lightreads

An Ornithologist's Field Guide to Love

3/5. An extremely silly “historical” romance about two rival ornithologists competing (and accidentally working together) to find a particular magical bird.

I think I’m over India Holton now. This is her fourth book, and to say they are variations on a theme is to vastly understate their repetitiveness. It’s a pleasant enough theme – a cartoonish approach to plot, a romance with little real conflict but hitting the same general notes every time of reaching each other through loneliness, banter, entirely unexplicated worldbuilding, a light narrative voice that says things in the general tone of “he kissed her so quickly the narrative could not come up with a metaphor.” Some playfulness with tropes, but it never amounts to anything, like the inn room they are forced to share that has not one bed, but seven. Cute, but nothing other than cute.

A pleasant diversion, but I’ve had four of them now and I think I’m good.

The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels and The League of Gentlewomen Witches

4/5. All vibes, no fucks. (No metaphorical fucks. There are definitely literal fucks). Very Gail Carriager, but less substance. No, really. And it's a good thing.

IDK guys, we moved across many states and it was terrible and cost all of the money and took forever, and – have I talked about this here? Whatever, you guys can roll with no context – I am still failing to adequately recover from that little bout of anaphylaxis I had, and Casterbrook remains beautifully, intensely two. So like. We are having a time right now. Therefore, I read these romance adventures about witches and women sky pirates and the men they bang and, eventually, marry in blurrily historical England. These books are sorta kinda doing a thing about behavior and restraint and societal expectations, except different ones than you think, and okay whatever, that's nice I guess, but pay that no mind, it doesn't hold water anyway. The jokes are brisk, the heroines are blisteringly competent, and the heroes are good in the sack. Done.