at U.S. Army forts, which were the vanguard of white civilization in the territories of the west. The "Ladies" of the title that we get to know here are heroic in the finest sense of the word. Their men, too, are worthy of them. Ms. Kelly debunks a lot of the myths surrounding the Old West. She clearly demonstrates her knowledge of the people and times, right down to the command structures of the army and the incessant bitter cold of the endless winters.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough! If you want to get lost in a time and place that will move you to laughter and tears; if you want to meet people who were able to forge lives out of dust, privation and beans; and, most especially, if you appreciate a terrific yarn, READ THIS BOOK.

I bought this thinking I could read maybe one of its ten short stories a week until Carla Kelly's next book becomes available. I read the first one on Tuesday of this week. It's Thursday when I'm writing this, and I read the last one this morning. It absolutely amazes me how someone who writes Regency-era romance as though she were there in 1813 or so can write 1870s and 1880s Frontier Army as though she were there, too. I can't even name a favorite among the stories; they're all too good. Encore, please?

Carla Kelly is one of my very favourite writers. As a Regency novel devotee (and not especially enamoured of short stories), I must admit I wondered what this volume would bring for it is often the case that romance writers have a special niche and crossing genres is not always successful. "Here's to the Ladies" was, for me, one of the best books I have read this year.

This is a delightful collection of stories of men, and their women and families, serving in the Army, Cavalry and Army Medical Corps during the period of the Indian Wars. Living and working in remote, isolated and difficult circumstances in frontier forts in the Dakotas, Nevada, Arizona and Wyoming, the people in these stories come to brilliant life in Kelly's hands. She writes with economy and brevity yet breathes life into her characters so that the reader feels they know each one intimately, their foibles, their fears and their deepest emotions.

Some of the stories are told from the masculine POV and Kelly is a past master at creating male characters of great sympathy and humour. My personal favourite is Capt Jesse MacGregor, a surgeon in Arizona whose story reads like a thrilling dime novel. In "Kathleen Flaherty's Long Winter" we have a shy hero and a heroine who turns tragedy into triumph. "Casually at Post" is the story of a man named God and is written with wit and charm. "A Season for Heros" tells of courage and heroism amongst the famous Buffalo Soldiers and is touching and poignant.

I don't usually read the "western" genre but feel this collection is as good as Nancy Turner's much applauded "These is My Words" or Penelope Williamson's "Hearts of the West". I expect to read this volume again and again and have passed it to the man in my life to read for the themes Kelly writes about are those which are central to all meaningful fiction: honour, courage, pathos, tenderness, humour and meaningful, satisfying personal relationships.

A keeper; please read it and relish the sterling quality of Carla Kelly's beautifully wrought prose.

This was my first 'short' regency romance and my first Carla Kelly book. I enjoyed it tremendously. The writing is fluid (thank you!), the story is original, and the characters are believable and well-developed. I cried for the soldiers who died. The descriptions of death and disease as a result of war were simple, but so real that you can't help but feel it. But mostly I chuckled and laughed out loud at Lydia's thoughts and actions. And thankfully, Major Sam Reed is no cardboard hero. He is brave and compassionate, but also somewhat of a liar (for certain reasons, he tells his family he married a nonexistant woman named Delightful Saunders and had a nonexistant child with her and talks Lydia into marrying him to save his tail!). I highly recommend this book! Very original. Very well-written. I had almost given up reading romance after some rather excruciating experiences with a hero and his manroot and another hero who was over-sexed to say the least. Well, I'm off to look for her other books!

Calling Carla Kelly a Regency romance writer is a bit of a misnomer, because most of her books focus in equal parts on finding love and finding yourself. This is especially true in the unfortunately titled, With This Ring.

At the start of the novel Lydia is a person who spends her life bowing to the wishes of others. She has been cowed by both her mother and an idiotic society. Her life is then slowly changed by a series of hard experiences and added responsibilities. A reviewer below questioned why the hero of the book, Sam Reed, would not help Lydia when he easily could have done so. Well, that's because Carla Kelly has created a hero who is unique in the regency genre. He says nothing because he wants Lydia to know she can succeed on her own, without any help from anyone. Which she does, of course, while the hero is virtually absent from the novel for over forty pages. Is there any other romance novelist who would attempt that?

I am a HUGE Carla Kelly fan and I didn't think she could top MISS WHITTIER MAKES A LIST but was I wrong! WITH THIS RING is undoubtedly one of her best stories ever. The hero, Major Sam Reed, is one of the most compassionate, selfless characters I've ever come across, even if he does embellish his military paperwork in order to get his men what they need. The heroine, Lydia Perkins, is quite unappreciated at home, and is only brought to London to act as a maid to her younger, much spoiled sister Kitty. Lydia finds true usefulness in nursing Major Reed and his wounded and dying men as they lay forgotten in a crumbling church while all of London is celebrating the victory at Waterloo. Sam convinces Lydia to marry him after she is thrown out by her family. Sam is in most urgent need of a wife, since he told his mother and aunt that he was married in order to secure the money he needs to run the estate he inherited. I don't want to give any more of the story away, but the two have quite a few unexpected, entertaining and sometimes poignantly moving adventures between leaving London and arriving at Sam's home in Northumberland. Simply put, this is a MUST read and a definate KEEPER!

"The Wedding Journey" is a tender and beautifully written novel of a marriage of necessity during the Napoleonic Campaign in Spain. If you are a lover of British history or you enjoy reading a well-crafted story with well-drawn characters, you will appreciate this latest offering from Carla Kelly. However, if, like me, you are also looking for a story with a grand romance or an unforgettable passion at its center, "The Wedding Journey" will disappoint you. Like Kelly's other books, "The Wedding Journey" features rather ordinary characters who are thrust into extraordinary situations. The hero, Jesse Randall, is a Captain and surgeon from Scotland, and the heroine is the daughter of another Captain who is a gambler and a wastrel, Elinore ("Nell") Mason. Jesse marries Nell in order to save her from being "sold" by her father to Major Bones, a nasty piece of work. I have to disagree with other reviewers who call these characters middle-class. Carla Kelly lets us know that Jesse Randall comes from a well-to-do family in Scotland which has a large house and employs several servants. Both Jesse and Nell's father, Bertie Mason, are Captains in the British Army and would have had to purchase their colors or rank --a very expensive proposition available only to the aristocracy and gentry in those days, not to the very small early 19th century middle class of shopowners and tenant farmers. Jesse and Nell are a courageous, unselfish couple who fall in love quietly as they follow the retreating British Army through Spain to the Portugese border. Their adventures along the way do draw a very vivid and sometimes gritty portrait of what life must have been like during the war between France and England. However, Jesse and Nell are no Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler. There is no grand passion between them nor any other strong emotion besides quiet affection. Two weeks from now, will I remember them? Probably not. If you have liked Carla Kelly's other books, you will undoubtedly enjoy this one, but if you are looking for a story about characters who will live on in your memory and heart long after you finish reading the book, then you may be disappointed.

I just literally finished reading this book and am ashamed that I allowed it to sit for weeks on end on my bookshelf before forcing myself to make time and read it. This was literally THE BEST signet regency book I've ever read and I truly loved and adored the characters that were fully developed and unique and every possible way. Despite the summary located on the back of the book that is NOTHING to what the book has in store.
The story all begins with Captain Jesse Randall, surgeon to the English army serving in northern Spain against the dreaded French. He has always loved the young Elinore Mason, a poor beauty with heart and soul. He is not your typical war hero with no fear and all about guts and glory. He is a new type of protagonist I've been waiting to read about. He's kind, shy and always thinking of others before himself. Ms. Kelly delves deep into his feelings and really brings readers to love him and want him to survive ALL that he goes through.
I cannot help but think to myself that this book would make the best movie of all time. It is a great war epic that has (of course) all the things that many love to read about: Romance (naturally), intrigue, drama, and action. There was not one character that didn't stop the even flow of the book and every point and detail given in the narratives only helped you understand situations more. I've never read a more "feeling" book than this and this is number one on my recommend list.

I have been a fan of Ms. Kelly's for a long time and have, I believe, a complete collection of her Signet regencies (including novellas). Ms. Kelly never fails to produce a story with well-imagined characters in a realistic milieu; her particular strength, from my point of view, is her use of "middle class" characters - rare in Regency romance. Many of Ms. Kelly's novels feature characters in the military professions, all of whom are fully drawn and none of whom engage in anachronistic behavior. It is wonderful to read about such lifelike people; their conflicts are never trivial and their affections always both sincere and believable. I read a lot of genre fiction, including romance, and Ms. Kelly is the one author who consistently can make me laugh *and* bring a tear to the eye within a single chapter. I am in constant dread of her retirement from writing romance! Despite the rather inane packaging of this title, I recommend "The Wedding Journey" to readers of adventure, in particular, as well as to romance lovers.

John Staples is a rake of the worst kind. He gambles, drinks and keeps a mistress of whom he's tired. He doesn't enjoy his life, but doesn't find the courage to take the necessary steps to change it. When Emma Costello steps into his life, as the servant of his American cousins, he loathes her on the sole purpose that she is Irish; losing his father and his eye in a battle against her people didn't help in making him friendly towards them.

And yet he saves Emma from being gambled in a game of cards. He buys her indenture back and finds himself "owning" a woman he hates. He doesn't treat her as a slave, though, but employs her as his secretary. He never suspects what ideas are up her sleeve, and he isn't careful enough when she makes him sign a document allowing her to reform him and make him a respectable gentleman until he can marry Lady Clarissa Paltridge.

John's growly reaction to Emma's first few actions to lead him to a righteous way of life are hilarious, but soon we realise that he's more willing to obey than he appears. But is his goal to become the gentleman that Lady Paltridge has set her eyes on? Or is he more interested in his reformer than he wants to admit? And can Emma ignore the desire that this dangerous rake stirs in her?

This is another must-read by Carla Kelly. The antagonism between the two main characters makes their journey to love enthralling. John hates the Irish, and yet he will help Emma in her search for her family, supporting her in her search at the Criminal Office. John does all he can to find answers to the questions haunting her. Their friendship is refreshing and proves that even a war between their people can't keep our two heroes apart. I've seen several readers mention that Carla Kelly writes about people before all, and this is true of this novel again.

My one and only regret, although Reforming Lord Ragsdale remains an outstanding novel, is that the first kiss between Emma and John wasn't showed live. The way it was written lessened its impact, I'm afraid, and I wish Carla Kelly had showed us what happened between the characters *when* it happened and not afterwards.

But this nitpick is very much compensated by the depth of character development that Ms Kelly devotes to her every novel. Reforming Lord Ragsdale is no exception when it comes to the quality and care brought to the personalities of both Emma and John.

Unfortunately, most Regency books are churned out with uninspired stock characters, plots, and endings - with only a few exceptions. "Reforming Lord Ragsdale" breaks the formula Regency with compelling charm and originality.

The title character is quite simply wonderful: he's funny, flawed, deep, and complex. His reformer, Emma, is equally rich and imperfect, and the two together are possibly one of this limited genre's most engaging couples.

I loved this book and couldn't help falling a little in love with Lord Ragsdale - as will anyone else who reads it. It's Carla Kelly's best and will spoil the reader for other Regencies, most of which will seem pallid, silly even, in comparison.

Get a hold of this book any way you can, you'll read it over and over - it's that irresistible!

I didn't think Carla Kelly could equal 'Mrs Drew Plays her Hand' for a heart-warming love story with moments which make the reader want to cry, laugh, and ache for both hero and heroine. But she's done it with this one. I know this book was written before 'Mrs Drew,' and in some respects it shows: Kelly's narrative style and vocabulary aren't quite as much in keeping with the period and some Americanisms creep in. But the book is so good that these errors failed to jolt me out of the story.

Ragsdale is a wonderfully complex but sympathetic character, initally seeming to be a dissipated rogue, but we quickly discover that underneath he has a very kind heart despite the episode in his past which makes him predisposed to hate Emma because she is Irish.

Emma is no ordinary servant, despite being in fact a slave (an indentured servant, forced into servitude for no pay for a fixed period). She too has reason to hate the British, and that hate initally becomes focused on Ragsdale as the epitome of that uncaring nation.

But both discover very quickly that first impressions are rarely accurate, and we are given insights into the reactions of both characters as they find themselves reluctantly drawn to each other. And despite the fact that Emma has set herself the task of reforming Lord Ragsdale - which involves healing his pain along the way - she also ends up being the subject of his attempts at reformation.

As someone originally from Ireland, I was very impressed with Kelly's use of Irish history as a backdrop; so many American writers have a tendency to write Irish people and Irish history in a very 'twee,' romanticised manner far divorced from reality. Kelly captures the atmosphere perfectly.

This book is now very difficult to obtain, and I got my copy through an Amazon auction. Now, having read it, I'd have paid twice as much as I did for it, including postage. It's really that good.

Carla Kelly never writes traditional Regencies, and her books are frequently superior to the average for that reason alone. I adored 'Mrs Drew Plays Her Hand' and 'Reforming Lord Ragsdale.' This book is quite different even from those.

Susan is the daughter of a gentleman, but her father is a gambler and has fallen on hard times. After he lost her family home, Susan was forced to go to live with an aunt, who turned her into an unpaid servant. So, she decides, she might as well get paid for such work, and applies for a job as a lady's companion.

At the home of her employer, Susan meets, not a handsome son who instantly falls in love with her (as more traditional Regencies would have), but her employer's bailiff. A completely unsuitable match for a lady - but why should it be considered unsuitable?

This is why I say this book is more reminiscent of Catherine Cookson's nineteenth-century novels, where these kind of cross-class romances are more commonly found. Kelly provides her usual natural style and occasionally earthy touch to the romance (and I don't just mean in terms of sex scenes; her characters are always well-rounded and she spares no maidenly modesty).

I still prefer her earlier books, but if you're a Carla Kelly fan this one is worth a try.

Carla Kelly has done it again. This time a Welsh bailiff, former foundling, thief, liar and war hero sets out to win the heart of a courageous lady. Susie Hampton is a lady and in the Regency time period, socially superior to Sergeant Wiggins. Their courtship and friendship has been so well crafted by Carla Kelly. She manages to incorporate the horrors of the long battle of England against France, while showing the bravery of the many men and women involved in the campaign. This book was a welcome addition to my vacation suitcase.

Carla Kelly never fails to present us with very real characters who are, sometimes, caught up in painful circumstances which they must work through.

In The Lady's Companion, she has presented us with Susan Hampton, the daughter of a profligate and selfish baronet who has sqandered his fortune and, therefore, her future amongst her own class. Susan takes courage into both hands and looks for a paid post outside her own circle. She meets the delightful Joel Steinman, proprietor of an employment agency, and is sent to the Dowager Lady Bushnell as a lady's companion. In fact, she has been sent, unbeknownst to her, as a gift from Joel to David Wiggins, former Regimental Sergeant Major, now the bailiff to Lady Bushnell at her manor, Quilling, in the heart of the Cotswolds. This is one thread of the story and it is beguiling in its unfolding.

The battle of Waterloo plays a big role in this story for it colours the actions and the characters of David, Joel, Lady Bushnell and her family. A beautiful metaphorical device, a strain of wheat bred from a handful of grain picked up at La Haye Sainte farmhouse during the battle, becomes a symbol of hope, of forgiveness, of coming to terms with the death, destruction, cowardice, heroism and trial by fire that those who survived must deal with in its aftermath.

All in all, this is a radically different book - nothing like most traditional regencies. It's not just a cross-class romance, it is about endurance, faithfulness, courage and honour. The love the various characters develop for each other is moving and poignant. The ending of the novel is emotional and sad but also full of hope for the future. Despite their superficial differences, Susan and David are well matched.