The Bliss

Rating:
Summary: amateur sleuth Regency romance
Review: At one time, many snobbish grubbing mothers and their simpering daughters considered Morgan Gage, as one of the prime catches of the Ton as he is wealthy and handsome. Morgan learns how fast first grade meat can spoil when he falls from grace as the pariah of the Ton with no entrance to any door of the Polite Society. Everyone including family and friends firmly believe Morgan murdered his father. Though he could not care less what the aristocracy thought of him, Morgan wants to clear his name as the "Wicked Earl of Waring" by catching the real killer, but he needs a ticket back into society.

Morgan finds his key when he meets Leah Brodie, a former top gun who also fell from grace (just not as far) because of her temper. Morgan offers a business courtship with Leah, who accepts expecting to regain her advantage with the Ton. As she curses and he sleuths, they fall in love, but first Morgan must uncover the identity of the culprit if he is to share a lifetime with Leah.

The amateur sleuth investigation conducted by Leah and Morgan enhances what would have been a typical Regency convenience tale. The who-done-it is cleverly designed to enable the audience to observe the positive qualities of the protagonists and a few not so nice traits while watching the pair bungle at finding clues. The love subplot remains the prime theme, but the mystery makes Jacqueline Navin's novel pure BLISS.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: amateur sleuth Regency romance
Review: At one time, many snobbish grubbing mothers and their simpering daughters considered Morgan Gage, as one of the prime catches of the Ton as he is wealthy and handsome. Morgan learns how fast first grade meat can spoil when he falls from grace as the pariah of the Ton with no entrance to any door of the Polite Society. Everyone including family and friends firmly believe Morgan murdered his father. Though he could not care less what the aristocracy thought of him, Morgan wants to clear his name as the "Wicked Earl of Waring" by catching the real killer, but he needs a ticket back into society.

Morgan finds his key when he meets Leah Brodie, a former top gun who also fell from grace (just not as far) because of her temper. Morgan offers a business courtship with Leah, who accepts expecting to regain her advantage with the Ton. As she curses and he sleuths, they fall in love, but first Morgan must uncover the identity of the culprit if he is to share a lifetime with Leah.

The amateur sleuth investigation conducted by Leah and Morgan enhances what would have been a typical Regency convenience tale. The who-done-it is cleverly designed to enable the audience to observe the positive qualities of the protagonists and a few not so nice traits while watching the pair bungle at finding clues. The love subplot remains the prime theme, but the mystery makes Jacqueline Navin's novel pure BLISS.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: "The Bliss" is a bit of a bust...
Review: Begin with an improbable plot: The hero, Morgan Gage, an Earl ostracized from society as the prime suspect in his father's murder, concocts a scheme to return to the good graces of the ton by pretending a love for the heroine, a banker's daughter. Of course, the author tells us that the banker has a good relationship with a duke, which is supposed to explain why a peer of the realm would want to align himself in the first place with a banker's family--a family that would have been looked down upon in Regency England as "in trade." However, what makes matters worse is that the heroine, Leah Brodie, with whom the Earl seeks to align himself, is herself a scrapegrace whose own ton scandal (she dumped a souffle over the head of one of her suitors at a public event) is hardly likely to raise the Earl's stature in anyone's eyes. Yet, as if by magic, once the two come together, in the blink of an eye the Wicked Earl becomes a highly sought-after marriage candidate in the highest circles.

To the improbable plot, add two main characters who are uneven at best: Morgan Gage, the Wicked Earl, is part strong, silent alpha male who mistakenly kidnaps Leah in the opening chapters, part "whipped" dog who dutifully laps at Leah's heels at ton parties, and part angiushed son who is tortured over his father's murder by an unscrupulous cousin. Leah Brodie is foul-mouthed, immature, melodramatic, and mainly tiresome. She does have some moments in the book when her outrageousness seems fresh and charming, but only to a modern audience. In real-life Regency England, she would have been regarded by the ton as far more of a pariah than the Wicked Earl.

On top of all this, add some poor editing: There were several places in the book where I found typos and poor word choices, but the most glaring errors were plot inconsistencies. The opening prelude, in which Leah first spies Morgan at a London ball, takes place in March 1816. The next two chapters, in which Morgan mistakenly kidnaps Leah thinking she is his stepmother(!), take place in June 1816, and third chapter, in which Leah meets Morgan once again at a ball at Glenwood Park in Yorkshire, takes place at least three weeks after the kidnapping, or presumably in or about July 1816. Yet, Morgan tells Leah at the Glenwood Park ball that after his father's inquest, he went abroad to Italy and France to oversee some properties left to him by his mother and that he "returned only last month after arranging for their sale." (page 55). Similarly, on page 77, Morgan recalls an accident he had with his sailboat at age twelve when his father angrily sent him into the house to "see his mother." However, on page 132, Morgan tells Leah that his mother and sister died when he was nine.

The result: A less than blissful reading experience. There were parts of the book that were well-written and interesting if one could overlook its other glaring problems, but the middle of the book absolutely bogged down with "filler" scenes that did nothing to advance the characters or the plot. I have read some of Jacqueline Navin's other books, and I seem to remember that they were much better than this. I hope that she tries harder next time.

Rating:
Summary: Very good!
Review: Once the darling of the ton he scorned, Morgan Gage is now an outcast, falsely accused of patricide. Though he has little use for society, he must live with it, and so must regain the favor of those he despises. Fate offers him a favor, throwing him into the life one of the ton's favorites, Leah Brodie, a well placed beauty with more brains than the average debutante. Leah yearns for adventure that can be found only with a bad boy, such as Morgan. Thus, these two unlikely allies find themselves working to solve a murder and salvage both of their reputations from scandal. As they work at these purposes, inevitably, they find there is more to the other than suspected, and they fall in love.

Fans of Amanda Quick will rejoice in this new adventure, pairing a quirky heroine and brooding, evil angel of a hero in a mystery delicately spiced with romance and the comedy typical of a regency.

Reviewed by Amanda Killgore.