Lara Temple Archives - Proud Book Reviews

December 26, 2022December 26, 2022

The Wrong Way to Catch a Rake – Lara Temple

This book contains:

Mentions and depictions of theft
Descriptions of espionage.

Phoebe and Dom are vastly different characters, and yet still so similar and complementary.

Phoebe is a quiet, contained, but not demure woman in a man’s world. Given her family history, she has every right to feel the way she does, and she’s doing the best she can to make her place in the world, but it’s hard. She spends her days with her aunt working towards the political gain of her home country, but it takes up all her life and there’s no room for anything else.

Dom, however, is the heir to a Dukedom, a drunk and a rake by all accounts. He spends his days sleeping and his nights drinking, gambling and carousing with women. So very different to Phoebe, yet their end goals are remarkably similar.

Phoebe and Dom are currently living in Venice, in very different ways. Phoebe is spending her time as her aunt’s companion and exploring the city while apparently trying to figure out some espionage related activities. On the other hand, Dom spends his time drinking, gambling and whoring his way through life appearing to do and achieve nothing.

As Phoebe and Dom get to know each other, they realise there’s more to each other, and yet they can’t quite place it together until someone else prompts those thoughts to connect and then everything changes.

This was the first regency romance I’ve read in quite some time, and it came right as I knew I needed my fix. While it didn’t have as much of the ballroom kinda stuff, you’d expect in a regency romance, it had plenty of the chivalry, politeness, class differences and of course, the differences in what the two sexes are allowed to do.

I think the best part for me though, was trying to figure out when they’d figure out each other. The constant questioning how it’s going to connect, what they’ll do with that connection and everything else is what made it so thrilling for me.

While not your classically great regency romance, I enjoyed it all the same. And I hope you can find the same weird little thrill.

April 28, 2022June 4, 2022

The Earl She Should Never Desire – Lara Temple

This book contains:

Emotional results of war
Descriptions of the death of a husband, mother and child
Family disputes.

Lily left home when she was barely old enough to be married and eloped with her husband to Greta Green. Since their families disapproved of their union, they ran away and joined the war effort, during which Lily had and lost a child before then losing her husband on the battlefield. After her husband dies, Lily returns home to Manchester to find work and try and live her life without her mother’s disappointment and disapproval constantly interfering.

Marcus promised his mother he would find himself a wife to become his countess and continue the family lineage and sets out to find the perfect bride. This search leads him to Lily’s sister as someone he can get along with, produce heirs and not hate his life. That’s all he’s asking for in a wife.

Lily’s younger sister is engaged and begging her to some to London to meet her fiancé and be there for her wedding. Despite her reservations, Lily travels to London and endures her mother’s wrath to be there for her younger sister.

When Marcus meets Lily, he’s instantly drawn to her despite his betrothal to her younger sister and somehow finds ways time and again to protect her and help her bear her mother’s antics. He even helps her when the after-effects of seeing war grips her tightly and she’s frozen.

Lara Temple’s regency romances have always drawn me in. The way she’s able to tell a story where the characters emotionally struggle and yet you feel like you’re struggling with the characters, and you want to help them is amazing. While we never have to fear a cheating situation happening, you still find yourself wishing they could hurry up and find a way to be together.

I read this in like the space of two days in amongst chores and uni work and the whole time I just wanted to go back to reading this because it was so good!

Author Bio

Lara Temple writes strong and sensual Regency romances about complex individuals who give no quarter but do so with plenty of passion. She lives with her husband, two children, and one very fluffy dog and they are all very understanding about her taking over the kitchen table so she can look out over the garden as she writes and dreams up her Happy Ever Afters.

January 18, 2021January 16, 2021

A Match for the Rebellious Earl – Lara Temple

Thank you Lara for reaching out to me to review this. You remembered I loved Return of the Disappearing Duke, and I’m so thankful you thought of me to review this for you.

Throughout the book we swap between Kit Carrington (the new Lord Westford) and Genny Maitland’s perspectives. Both characters met when Genny travelled with her grandfather’s army regiment several years earlier, however, were never close and weren’t in contact once they separated ways.

Kit is reluctant to take the mantle of Lord Westford, especially because of how his cousins treated him. The only reason he’s back is because his half-sister is getting married and she wants him there. His plan is to sort out the family business, attend his sister’s wedding and set sail again! Genny is in a different position. With no family, her sister’s dead husband left them with a lot of debt and no way to support themselves. On top of that, they’re stuck living with Kit’s horrible grandmother who torments them every chance she gets.

Genny is trying to find a way to clear her sister’s husbands’ debts and find a new life for them, free from the Dowager Westford. To get what she wants she uses the skills her grandfather nurtured to form alliances and manipulate people and situations to achieve everyone’s goals.

One such alliance is with Kit, the goal of which is to find suitable husbands for Genny’s sister and Kit’s step-mum. While working with Kit to organise everything to her liking, they discover their attraction to each other. As they execute each part of their plan, they’re fighting their attraction for each other, without letting anyone realise what’s happening.

I’m a fan of Lara’s works and always enjoy a story with a strong female lead. Throughout this story I was left wondering how they’d get their happily ever after. They fought it every step of the way, which for some reason made me all the more determined that they should get it!

I got so invested in their relationship that I found myself stressing that maybe this would be the book where they didn’t get a happily ever after.

The fact that in the end, it was Kit’s maturity that helped them bridge the gap and move forward was awesome. The fact that you could tell how nervous he was, how he didn’t want to risk his heart but at the same time knew he had to put himself out there, it made that moment so much more believable.

All their interactions leading up to that moment allowed it to feel so much more alive and real. Every time they’d come close to maybe admitting their feeling one or both had shied away. So that moment where they both finally put it all on the table had me cheering them on.

August 30, 2020February 1, 2021

The Return of the Disappearing Duke – Lara Temple

Welcome back everyone, you know that feeling when you start a book and realise it’s a sequel, yet can’t figure out to what? Yea I had that with this one.

Within like 2 pages I knew this was a sequel to another book I’d read. Yet when I looked through all of Lara Temple’s books on Goodread’s that I’ve read I should figure it out based on the series names.

After a quick email to Rachel I figured it follows the Sinful Sinclairs but I’m still not sure if it’s meant to be part of that series or not since there was barely a Sinclair in this one.

If you are a fan of reading a series books in order you’ll find this one slightly annoying since most of it is set before The Lord’s Inconvenient Vow, yet if you tried to read this first you’d just spoil some of the good things in that. So please don’t read this one first!

The way Cleo is treated by others and how she acts in response felt authentic to me, mostly because she often pretends to be a man in order to go about doing things that women can’t otherwise do. She even made a comment about how much easier it is to be a man. A sentiment I don’t think has changed too much in all these years for many women.

The slow development between them was such a bonus. It wasn’t something that happened too quickly, they respected when the other didn’t feel the same. I mean, Rafe was in touch with his emotions enough to actually clear up the misunderstanding between them!

That is a rare man that can do that without even realising it!

I loved every minute of this book and easily finished it within a few days.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this review; on Friday I’ll be reviewing Hopeful Hearts at Glendale Hall by Victoria Walters. Continue to read further down to find out about the author and any extra giveaways available.

Author Bio

November 1, 2019February 2, 2021

The Lord’s Inconvenient Vow – Lara Temple

Welcome back everyone, after finishing up another month we have just two more left to the year. What a year it’s been! I’m pretty sure this is one of the last, if not the last, regency/historical romance I’ll read this year.

Unless of course I give in to my cravings and read another one anyway!

I’ve read a couple of Lara Temple books since I first started blogging, unfortunately I missed out on the second book of this series. Which I think contributed to me finding it hard to connect the first book, The Earl’s Irresistible Challenge, to this story.

I found myself constantly looking back and trying to remember if the first book mentioned a little sister. If it mentioned time in Egypt. If it mentioned the family dynamic. Because I honestly couldn’t remember it.

In typical Lara Temple style, I found myself drawn into the characters. Although there were a few concerns about how quickly they got together, how they reunited etc that really bugged me. I was completely drawn into the adventure of the story.

Yet I was still left lacking in the emotional build up. Yes, I got the connection and the drama. But it’s not the same as the build up over several chapters. If not, most of a book.

Yes, of course the HEA ending really did suck me in But I felt like I was missing a little something in the meantime.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this review, next week I will be reviewing A Christmas Kiss by Eliza J Scott. Continue to read further down to find out about the author and any extra giveaways available.

Author Bio

Lara Temple writes regency romances about complex individuals who give no quarter but do so with plenty of passion.

After moving around the world as a financial analyst she returned to her childhood love of making up stories, and was surprised to discover that other people don’t mind reading them. She lives with her husband, two children, and Lord Oscar the pooch who are all very forgiving about her taking over the kitchen table when she’s writing.

January 25, 2019February 3, 2021

The Earl’s Irresistible Challenge – Lara Temple

The Earl's Irrestiable Challenge Tour Banner

Welcome back everyone, I hope you enjoyed my review of a towns struggle while two lost loves found each other again. This week’s book is one of those classic regency romances that just draws you in with its female empowerment.

Writing Style

The overall writing style for this one felt really cohesive and like the author had planned out each phase of the book before actually writing it as a whole. The rushing to get the couple together and happy that sometimes occurs didn’t happen. You could see moments throughout the book where both characters could feel and accept that their relationship was changing.

Although the author didn’t describe the surroundings much, they did focus on the characters emotional and physical responses to each other. I felt like I could truly see Lord Sinclair intimidating Miss Silverdale when they first met. Whenever they were having a moment, I could imagine what their expressions looked like, right down to how they held their body in that moment.

First Impressions

To begin with I was confused as to how this could be a romance given Lord Sinclair was doing everything he could to avoid being around Miss Silverdale. Also, Miss Silverdale was adamant that he was arrogant, among other not so nice descriptions, so it didn’t seem like someone so self sufficient and forward thinking could possibly want to be with someone like that.

That soon changed when I realised that this was because they had yet to spend enough time together to really start to click. I will admit I was reading this initially when I was REALLY stressed and reading it in like 2-5-minute intervals. So, I probably should have realised this sooner. But you know, when you get caught up in other things you don’t necessarily notice things properly or think straight.

Final Thoughts

I’m glad the author didn’t rush the romantic connection. And I was surprised at when and how Lord Sinclair decided to propose to Miss Silverdale. But that was a good thing. How many of these regency romances do you read when you know the exact moment the realisation of a proposal is coming?

So, the fact I didn’t know made me re-think a few other things I thought were going to happen. And yet again I was still surprised! I love it when a book can have that predictable feel but then throw a curve ball at you when you’re least expecting it. Given the genre this book is in that’s kinda hard to do! So kudos to the author for still managing to surprise me! I hope you do this with all your books!

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this review, tomorrow, that’s right! Tomorrow I will be reviewing An Unconventional Affair Book 2 by Mollie Blake.

If you liked her first book be sure to tune in tomorrow for my review of her second book! But FIRST! Continue reading for info on today’s author.

Author Bio

Lara Temple writes strong, sexy regency romances
about complex individuals who give no quarter but do so with plenty of passion.
After moving around the world for her career as a financial analyst and
business consultant she returned to her childhood love of making up stories,
and was surprised to discover that other people don’t mind reading them.

She lives with her husband and two children who are very good about her taking over the kitchen table for her writing (so she can look out over the garden and dream while Oscar the dog keeps her feet warm by sitting on them as she works).

The Earl’s Irresistible Challenge (out December 2018) is the first in her Sinful Sinclair series. In May 2019 Unlaced by the Highland Duke, part of a four book series with three other Harlequin Mills & Boon authors will be released.