Elaine White's Life in Books

** This review is copied word-for-word from my review of The Crofton Chronicles bundle. **

Stately Passions
Book 1: Saving Crofton Hall
A Crofton Hall Novel
Length: 70-99%
POV: 3rd person, dual character
Star rating: ★★★★☆

Okay, so I have to say that while I loved this one, it really would have been better as a stand-alone accompanying novel, NOT as part of this bundle. Because, personally, I cried and my heart ached and I was completely in love with the ending to book 3 within the historical era. Reading this one stole that happy, crying, wistful mood and left me feeling a little flatter than before. The ending of book 3 was PERFECT. And it really should have been left to be the ending, with the Stately Passions book(s) as a completely separate companion series. Putting them together just ruined the magic.

Saying that, I did enjoy it. Ben is an amazing mix of Anthony and Sebastian's personality traits that it was an easy slide from reading about them to reading about Ben. It felt comfortable and almost-familiar to go from Sebastian's POV to Ben's. He's as feisty as Anthony, but with that level-headed control and quick tempter of Sebastian.

This is also the first book that is dual POV, which is a chance, but not necessarily a bad one. However, I'm not entirely sure that it was needed in places, because we often say things in say Ashley's POV that were later explored and/or explained in Ben's, meaning that we didn't have to see it first hand if we were going to be discussing it at length later or vice versa.

It also felt really long to read. I mean I read it in an afternoon, so it's not that long realistically, but it felt like it dragged on, whereas I felt like I flew through the previous books. This could be because there's not a lot happening in this book beyond the romance. There's the Ben and Ashley romance storyline, plus the background story that kicks it all off of Ben's mother putting them in financial difficulties. However, other than that, nothing really happens in between and there were times when the story dragged or flagged because of that. There was none of the drama or excitement that the historical books had, for sure.

I was a bit disappointed about the ending. Sebastian would have turned in his grave if he knew what they'd done with that folio, which goes against everything he and Anthony stood for. While I get the logical side of it, the artist in me was screaming the whole time and wishing that some other plot arc had crept in to surprise us with another option. The implication that I understood was that this was the incomplete play that Shakespeare had written for Sebastian about his life with Anthony and that it makes it even more of a travesty to have to sell it, placing it in the care of someone outside of Crofton Hall. It just felt like it wasn't properly appreciated by Ben or Anthony, who I thought would have been more eager to find a way around keeping it while getting the money to save the Hall.

At the same time, I was disappointed in the ending because it left a lot unanswered. It didn't tell us whether they actually sold it and saved the Hall or not. It didn't tell us whether the exhumed Sebastian and Anthony's bodies to prove they'd been buried together as husband and wife. It left a lot to the imagination, that I presume will be told in future stories. However, it's the only one in this bundle so far to leave us with questions unanswered and plot arcs unexplored, so that was disappointing.

I also got a little annoyed at the constant use of “cut him up” or “cut up” in terms of the driving, because this isn't the proper saying. It's “cut him off” or “cut off”, whereas the author's use has a completely different and much more sinister meaning. I have to take this as a misinterpretation or misunderstanding of the saying, as it happens too frequently to be an editing mistake. Maybe it's a thing in England, but I live in Scotland and I have never ever heard of this version.

I loved seeing the familiar names popping up and the hints that led back to the historical novels; e.g. The Duchess of Marchent, the play of Macbeth, even how alike that they were to the previous cast, as Catlin was the spitting image of Bronwyn and Ben and Ashley both had equal traits to Sebastian and Anthony.

Overall, while it was a fun contemporary romance and I'll be interested to read the rest of the series, it didn't grab my hear the way the historical novels did. I wouldn't be rushing to buy this in paperback, the way I feel with the historical stories. This one was less dramatic, less exciting and much slower to get through, completely stealing the perfect ending of book 3 and leaving me with a feeling of disappointment that wouldn't have been there had this story not been included in the bundle.

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Favourite Quote

““Have you ever thought what I actually want? Maybe I do want a night where someone would cook me dinner, read to me in the bath, and cuddle up without expecting anything in return. But that's not the real world, Catlin. People look at me and see the earl, not the man.””

““When you kiss me, do you feel like you're seeing stars?”
Adam scowled. “What are you on about? Of course I bloody don't.”
“And there's the problem.”
He walked away, determined not to look back, and his traitorous mind suggested that if Ben Redbourn were to kiss him, it'd be like crashing headlong through a supernova.”

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