Book 822: A Husband for Hartwell (The Lords of Bucknall Club #1) – J.A. Rock & Lisa Henry

Of course, I’m going to say yes to a review request that has “It’s Bridgeton but make it gay!” in it.* Even though I never read the series, I thoroughly enjoyed the Netflix adaptation and we all know I’m obsessed with Jane Austen and the Regency era.

For the most part, I was curious about how they were going to get the gay thing in and it was pretty clear from the beginning with the book starting with a proclamation that all pairings are allowed as long as they’re within the marriageable class and that it was mostly designed for second or third sons of the gentry.

Overall, I enjoyed the book. I felt it could’ve been edited a little better (I spent so much time thinking Warry was the eldest child, but he had an older sister and for some reason it just didn’t click they meant he was the eldest son) and many of the minor characters, aside from Warry’s older sister and Hartwell’s friend who is of course book two’s protagonists, weren’t fleshed out.

A year or so ago, he would have prattled about anything that came into his head. But they were both gentlemen now, and with adulthood came a level of self-consciousness—a sense that the manners they displayed suddenly mattered more than the content of their speech. (Chapter 3)

The true crisis of the novel was Warry’s making. He’d stumbled across a scandalous letter his sister wrote to her ex governess/lover that was incredibly explicit. It was then stolen by a former employee and used to blackmail Warry into marrying the big bad of the novel. I appreciated the female-female love story but wish there was a bit more of it just to help flesh out the character. While all of this is going on Hartwell and the aforementioned sister agree to marry so Hartwell won’t disappoint his dad and lose his title (because those don’t pass to non-procreating relationships even if they’re condoned). This comes to a head and Warry ends up caring for Hartwell after he gets tanked one night and then Warry returns the favor after a big to-do at the first ball of the season.

For the most part, the book felt authentic to the period (or what I know of it at least). The language felt right, the sex scenes weren’t over the top and they used what felt like appropriate euphemisms. I truly appreciated that there were NO sex scenes until well after halfway through the novel and the first intimate scenes we got to see were incredibly restrained. The characters grew as the book progressed which is vital and when I finished reading I felt that I could easily read the next one in the series.

Recommendation: I quite enjoyed this one. It took a little while to get going and I honestly thought there were a few continuity errors, but I either imagined them or couldn’t find them when I went back looking for them. The protagonists and primary minor characters were well written and believable and the sex scenes were intimate and well written. I’m looking forward to the second book in the series, A Case for Christmas, shockingly NOT a holiday romance, I don’t think.

*I received a copy of A Husband for Hartwell via Gay Romance Reviews in return for my honest opinion. No goods or money were exchanged.

Opening Line: “William Hartwell, arguably London’s most eligible bachelor and certainly London’s most melancholy marquess, was not entirely surprised to find a frog down the back of his shirt.”

Closing Line: “Hartwell only shrugged, and then leaned in to kiss Warry again.” (Whited out to avoid spoilers, highlight to read.)