Series: Hell's Bells, #1
Traits & Tropes: pining; hero with secrets; older, independent heroine; class difference; self-made hero; dirty talking hero; best friend's sister
Publication Date: 08.24.21
Genre/Setting: Historical; Victorian; London, England, 1838
Heat Level: 3.5
Rating: 3.5 stars
Lady Sesily Talbot has embraced her role as London high society’s most scandalous lady, if she can even be called a true lady given her father’s common origins. She enjoys the freedom that comes with being older, wealthy, and already of dubious reputation. Seeing her lure a man into a darkened garden is nothing memorable to the eyes of the ton, and none have realized that her supposed trysts aren’t all they appear to be.
Except Caleb Calhoun, who sees much more than he should of the truth of his best friend’s lovely and rebellious sister. He’s impressed with himself for resisting his connection to Sesily for the past two years, especially considering the clearly interested looks and blatant invitations she gives him each time they meet.
But Caleb was most successful at resisting Sesily when there was an ocean separating them. Now he’s back on English shores and someone must try to protect Sesily from the risky endeavors she undertakes late at night. Caleb is hopeful that such time spent with Sesily will be enough to get her out of his system, once and for all, but it rapidly becomes clear that will never happen as Caleb realizes Sesily is a forever type of woman, and that sort of future remains woefully out of his reach.
I have quite a mix of feelings about this book, so as per usual when this happens, beware you may encounter spoilers below as I get my thoughts out, though I’ll try to remember not to.
I have been looking forward to this book for quite a while and putting off reading it for the same reason. When hopes and expectations are high, the standard can sometimes be impossible to meet, or we set ourselves up for a letdown. That was the case here in some respects, but not in others. For the first half-two thirds of this book, I just wasn’t that into it. Sesily, and at times Caleb too, just annoyed me. I found them arrogant and not that likable and I was annoyed by having the feminist aspects of the book shoved down my throat. For me, romance itself is feminism and empowerment, so I don’t need or want so much of a clear agenda in my book, especially when it makes me feel like I’m reading a modern contemporary romance rather than the escapist period piece I’m after. I think part of my annoyance stems from the fact that this agenda has been pushed so hard recently in nearly every book I’ve read that I’m just sick of it, especially when I didn’t need it reiterated to me in the first place and it just feels like preaching to the choir.
Besides that, I found Sesily off-putting because of her arrogance and the high opinion she had of herself and her good looks. She was very aware of her nickname as “sexily” and the fact that she could have anyone she wanted. In fact, the main reason she was so interested in Caleb, at least at first, was because she thought he had no interest in her. This just made her seem like a spoiled child to me, definitely not a mature and intelligent woman of 30, and boy did she ever emphasize her age, maturity and independence every chance she got. Her confidence and supposed empowerment for me just came off as obnoxious arrogance and poor decision making under the guise of bravery and independence. Most times, Sesily was cutting off her own nose to spite her face, as the saying goes, which is rather the story with much of the feminist movement itself over the years really.
This is probably just a weird quirk of mine, but the descriptions of both Sesily and Sera as beautiful women who are well aware of their beauty and who use it to get what they want just emphasizes stereotypes of women using their looks to manipulate men, which just breeds disdain. Anyway, the number of times Sesily mentions knowing she looks fabulous, and she can’t fathom why Caleb wouldn’t want her makes it hard to believe or relate to her insecurities about his rejection. It also makes her seem rather small-minded that she for quite a while there she really can’t think of much of anything beyond looks and physical attraction/desire. Sesily is a weird combination of worldly and incredibly naïve, so it was often hard to figure out where she was coming from, much less where she was trying to go.
I liked the concept of this book, I’m just unsure of the execution. A lot of this narrative rapidly fell into a repetitive enumeration of all the reasons Caleb and Sesily can never be together, and this was perpetuated by both Sesily and Caleb. Several times he calls her combative and accuses her of viewing everything as a battle even when it isn’t, and it is hard to disagree with him. For his part, Caleb was very preoccupied with his past and his secrets and when this was matched with Sesily’s immaturity and quickness to fall into a sulk (much too often for a grown woman who loves to emphasize just how grown up she is), I got a little frustrated. At this point in the book, a plot device that is just a pet peeve for me was deployed and I nearly threw the book, it just felt like such a cop out and unnecessary.
By the time we got more details of why she is the way she is, and why he’s so resistant to her advances, it was very nearly too late for me to care. Thankfully, things turned around in the nick of time for me and I actually really liked the bravery Sesily began to demonstrate. She was brave enough to tell Caleb her feelings, even knowing the difficulty they faced due to his unique circumstances. I somehow wound up loving their teamwork and her refusal to give up when he could see no way out. Caleb could see only one way to protect Sesily and he was too blinded by his need to keep her safe to see any other options. This is where Sesily’s strength and ingenuity finally, finally got a chance to shine and I’m glad I stuck it out to get to that point, even if it was a long time coming. Sesily and Caleb truly met each other halfway in the end and I’ll never not be a sucker for a couple who works together as a real team to fight some sort of outside force. For me, the first 60-65% of this book was very much not working, but the last 30% or so of the story saved this book for me and I will look forward to the next book in the series.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/4009835055
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3847315973
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