THE FIRST SNOW OF WINTER and THE LABOURS OF LORD PERRY CAVENDISH, third and fourth Winterbournverse books

THE FIRST SNOW OF WINTER
JOANNA CHAMBERS (Winterbourne #3)
Self-published (non-affiliate Amazon link)
99¢ Kindle edition, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: 1814: Captain Sam Alderton returns to England from the continent with his life in tatters. Maimed and directionless, the last thing he wants to do is spend Christmas with his family and their close friends, the Huxleys—especially Jasper Huxley, who he almost kissed five years before. Sam plans to avoid the festivities, but when the first snow of winter arrives, and he and Jasper are trapped alone together at Alderton Hall, they find themselves revisiting old traditions and painful memories together—and discovering that things may not have been quite as either of them thought five years earlier.

My Review: Except for three foul, putrid w-bombs, this first-time friends to lovers tale gets full marks. The childhood love of the young men is well-played for the explanation of their chemistry as men. Adding in the war wound and its effect on each of them is what tips this short piece into a good read on its own and not a mere add-on to the series.

There are a few small details that niggled at my pleasure...like Jasper's freshly-washed hair. The act of washing one's heair was not trivial in the Regency. It took planning and was rather more complicated than standing under a shower and scrubbing in a surfactant. Jasper wouldn't have done all this on Christmas Eve, and most certainly wouldn't have done so in conjunction with a bath at someone else's home, even the home of childhood friends.

I found Sam's mother a revolting, manipulative old party, with her ginned-up tears and her revulsion for Sam's war wound. I get it, about the wound at least; but it didn't make her a sympathetic character in my eyes. And Jasper's female connections are described so humorously by Sam...Augusta, Jasper's mother, was bringing her own mother to Christmas and Sam thinks: "Bertha was the least grandmotherly person imaginable. Unless one was thinking of Lucretia Borgia’s grandmother, perhaps. Or Caligula’s." Which is pretty much priceless! And accurate.

One important point is that we're not made privy to the source of these two characters' prequel-ness...so while this is a series I strongly advises you to read in order, be a bit patient with this Napoleonic-Wars excursion from our accustomed George IV-era trip. The order of battle is quite important to follow in this series to extract maximum pleasure from it.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

THE LABOURS OF LORD PERRY CAVENDISH
JOANNA CHAMBERS (Winterbourn #4)
Self-published (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$3.49 Kindle edition, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Lord Perry Cavendish knows that he's seen as a not-too-bright, amiable, sporting sort of chap. The type who can hold his own in the boxing ring, drink most men under the table, and offer a useful opinion on a piece of horseflesh—but not much else.

When Perry visits his friend, Lysander Winterbourne, he is introduced to the Honourable Jonny Mainwaring, a free-thinking artist who is everything Perry is not: unconventional, emotional…and very talkative.

At first, Perry is overwhelmed by the vibrant, witty Jonny Mainwairing, but when he agrees to sit for him, he discovers the real man beneath the dramatic flourishes, and the undeniable physical attraction he feels for Jonny begins to develop into something more.

But Jonny is not to be easily won over. While he has a longstanding weakness for brawny men like Perry, he’s still smarting from his latest heartbreak and determined to change his habit of throwing himself into each new affair without pausing to recover from the last.

Can Perry convince Jonny that he is more than just an empty-headed young buck, and that they could have a real future together?

My Review: The w-bombs come thick and fast here. Two—two!—within the first chapter alone! The onslaught of cheesy, unpleasant eye-infection behaviors continued until there were six...count 'em six...infringements of the Readers' Rights Agreement. Humph.

Perry is a Chelsea-bun hero all right, plain on the outside but fruity and spicy all the way through. (That's the period-appropriate term for a Cinnamon Roll hero, don't you know...since Chelsea buns were first made in the eighteenth century, unlike cinnamon rolls.) He's ooey-gooey sweet, with that large, lumbering man charm that seems to center on not fitting the furniture:

He was sitting in a spindly little chair, at a spindly little desk in the morning room. It was probably a lady’s desk and part of the effects of the house Adam had purchased when he’d bought the estate. Had the previous occupants been elves, Perry wondered? Most of the chairs in the house seemed to be too small for him.

Been there, Brother Man, been there and hated the view. Dinky little people need to understand that they are not the proper measure of the world! But a deeper hurt has been done to Perry, beyond merely being made to feel that he's Too Much...

“You need to go slower,” Perry repeated, his face heating with mortification. “I’m not one of those clever fellows like you who can write quickly.” He forced a chuckle. “I was a bit of a dunce at school.”

He's not eloquent or even terribly articulate in his speech, and not a very intellectually inclined sort, but not (as Lysander knows of old) slow-witted or dumb. In his classes, however, he was rather thought less of and certainly belittled by his harridan of a mother. He bears terrible emotional scars because of this, and is very sure that someone like the garrulous swan-like Jonny Mainwaring, fey and dandyish and a riot of color and sound, would sooner be dead than than spend time with him.

Jonny is suffering from the fey, dandyish man's usual problem with other men: What appeals to them at the start makes them absolutely mad as hornets by the end. Jonny's an artiste, you see, on top of being less than a manly man. He's accustomed to that being a Very Bad Thing...and here's this large, lovable lummox of a Perry practically blushing himself into a stroke every time Jonny so much as smiles at him! And seems unable to utter a sound...except in extremis, as the two decide it's time to get it on.

When Jonny’s tongue slid against his own, Perry’s cock jerked. It felt hard enough to hammer nails into a board...
–and–
No. No, {Jonny} would not be going down that road again. Before he bound himself to anyone else, he had to sort himself out. He was a grown man who should be capable of standing on his own two feet. And if it turned out that he could not get his own wild feelings under control, well, perhaps he was better off alone.

Ahh, there it is...the Fuckening! How to screw stuff up without really trying. Okay, they're both young, one does need to forgive them for the collywobbles. And, of course, neither one can be honest with the other because they can barely be honest with themselves! These are the pains of loving before you're experienced in it, and it was a lot harder to gain experience in that time. So, well, the dance does go on...and all because some thoughtless clod hurt Jonny, who then failed to fail to pass it on to the sensitive studmuffin that is Perry.

A trip away from their base to visit Jonny's friends Sam and Jasper (see review above) has the two spending an idyllic and blissful day driving (Perry loves to drive his curricle, Jonny is amazed that he enjoys riding in the curricle with Perry when he has always hated riding in carriages) and eating together and then having a lovely visit with Sam and Jasper. The two of them are leaving for Italy soon, and they've asked Jonny to join them...a lovely offer, a place Jonny would love to visit, but he says no and offers his usual "I'm a bad traveler" excuses. This leads Perry, in his cups, to offer quite simply, sincerely, and beautifully to be Jonny's help and comfort through the horrors (to Jonny, not to Perry) of the journey.

The very most horrible thing then occurs. Jonny says a dismissive and cutting "no, thank you, I couldn't possibly impose on your kindness" rejection. "I know...KNOW...this is not going to end the way it is heading," thinks I. But just in case, I started sharpening my kitana and digging around for those ninja stars I got for that one Yule. "I might need to travel to England soon, on an unrelated topic. Do not be alarmed if I am gone some time," I posted, making plans to cause much, much trouble for A Badly Behaved Author.

Oh me of little faith. No, Author Chambers did not break the remaining parts of the Readers' Rights Agreement (Romance subhead). What a relief. And yes, the ending while happy was not without flaw...I felt it was rushed, and presumed that Perry would be much more forgiving on a much shorter time-frame than I found entirely believable...but it delivered the goods: These two delightfully different men are Together and will stay that way.

So, it was labourious wading through the w-bombs, but the conclusion lived up to my desires. You need to be in the mood for fears and doubts to get the full effect from the read. I think it's very worthwhile to take the trip.