It feels like it's been forever since I've posted (that might be to do with the fact that I haven't posted in FOREVER...oops!), but I've been busy and distracted with other projects. Those include: writing my MA thesis (done, signed, published!); editing My Summer with Gatsby; working on my current WIP called Boats Against the Current (the sequel to MSWG); learning how to three day eventing with my pony, Jet; and playing farm wife on the ranch with Hubster.
We've also experienced a pretty huge paradigm shift around here in regards to our stance and plan for fertility treatment (I'll write more about that later, but for now, you can get an idea by reading this post), and Hubster and I are gearing up for a trip to Salt Lake to consult with an Endometriosis Specialist next month.
All that being said: it's been rockin' here around the ranch!
But one of the best parts of finishing my Master's Degree Thesis is that my schedule has opened way up for reading! Yes, that's right--I am done reading specifically for classes, so that's given me SO MUCH TIME to read for pleasure since my thesis defense in April.
Since then, I've discovered a new series that I ABSOLUTELY ADORE. Seriously. I can't believe I haven't been reading this series all along.
Rhys Bowen, a nom de plume for British author Janet Quin-Harkin, is the writer of wonderfully clever mystery stories, and writes the Her Royal Spyness series, which I am currently obsessed with. She also writes a few other series that I haven't read yet, but have heard good things about: Molly Murphy Series, the Evan Evans Series, and the Red Dragon Academy. Plus she just released a stand-alone historical fiction novel, In Farleigh Field, which I cannot wait to read. My grandpa (who is notoriously hard on women authors...to which I always say "Grandpa, I'm a woman author!) picked up a copy of In Farleigh Field recently and called to tell me how much he loved it, so I knew I had to start reading this author.I downloaded the first novel in the series, called Her Royal Spyness, as an audiobook, listened to it voraciously, and immediately downloaded the second, called A Royal Pain. Now I am on the third book, called Royal Flush, and it has not disappointed!
Her Royal Spyness opens in Britain, 1932, and follows minor Royal Lady Georgiana Rannoch (34th in line to the throne), who has been educated to be a lady and marry an eligible bachelor. But since her late father lost the family fortune in America's 1929 Stock Market Crash, leaving her older brother (now the Duke) to pay death duties and live on the family estate in Scotland with next to no money, Georgie is left to find her own way in the world. Determined to make a life for herself that doesn't include A. marrying a rich man she doesn't like, B. marrying a horrible Prince from Romania, or C. being shipped off to act as Lady-in-Waiting to an elderly princess deep in the countryside, Georgie stumbles along in London (literally and figuratively), making friends and enemies as she goes. But in the end, she is called on by Her Royal Highness the Queen to spy on her cousin, David, the Princess of Wales, while he carries on an affair with American Wallis Simpson. Then, in the middle of trying to learn to make tea and build a fire, Georgie finds a gambler murdered in the bathtub upstairs at her family home in London. Then, her brother is arrested for that murder. THEN, Georgie realizes that someone has been making attempts on her own life (she had chalked it up to clumsiness until now), and is determined to solve the mystery and save her brother from being hung (by a silken rope, obviously, since they're royalty).
Georgie's antics are hilarious, and Bowen's mystery is cleverly written and moves along at a great pace. The second and third novels have proven to be the same, and I am so stoked about that, because there are ELEVEN of these books, the most recent of which will be released next month. That means that Bowen is still going strong on the series, so the fun will be ongoing.
This series has a special place in my heart now too, because the queens initial request that Georgie spy on the Prince of Wales as he courts Wallis Simpson means that this series will be working up towards that famous historical incident: the Abdication just before World War II. I love this time in British history, because it was so rife with social change and shifts in the class structure. And on a side note, if the Abdication interests you, check out Juliet Nicolson's novel Abdication, or this fascination biography of Wallis Simpson, written by Anna Sebba titled That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor. I found both to be interesting reads.
I am so excited to continue to gobble up this excellent series (and the reader for the audiobooks, Katherine Kellgren, is excellent, so if you need a listen for a roadtrip, check it out), and I have a copy of In Farleigh Field waiting for me on the to-read pile in my bedroom.
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