Acquired Book By: I am a regular tour hostess for blog tours via Cedar Fort whereupon I am thankful to have such a diverse amount of novels and non-fiction titles to choose amongst to host. I received a complimentary copy of “Mischief & Manors” direct from the publisher Sweetwater Books (imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc) in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.
To find out why I love Sweet Romances and the #PureRomance imprint you might like to check out my previous postings for Cedar Fort blog tours, wherein I related my love of Historical & INSPY stories on my last blog tour featuring To Suit a Suitor, however, I have happily been reading the offerings of this particular imprint for quite a long while now. To follow through my readings, be sure to scroll through this tag Pure Romance!
I had originally intended to host an interview with this review on the blog tour – however, due to the circumstances that befell my family when my Dad was hospitalised with stroke, I found myself unable to pull together the two showcases for this novel. Therefore, I opted instead to feature a review and cancel the interview. I found that returning to blogging after my father’s medical emergency was a bit harder than I had foreseen and was thankful I could remain on the blog tour. This is one of the reviews I have been working on whilst my Dad has been recovering and I have found I needed more time to compose.
Mischief & Manors
Subtitle: Pure Romace
When Annette Downing and her mischievous little brothers are sent to Kellaway Manor for the summer, she hopes for a relaxing escape. But Annette soon finds her closeted heart in jeopardy when reunited with the handsome Owen Kellaway, a childhood acquaintance and respected gentleman.
When Owen is enlisted to help the boys with their behavior, Annette wonders if he has just as much mischief up his sleeve as her brothers. Bound by a promise she made to her late parents, and amid a frightening mystery, Annette faces a difficult decision when she finds herself falling for Owen's charm.
Places to find the book:
ISBN: 9781462119370
on 1st December, 2016
Pages: 272
Published By: Sweetwater Books (@SweetwaterBooks),
an imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc (@CedarFort)
Available Formats: Paperback, Ebook
Converse on Twitter via: #INSPYRom, #SweetRomance, #HistRom + #Regency
my review of mischief and manors:
On entrance into this Regency, we are met by a sister whose at her wits end to resolve the meandering ways in which her brothers attempt to vex her into a slow migraine of cheeky behaviour. They would rather act out than mind their manners but when it comes time to count, it’s their behaviour that places them all in grave danger of being displaced by an Aunt who’d rather not have inherited them. Their Aunt isn’t the kind of Aunt you’d endear yourself to find three orphans being raised by, as she has a stern heart and an unkind mind wherein she doesn’t see the children as blessings but rather stones in her shoe.
Despite her best intentions, Annette has trouble reigning in her brothers – their too young to understand the gravity of what is happening around them unless their caught in making mischief which is their true passion at this stage in their childhood. Annette is of marrying age but is only greeted with a sharp edge of criticism and is put down everywhere she goes for being ‘less’ than expected. When her Aunt informs her that she’d rather be rid of the lot of them, she decides to send them off to a family friend of whom had encouraged their visit some five years in the past; close to the time when their parents had died. You could feel the pull on Annette’s heart – of how much she was worrying after her brothers and whether or not she could keep them safe from the wrath of their Aunt or the temptations of the world.
By the time the three of them arrive at the home of the Kellaways – it seems to be a way to re-begin on a path that isn’t as difficult as the previous one. That is of course, until Annette is reunited with Owen; there is a lot of tongue-in-cheek dialogue between the two as they remember the past, when they were children and at each others last nerve. They did not get along famously as children but as adults, they seemed to have forgotten how to relate to each other even more; partially because Annette did not have the best first impression of him originally and was holding it a bit against Owen even now. He’s since become a doctor and has settled himself a bit distant from the boy he was even if he still has a cheeky sense of humour.
There was a lot of attention spent on focusing on how cheeky the brothers were and how their behaviour was influencing certain events; on one hand it was working and on the other, I nearly felt that there was a forcing of theme to work within the scope of the titled story. Almost as if the title itself was becoming a pulse of inclusion rather than a light highlighting of where the story would take the reader. I found myself moving in and out of focus as despite the lightness of the premise, of a girl trying to come into her own with the weight of the world on her shoulders in many regards, I found the story was a bit weighed down on trying to be something it wasn’t able to become. It was surprising to me because generally speaking, I find the Pure Romance line of stories to be one of a feather; they all hone in on the sweetness of a Romance whilst providing an inspirational outlook on life.
The strange thing is that the more I read of the novel, the less I was finding I could attach myself inside – a lot of it seemed strained. I just couldn’t get my footing to alight inside this debut as much as I had wanted too and I regret in the end it simply wasn’t a good fit for me to read. Perhaps others will find it better suited to their interests but for me? I felt the theme of the story was simply overplayed and did not flow organically.
Small fly in the ointment:
I am unsure why, but there is a considerable amount of time spent on one of the brothers being ill – almost as if there were a lot of reasons to continuously bring up how ill he was and where his sickness had ended up being presented. I know there was a place for some of this to be mentioned, but I thought it was a bit overly done and could have been shortened. It was a bit disconcerting reading about it after awhile because it affected the pacing.
on the historical romance styling of ashtyn newbold:
Newbold has written a Regency Romance that takes it’s thread of entrance through the eyes of siblings; cast away unto their own after the death of their parents, how they would navigate their world is the folly for the story the author has told. The title of the story is a play on words – where Manors are the setting for the folly of this comedic Regency, where jostles of comedy intermix with the harder bits of the story where three young orphans are not as welcomed by family as they are friends of the family. The mischievous side of the story lends itself to encroach on how sometimes focusing on the lighter side of life is a method of surviving the dramatic. Despite noting this about her narrative, I found myself struggling to gain a foothold in the pacing and rhythm of the story as it was told.
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{SOURCES: Cover art of “Mischief & Manors”, book synopsis, author biography, author photograph of Ashtyn Newbold as well as the blog tour badges were all provided by Cedar Fort, Inc. and used with permission. Post dividers by Fun Stuff for Your Blog via Pure Imagination. Tweets were able to be embedded by the codes provided by Twitter. Blog graphics created by Jorie via Canva: Book Review Banner using Unsplash.com (Creative Commons Zero) Photography by Frank McKenna and the Comment Box Banner.}
Copyright © Jorie Loves A Story, 2016.
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by @AshtynNewbold via @CedarFortBooksRomance & Folly take centerstagehttps://t.co/2sTbnG66Ys pic.twitter.com/N6BOnxGyC5
— Jorie, the Joyful Tweeter ?? (@joriestory) December 27, 2016
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
- 2016 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge
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