Nancy Campbell Allen - Brass Carriages and Glass Hearts

Emmeline O’Shea is determined to save the world—single-handedly, if necessary. A strong voice for societal reform, she is the natural choice to deliver a key speech at the end of the International Shifter Rights Organization’s week-long Summit in Scotland.
But when a death threat arrives at Emme’s home, she is immediately placed into protective custody, watched over by none other than her personal nemesis, Detective-Inspector Oliver Reed. The two have crossed paths many times, with disastrous results, but now they will have to work together in order to reach the Summit before midnight of the last day in order to ensure legislation is passed to protect the Shifter community.
As unseen enemies close in around Emme and Oliver, they struggle to reach Edinburgh by any means necessary, only to find Emme’s vindictive stepsister, Oliver’s vampire brother, and a dangerous political minefield awaiting them in Scotland.
Even more difficult is their own refusal to admit that the fiery animosity that once burned between them might be turning into the heat of romantic passion. Could a straitlaced policeman determined to uphold the law and an outspoken activist willing to break the rules ever find true love? Or will all their dreams shatter like glass when the clock strikes midnight?

Comment: I liked the previous three books in this series and I would most definitely read this fourth one, which I managed to do recently. However, it didn't impress me as much as the others.

In this final installment of the fairy tale adaptations into steampunk like stories set in England, we finally have the focus on Emmeline O'Shea, the activist determined to advocate the shifters' rights. This has put her often on the sights of the police, usually because of manifestations going too far, and Oliver Reed has watched this for a long time, since he is a police detective. They also have another thing in common, their friends who seem to have paired up and now they are the only ones left single.

When Emme is set to present an important speech in Edinburgh, after having received some threats, Oliver is tasked to act as a sort of bodyguard and they travel together. Perhaps this is the time for them to work on their mutual feelings, which have developed without the other being aware, but someone is keen on not letting Emme reach her destination. Will they be able to do their jobs without falling into more danger?

This was a fun and action paced story, as the others have been but I confess I just wasn't as dazzled by it as I hoped I would. The situations which were developed here weren't as fascinating as the ones in the other books, I mean, the setting of the previous book was mostly inside a submarine!

In fact, this was probably what disappointed me the most, how boring the plot felt when compared to what came before. I know this doesn't have to be an issue if the story is compelling on its own worth, but I just can't help comparing. Besides, the main characters involved, Oliver and Emme, have been portrayed in a sort of mix between enemies who might become lovers and opposites attract. Both these tropes (and variations on the theme) are exciting but these two, in my opinion, made everything feel bland.

Oliver is a good guy and very honorable, especially in contrast to what we are told of his brother, who wasn't a good person and is even less so after becoming a vampire. This brother isn't on the page much, which I liked, but there are enough references to infer how different they are in everything. However, his honor and morals aside, Oliver didn't seem to be a very well developed character, I don't think he had a personality I'd remember much of and he read as someone not as key as Emme.

Emme is, obviously, a good girl, full of dreams and expectations and almost as if she is on a quest in how she can help save shifters. I liked that she was vibrant and dedicated and some of her personality shone when she talked about her hopes, but at the same time she wasn't such a novelty, or perhaps I should say her interactions weren't as specific in ways to make her seem like the only one could be protagonist in this exact story. 

The romance between them is pretty low key, as it had been with the others, but I was disappointed because the small things which could give us hints of how their feelings were changing or progressing felt very bland as well. I know we would not have passionate scenes in these types of books but the fact Emme and Oliver had known each other since the first book and their interactions were more on the animosity level, made me expect to want sparks when they finally admitted they saw the other differently. I think this didn't happen, for me the admittance of feelings/emotions felt too easy, too quick, in the sense they have always felt that way but only now could share. When did this happen? I feel we didn't see the fun part of the relationship progress.

There is also the use of the fairy tale idea, which in this book is loosely based on Cinderella. The author uses, mostly near the end, a few details that clearly indicate this choice but I will be honest, it felt too little too late. For me, the best part of the Cinderella story is that fantasy of two people from different backgrounds - or with different experiences in life - to finally accept they have in common sentimentally to justify a HEA. Oliver and Emme might have different social origins but this is never highlighted, never important for their paths/roles. It felt like the Cinderella connection was a bit more than loose, for me.

All things considered, the story as a whole is interesting, people looking for to help those who need, at the same time there are some secrets, some antagonists playing the villain role... but as a complete story this didn't convince me. There are also some loose threads - or that I see as such - which didn't seem to be fully explained... I don't know if it was intentional because more books might come, or just a choice, in which case feels the wrong one... I don't know, but this wasn't as amazing as I hoped.

Grade: 6/10

Nancy Campbell Allen - The Lady in the Coppergate Tower

Hazel Hughes has spent her life believing she is a Medium—someone who can talk to ghosts. But as of yet, that skill has remained frustratingly elusive. She is also suffering from a reoccurring childhood dream of someone who looks almost exactly like Hazel, but this dream version of herself is slowly going mad.
Sam MacInnes is a talented surgeon who runs in the highest social circles thanks to his family’s position and history. When Sam hires Hazel to assist him with his medical practice, he is immediately drawn to her intelligence, wit, and beauty.
Their potential relationship is derailed one evening when a mysterious count arrives in London and reveals to Hazel the truth about her past: she was abducted at birth and her twin sister has fallen dangerously ill.
Hazel agrees to travel to Romania with Count Petrescu in order to save her sister, and Sam insists on accompanying her. The count has secrets, though, and the journey grows more sinister with every mile that draws Hazel closer to her homeland. Even as her feelings for Sam become deeper and more complicated, she fears she might not survive the quest to save her sister with her heart intact, not to mention her life. She must learn to draw on gifts she doesn’t know she has if they are going to ever return home again.
Hazel and Sam must fight their way past dark magic, clockwork beasts, and their own insecurities as they try to reach her sister in the impenetrable Coppergate Tower before time runs out.

Comment: This is the third book in the Steampunk Romance series by this author, with a cast of characters somehow connected and where the stories are adaptations of fairy tales into the steampunk sub genre.

In this 3rd story we follow Hazel Hughes, now a doctor's assistant, who suddenly discovers that she was adopted and her original family is from Romania. Her apparent uncle count Petrescu has traveled all the way to England as soon as he discovered this and there's more, he tells Hazel she actually has a twin sister and she is doing badly, health wise, so can she go back with him so she can help, considering Hazel's healing abilities (and why she is, in part, a good assistant to a doctor)? 

Hazel is curious and can't ignore the need to find out if this is true, especially with the dreams she has been having, but she is also cautious about this situation and that is why she accepts the help of her employer dr Sam MacInnes. 

He has been thinking about her as just a friend and good employee but this situation helps to paint Hazel in a new light for him, and going with her is the right thing to do. But there is something very odd about the count and too much secrecy in his reasons, are they actually going to meet problems?

I think I liked this one slightly more than the previous novels. The romance has the same formula, two people in close contact changing their feelings, and all is mostly alluded to instead of visible on the page, but since this is given for the series, it didn't bother me. In fact, it felt as if the author stressed out their growing attraction more often, but rest assured nothing physical beyond kissing happens and, overall, the structure of the novel doesn't really require that.

The plot is very simple, Hazel talks to the woman she has always known as her mother, she understands something weird happened when she was adopted, but she has had a good life, even though her social status isn't one of nobility - which is going to change now - so she has been aware of her limitations but thankful for her friends and the privileges, and she knows she and her mother haven't been too bad. She also knows dr Sam is out of reach because although he works, his family is wealthy, but that doesn't stop her from thinking about it.

Now, a sudden new possibility opens up her world and she finds out she is from a noble family but the medical situation of her twin Marit is dire and for her own safety, she is guarded in a tower (the Rapunzel fairy tale, more or less) but Hazel isn't certain if she has to go to help or to save her... Hazel has had dreams which she now realizes are ways to understand her sister and everything is so confusing... plus she and Sam agree the count is hiding something about this whole situation...

They agree to go with the count and, to me, this was the best element in the whole story: how do they travel from England to Romania? No carriage and no steampunk related dirigibles... oh no, they all travel in a submarine! I thought to myself, what fun this was and I don't remember being as dazzled by a submarine journey in fiction since Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea or, more loosely, Abduction by Robin Cook, so I was fascinated by all the submarine related scenes and conversations and how it felt like a real house inside.

The time they spend inside the submarine allows them do become more worried because some things happen which are difficult to explain, such as what happens to Hazel's maid. There is also the issue of the way the count observes Hazel and when she helps Sam once or twice, in healing someone. I thought this whole things offered an interesting vibe of mystery and that something wasn't quite right... I think the real motivations of the count aren't that hard to guess but, of course, only when they arrive in Romania and try to help Hazel's sister Marit do they discover what the secret was.

Every paranormal or steampunk detail was well thought... I think the world building is as satisfying here and it has been in the previous novels, which means the author had a definitive overall plan for them all and then got the rest more defined as the stories developed. There are so many things that might seem secondary and could have been easily overlooked but to me they added zest to the story, such as the way the submarine worked or how it has a library where Hazel looks for clues...

I liked this novel, it wasn't perfect to my personal taste and to some scenes I might have liked seeing in certain moments, but it turned out quite well. Obviously there's a HEA for Sam and Hazel and we even get an idea of what Marit's life might be like. I hope this might be mentioned in the next book too, even though it won't be about her. 

Grade: 8/10

Nancy Campbell Allen - Kiss of the Spindle

Doctor Isla Cooper is cursed. Literally. Each night, at the stroke of midnight she falls into a death-like sleep from which she cannot be awakened for six hours. To make it worse, the curse has an expiration date—after a year, it becomes permanent. And the year is almost up.
In a desperate attempt to find Malette—the witch who cursed her—Isla blackmails her way onto Daniel Pickett's private airship bound for the Caribbean, only to discover she's traveling with three illegal shapeshifters and the despicable Nigel Crowe, a government official determined to hunt down and exterminate every shapeshifter in England. Isla and Daniel must work together to keep the identities of the shapeshifters hidden while coming to terms with their own hidden secrets, and their blossoming attraction to each other.
Filled with suspense, intrigue, and plenty of romance, Kiss of the Spindle is steampunk Sleeping Beauty story. It is a race against the clock as Isla and Daniel try to hunt down the elusive Malette before Isla's death-like sleep becomes permanent.

Comment: Last year I've read and liked the first book in this Steampunk Proper Romance series, which is a loose adaptation of some fairy tales. That first book focused on Beauty and the Beast and now we have Sleeping Beauty.

When this story begins, heroine Isla Cooper, an empath doctor specialized in helping the shifters with their emotions, is about to blackmail Daniel Pickett, of the Pickett company, to let her travel to the Caribbean for research. In fact, Isla wants to go because she knows that's where the witch Malette is at and months ago Isla was the victim of a curse and now she wants a cure. However, on the same trip Daniel is taking three men, all shifters, because of a certain law regarding the presence and forced registry of shifter in England so he wants everything to be as discreet as possible. No one counted with the presence of Nigel Crowe as well, an officer of the crown, always trying to catch shifters and prosecute them. The journey will be a tricky one for all involved, but Isla knows she needs to be calm for her curse forces her to sleep between midnight and the sunrise... will she arrive at the island on time for a cure?

This second story is very loosely connected with the first - the only thing I can remember is the fact the hero of this book is the brother of the heroine in the first one - but I'd say the structure is well done and one does not need to have read the other book in order for this to make sense. I guess I could also say it's more enriching to do so anyway, but to be honest I don't remember that much from the first book...

This story begins with some notion of haste, because everyone embarking on the journey seems to need to arrive as quickly as possible. Since they couldn't for more than one reason leave earlier, this journey is important and I think the author did a good job trying to impart that quickness. In a way, this did set the mood for the early chapters, it felt as if things had to be in motion and the presence of the agent of the crown made everything feel even more complicated, as if at any moment something could go wrong.

All characters had reason to travel but three of them are shifters leaving England because of the law. I thought the biggest worry, apart from the heroine's quest, would be how long or how stressful things would be before the agent of the crown proved the three men were shifters, so there is some tension at first and that, for me, was well done, I was stressed just thinking about the possibilities. However, things got to a point - when the heroine shared her plight - and then the focus seemed to change as well...

As soon as the heroine tells the others what happened, they immediately tell her they will do their best to help and even Nigel, the antagonist, seems to become softer...Isla also works her "magic" on him and invites him to do things with the others, creating a sort of bridge. I thought this would be cute and quite a change, you know, beating a mean-spirited person with kindness, but actually the author had other plans and the connection between Isla and this Nigel is much closer than what the premise seemed to indicate. I don't mind the path taken, but there was a clear change in tone and in plot from this moment on and at times I felt the story wasn't truly delivering on what I assumed it would be the key idea. Nevertheless, most of the hinted plot related situations are solved in a satisfactory way.

As for the romance... this being a proper romance, the only thing we see besides love declarations is kissing, but I think the author gave us enough scenes and interactions to make the falling in love idea feel organic and believable. Isla and Daniel seem to be a stable couple or, at least, a couple who will be able to convincingly have a steady relationship in the future. I don't have much to comment on their personalities, they are good people but not stubborn in their ways to think they are better than others or that we, the readers, should look at them as the only important characters here. Their characterization was done well enough, I think.

I was entertained while reading, I can think of the details I'd change, the ones I liked, it's true some scenes towards the end were a little less interesting to me, but as a whole, this was a good story. I think it's a fact I will read the other two stories too, next year.

Grade: 7/10

Nancy Campbell Allen - Beauty and the Clockwork Beast

When Lucy Pickett arrives at Blackwell Manor to tend to her ailing cousin, Kate, she finds more than she bargained for. A restless ghost roams the hallways, werewolves have been reported in the area, and vampires lurk across the Scottish border. Lord Miles himself is clearly hiding a secret. He is brash and inhospitable, and does not take kindly to visitors—even one as smart and attractive as Miss Pickett. He is unsettled by the mysterious deaths of his new wife, Clara, and his sister, Marie. Working together, Miles and Lucy attempt to restore peace to Blackwell Manor. But can Lucy solve the mystery of Miles? Can she love the man—beast and all?

Comment: Another book that ended up in the TBR pile for who knows what reason. I assume because of the Beauty and the Beast inspiration but maybe it was due to something else. Nevertheless, it was a story I ended up liking so my reason to add it actually paid off.

In this book we find a steampunk world during Victorian times, with our characters living a pretty much similar life to that on the 19th century but with several add-ons in the figures of vampires and shape shifters and mechanical entities. This story begins with out heroine Lucy coming to stay at Blackwell Manor to be with her cousin Kate, who recently married the younger brother of the lord of the house. Kate hasn't been well and Lucy is determined to know why, especially since Kate's ailment seems to be physical and, as a botanist/scientist, Lucy believes she can help. Miles, the lord of the manor, has had issues in the past, has a scar in his face and courtesy of a family inheritance, a problem every month he can't share with others. When Lucy arrives, he is attracted to her but fears she won't bear to look at him. Besides, there seems to be some ghost haunting the house and his brother's wife is ill. Could it be that something weird is going on? Could Lucy and Miles join efforts to discover what is happening?

In the first chapters, I was reading and thinking that this was OK but a little boring. I was trying to decide if I wanted to keep going when something interesting happened and I thought I had to know what would happen next and when I noticed, I was already half way through it, so this ended up being good evidence that sometimes a book might not grab us right away but perhaps there are good things coming still!

I think what was making me not very impressed was how this seemed to be such a predictable story at first and the paranormal elements didn't seem to matter much but when the ghost made an appearance, things changed and Lucy and Miles started to interact more, which made the experiences/situations they shared more interesting too, because by having to interact, we could learn more about the two of them and although this is a "proper romance" in the sense there is no lust or sex scenes, I think it was clear they would be a good match and I wanted to see it happen.

However, despite that, I'd say the biggest appeal in this book turned out to be the mystery of what was happening to Kate, why was she so ill since she arrived at the house and then, why was there a ghost trying to give a message to Lucy, who never reveled any kind of connection with ghosts before. I was intrigued by where the author was taking this plot and I believe she did a good job balancing the two things: the mystery and investigations with the slow developing romance between Lucy and Miles which, at first, seems to be quite bland but turned out to be better than what I anticipated.

The romance is definitely slow and focused on the things they discover about one another, how caring and compassionate they are. It was sweet to see how they started to appreciate the other person for the little things they did to help someone else or by how they treated one another when others might have different opinions... I especially liked the scene where confident Lucy defended Miles while others were staring at him because of his scar. It was very good to see, on one hand, how their feelings seemed to be based on mutual respect and not just lust as often happens.

The mystery, at some point closer to the end, is no longer so intriguing, I must confess. Some things get known and the villain gets uncovered in a somewhat predictable way for me. It was a bit frustrating to see how the villain became a villain, although the personality for it was always there, it seems. Another detail that didn't feel as well done, or at least it wasn't the focus so several elements felt like they were under developed or were made to feel pointless, was the paranormal content. Some things felt they were interesting and important, others were harder to understand why they should matter...

All things considered, this was a nice surprise. I liked the mystery and the romance even if the execution wasn't always as well done or when I'd change some things for personal preference. Still, it was an entertaining read and I will read the next story too, some day.

Grade: 7/10