This was a miss for me. I didn't care for the characters, I struggled to care about any of it at all really. And I didn't believe their developing feelings, it felt like just some lust. And the heroine was a bit dim. Disappointing. ( )

Shana Galen has done a marvelous job of describing the danger and terror of Revolutionary France. This is not some light ballroom romance it is a dark, look into how scary it was to be in Paris at this time. Even worse, if you are an English citizen trying to help the Scarlet Pimpernel save French Aristocrats from the guillotine.
Gabrielle is a Vicountess who has been widowed and left not only penniless but deep in debt due to her husband's gambling. She has been stealing to pay off his debts and now has been recruited to go to Paris to help save a woman and child. Her husband's friend Ramsay is a commoner who people think is an Earl. he steals to pay off a blackmailer. Together, they go to Paris, with different goals but end up working together to steal a famous bracelet that will bribe a guard to let the prisoners free.
Needless to say, they are caught up in the terror but still manage to find time for love.
IF this is the first book in the series, I can't wait to read the rest of this series. ( )

Even though I’d read only one of Galen’s books, Sapphires are an Earl’s Best Friend, I knew I was in for a treat.

I know a book has been successful in teaching me something when I highlight certain terms and later look them up. Author Shana Galen has done her homework about the Reign of Terror. She paints an accurate and bleak picture of the life of its nobility, or perhaps better said, the destruction of it.

The guillotine was a despicable killing machine. In Paris alone, it is estimated between 2,600 to 3,000 people were beheaded by Madame Guillotine. An estimate of 17,000 people throughout France were beheaded, or as the people would say, so-and-so ‘sneezed into the basket’ or ‘poking through the window’. These terms are used in the story and they are historically accurate.

Scarlet Pimpernell is very much part of this story. I’m not sure he actually existed, but there is a novel written by Baroness Orczy, published in 1905 who speaks of an Englishman who rescues aristocrats from Madame Guillotine. Perhaps, he is legend. But in this story, he’s real.

I was transported to the fear and terror of that time. I could smell the people and filth of the streets, catacombs and sewers. I could feel the hatred of the common people for the gentry who represented the reason they had almost nothing.

With this backdrop, Lady Gabrielle McCullough, an English woman is also living in a situation she needs to escape. Her dead husband left her in debt and the creditors are demanding their due. She takes up thieving and is rather good at it. When she thinks she’s obtained a highly valued piece of jewelry, it is stolen from her by the only man who has had her heart flutter, Earl of Sedgwick.

The situation is quite comical even though it’s dangerous. Sedgwick is also a rather accomplished thief. It appears he has troubles of his own. He’s being blackmailed and needs the item to keep his secret, secret.

Sedgwick has always liked Gabrielle. In his own way, Sedgwick is honorable. I really enjoy this character. He’s honorable, yet is driven to do dishonorable things. In that direction, he accompanies Gabrielle to France. She’s there to save two aristocrats, a duke’s wife and daughter, a request by the duke and Scarlet Pimpernel himself. She must acquire a precious and most difficult-to-procure jewel for a warden in the prison, who then has promised to release the woman and child. But has she jumped from the frying pan in England into the fire in France?

In such a climate the streets were not safe. Gabrielle is relieved to have Sedgwick along. He has told her he isn’t trust worthy. So at what point does she find he may be trusted? This trip to France has not only changed the hero and heroine, it has given me a true insight into this catastrophic time in history.

I loved how the story began—with a scene we eventually get to with the telling of the tale. Galen repeated the scene. With the acquired backstory, the scene is now fully emotional and dreadful for me, making me amazingly sympathic. Excellent writing.

I liked the extremes of the story. Side-by-side, I experienced the evil of man, done out of revenge, the good of man to help people from certain death, the greed of man to better himself, and the selflessness of others.

Needless, to say, I love the way the events and environment were portrayed through Gabrielle and Ramsey’s journey. They were flawed, Ramsey more so than Gabrielle, yet noble in their actions. Can Gabrielle forgive Ramsey’s duplicity?

Galen keeps the story running at a fast clip. I was totally engaged with it all. The overall arc of the story is spot-on. I could not be more pleased with this read.

A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book and my comments here are my honest opinion. ( )

Paris in the revolution!

The opening scenes are gritty and vivid, laced with a certain amount of gallows humour. Lady Gabrielle McCullough is in a tumbrel in Paris rumbling over cobblestones, having had her hair slashed off in readiness to meet Madame la Guillotine, and surrounded by crowds screaming for yet more beheadings. Yes! This new series has us smack in the middle of Paris at the time of the French Revolution. The scenes of gore and crowds howling for blood, the sansculotte, Robespierre, even Fouché, is here. Above all, the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel is in the background moving people around, directing the rescue of aristocrats and others, always within a whisker of being discovered.
The action then retreats to how Gabrielle has arrived at this state. It seems that upon being widowed Gabrielle found herself responsible for her husband's considerable gambling debts. Debts owed to a very nasty man. To keep herself afloat, Gabrielle has taken to stealing antiquities. In the middle of appropriating an Egyptian necklace aGabrielle is surprised by her husband's best friend, Ramsay, the Earl of Sedgwick. Ramsay is being blackmailed by a mysterious woman (who seemingly has informants everywhere), into doing various tasks for her in order to regain important papers she has about him. The scene of Gabrielle and Ramsay's meeting in the darkened room is both amusing and tense. The results, interesting.
When Gabrielle is approached by the Pimpernel in London to rescue a French countess from a Paris prison, Gabrielle agrees.
Imagine her surprise when she finds Ramsay making another appearance in her life, bound for Paris on the same ship as herself. Trust goes out the window, even as sensuality rushes in. And the dark dangers of Paris await. Little does Gabrielle know that Ramsay needs to discover the Pimpernel's identity, and that Gabrielle is to be that conduit.
What is so fascinating about this story by Galen is the tension generated between what Gabrielle and Ramsay are forced into doing, the dangers they find themselves in, their conscience or lack thereof, and the undeniable chemistry between them, all set against a particularly bloody and horrendous time in French history.
In the meantime we are treated to an interesting array of secondary characters, some of whom I'm sure we will meet in the future.

A NetGalley ARC ( )

I was happy to be invited to read an ARC of this book as I’ve very much enjoyed Shana Galen's other books. The story takes place in England and France at the time of the French Revolution, and brings back fond memories of reading a Tale of Two Cities. I stayed up very late reading this book because I could not go to sleep and leave Gabrielle and Ramsey in peril. The heroine Gabrielle, Lady McCullough is the widow of a friend of Ramsey, Lord Sedgwick who is both more and less than one would imagine. They meet again while they are both attempting to steal a famous jewel, Gabrielle to pay off her husbands debts and Ramsey to satisfy the demands of his blackmailer. The story is a lovely amalgam of daring rescues, perilous times, passion, betrayals and of course true love. I do hope that there will be a story for Alex Martin as well. ( )