Hi Readers! It's March already and time for another Book Club Thursday. My friends and I are here this week to REMEMBER WHEN. This is when we each feature something to discuss from our "booky" past.
It's not always easy to pick a topic. They tend to pop out after wondering what the heck will I write about. I had one I had in mind, only to pick something else entirely. Sheesh!
Somehow, I thought of one of my favorite comfort read authors, Jayne Ann Krentz. The first book I read of hers was THE FAMILY MAN (the hero had my hubby's first name) and I was hooked. I started searching out and reading her backlist. I was a happy camper. And then I found out about pseudonyms aka pen names. And JAK has lots of psuedos. So my REMEMBER WHEN this month is: Remember when you found out your favorite author wrote under Pseudonyms and you were compelled to check out (and buy) their backlist?
Phew!
Amanda Quick. I had seen her books at Target where I did most of my shopping for books until I discovered new and used book stores. She wrote historical books set in the Regency Era. Up until then all my historicals were in the good old USA either in the south or the west. The first Amanda Quick books I read were Mischief and Mistress released in the mid 90's.
Imogen Waterstone has always prided herself on being a thoroughly independent young woman, but now she needs a man of implacable will and nerves of iron. That's why she invited Matthias Marshall, infamous Earl of Colchester, to her home in Upper Strickland. Who better than the legendary explorer to help her lay the perfect trap? Her scheme is simple, really: She plans to let it be known that when she inherited her uncle's collection of antiquities, she also inherited a map to a fabulous ancient treasure. She's sure that her enemy would risk financial ruin in pursuit of the mythical artifact. And to make doubly sure the scoundrel took the bait, she wants Colchester to pretend that he's out to seduce Imogene so that he, too, could get his hands on her map.
Yet in all of her plotting, Imogene never anticipates Colchester's violent reaction to her request or her own electrifying reaction to him. Neither does she expect that a malevolent threat would emerge from the labyrinth of London--sinister enough to endanger her and Colchester's lives.
After a year of grand adventures touring the classical ruins of Italy and Greece, Iphiginia Bright returned to England to discover that the real excitement was at home. It seems that her Aunt Zoe has fallen victim to a sinister blackmailer and only Iphiginia can hope to stop the culprit before he can do more harm. Her plan is inspired: Imitating history's most legendary beauties--Cleopatra, Helen of Troy, Aphrodite--the former schoolmistress will remake herself, and descend upon London Society as the dazzling mistress of Marcus Valerius Cloud, the infamous Earl of Masters. Rumors hint that the Earl has disappeared at the blackmailer's hands, and by posing as his unknown mistress, Iphiginia is convinced she can ferret out the villain. Overnight, Iphiginia is transformed into a vision with a host of eager admirers, including one she does not expect -- the Earl of Masters himself, who strides into a shimmering ballroom one evening to cooly reclaim his "mistress". He is everything they say he is... arrogant, attractive, devastatingly seductive, and Iphiginia can't help but be enthralled. But when Marcus agrees to play along with her charade, she doesn't know that the determined earl has plans of his own: to tease and tempt her, until the beautiful deceiver becomes more than his mistress in name only.
I hemmed and hawed about buying these because I didn't know about this era in romance books. Mischief's cover called to me, but it waited for me on the shelves for months. I also passed on Mistress for a while because the heroine's name was Iphiginia. What kind of name is Iphiginia? Eventually, I caved in and bought them. In Krentz signature style, the heroines might not be the prettiest girls of the ton, but they make up for it with brains and heart. The heroes are usually men that are loners that follow their own path and are intrigued by Quick's quirky heroines. Together they share snappy dialogue and light suspense as they follow the road to the HEA. I enjoyed both stories and continue to read Quick's stories today. For a change in May of this year, she is releasing THE GIRL WHO KNEW TOO MUCH set in Hollywood of the 1930's. Color me curious.
March 9- Clearing Off the Bookshelves
