Kav's Reviews > Winning Miss Winthrop

Jane Austen eat your heart out! There's definitely a Persuasion vibe to this incredible first book in a new series by Carolyn Miller. We're back exchanging banter and barbs in Regency England where appearances are everything and everyone must live by an exhaustive list of rules or be cut from polite society. And our hero and heroine -- Catherine and Jonathan -- are a pair of the most exasperating characters I have ever met within the pages of a book.

Misunderstandings based on assumptions and wounded feelings create havoc in their lives as they are thrown together by circumstance. Unlike most romance novels, this couple spends a lot of their time apart; but since readers are privy to their innermost thoughts we also have a front row seat to their deepest longings. These two dunderheads are in love and have been for some time but neither is willing to forgive the other and, until they do, they have no hope of unraveling the past and revealing the truth. I never wanted to knock two heads together more than with Catherine and Jonathan. And give them a good scolding while I was at it. Talk about a page-turning reader dilemma.

As in all Miller's stories, this one has a fascinating and infuriating cast of secondary characters. Catherine's mother -- like nails on a chalkboard! That woman grated on my nerves something awful even though she did provide some groan-out-loud laughable moments as well. Catherine has the patience of a saint to put up with her mother's histrionics, that's all I can say! And fans of Miller's previous series (Regency Brides : a Legacy of Grace) will be thrilled to discover some familiar faces in Winning Miss Winthrop which is a surprise bonus! (Though it isn't essential that you read the first series to follow this one.)

I'm in a euphoric tizzy of Regency proportions having just finished WMW -- and giddy with delight over the fact that the second book in the Regency Brides : a Promise of Hope series is already out. Miss Serena's Secret here I come!