Stacy Alesi's BookBitch.com™

No April Fool’s Day here…

Meet Jonah Arlo Alesi, my first grandchild! Today was Jonah’s due date, but as my daughter-in-law put it, “Our April Fools baby played the ultimate prank and arrived a month early!” Yes, Jonah arrived 4 weeks early, all 5 pounds, 5 oz. of him. He hung around the hospital for a bit, but came home in time for his grandparents to visit. He is the first grandchild on both sides, and we are all beyond thrilled!

Needless to say my time and attention has been focused elsewhere these days, but I will be back here posting soon enough. I just looked at my list and I have over 20 books to review! I have definitely been slacking. So for a sneak preview, here are some thoughts on the historical romances I’ve read lately.

I’ll start with Ten Things I Hate About the Duke by Loretta Chase, the second entry in the Difficult Dukes series, which I loved – Chase is always a sure thing for me, as is Lorraine Heath. Heath’s latest, Scoundrel of My Heart, is the first book of a new series, Once Upon a Dukedom, and was a fast, sexy read. I am looking forward to the next book.

The Worst Duke in the World by Lisa Berne, is book 5 of the Penhallow Dynasty and it was a really fun read. How can you not like a book that features a loveable pig named Duchess? I didn’t love the only other book I’d read by this author, but this one will lead me to read more Berne for sure.

Never Kiss a Duke is the first book of a new series, Hazards of Dukes, by Megan Frampton, another must read author for me. She always tells a good story, and I love her sense of humor. Eva Leigh has the third book in her Union of the Rakes series, Waiting for a Scot Like You, and it was terrific! She’s another author that I never miss.

One of my long time favorites, Eloisa James, has a new addition to her Wildes of Lindow Castle series, Wilde Child, that was a total delight, especially if you are a fan of Shakespeare. When she isn’t writing bestselling historical romances (over 7,000,000 in print!), James is a Shakespeare professor at Fordam University, and that knowledge comes into play here, with fascinating results. I am trusting that her explanation of why actors call Macbeth the “Scottish play” and never say the name in the theater is true and not what I’d heard before. Worth the read for that tidbit alone!

A new-to-me author, Amalie Howard, wrote The Rakehell of Roth, the second book of the Regency Rogues series, but I hadn’t read the first book. No matter, this was an enjoyable read – enough that I am going to find the first book to read. Plus I loved the oh-so-purple cover! Another new author for me was Eva Devon, and I loved The Spinster and the Rake, the first book of her Never a Wallflower series, which the publisher describes as “blend of My Fair Lady meets Pride and Prejudice with a twist!” That worked for me!

I am also extremely grateful that my husband and I got our first Covid Vaccines. We are due for the second one next week. It hasn’t been easy in Florida with a governor who is most concerned with his big donors and not at all concerned with keeping everyone or anyone else alive or safe. He gave exclusive vaccine rights to Publix after a quarter of a million donation from Publix. Communities where large donations were made got pushed to the head of the line for vaccines. Fun times in Florida.

Florida officials call for FBI to investigate governor Ron DeSantis ‘for linking vaccines to donations’

The announcement that the state is partnering with Publix on vaccination sites comes a month after the supermarket chain made four $25K donations to governor’s political committee.

Back to my sweet grandson – I miss him and my son and daughter-in-law terribly. Jonah is changing so much day to day! Here are a few of my favorite pictures.

As always, thanks for reading and stay safe!

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 1st, 2021 at 8:00 AM and is filed under Ramblings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.