And I may or may not have ordered the books in her next series. Let's not talk about that right now.
SPOILER McSPOILER WARNING ABOUT SPOILERS. This review contains information about the ending of the Four Soldiers series and details that you may or may not want to be a surprise. The book is two years old, though, and you can get most of the spoilerage by reading the book description. Consider yourself warned.
So throughout the Legend of the Four Soldiers there have really only been three soldiers that we're aware of. There's Samuel Hartley, Lord Vale, and Alistair Munroe. "Who," we think to ourselves, "Can the fourth book possibly be about?"
How about Reynaud St. Aubyn, the very reason Samuel Hartley comes to England to seek out his Emmeline in book one (you'll recall, perhaps, that Reynaud is her brother), the thought of whom torments the Spinners Falls survivors the most. Lord Vale especially, has vivid memories of his childhood friend being crucified and burned alive.
Which is a slight problem. In all three previous books, the three men speak with black-and-white certainty about the fact that they saw Reynaud crucified and burned alive (after he was tortured). There's no hesitation. They saw him. Until book four, when they saw a man whose face had already been burned beyond recognition, a man they had been told was Reynaud.
I don't have a problem with this. I want a book Reynaud, and I want everything to come together. I just need to say that there's a definite weakness in the thread.
Reynaud was indeed taken hostage by the natives in the Spinners Falls incident, was indeed dragged off to be a slave (with potential to be crucified later on) but managed, through sheer force of luck, to just get tortured a lot. He eventually escapes captivity and manages to get home, only to stumble directly into the new Earl of Blanchard's political tea.
The new Earl is a distant cousin of Reynaud's who inherited the title after Reynaud's father died (following Reynaud's supposed fatality on the American frontier). He now lives in the Blanchard townhouse with his lovely niece, Beatrice.
Because of course he has a lovely niece named Beatrice. And of course Beatrice has spent so much time gazing longingly at the portrait of Reynaud in the study that she knows exactly who he is when he bursts into the party, all hairy and emaciated. And of course the two become enamored of each other pretty instantly.
Their relationship is a lot rawer than the others, because Reynaud himself is rawer- just barely this side of civilized after having spent so long fending for himself in the wilderness. I would classify this as the most "traditional" romance of the four. Beatrice is all virginal and headstrong, and Reynaud is all chest-thumpy-while-growling "mine." All the time. This is not a bad thing (I do like me some chest-thumping), but I do find it surprising, considering how "real" and "different" the relationships were in the previous three books.
Reynaud's return triggers a series of events that culminates in the discovery of the traitor who sold them out at Spinners Falls. I'm not going to spoil this, but it's because I almost don't care. I mean, I do care. I invested time in these books and I enjoyed the hell out of them. But to me the point isn't who committed this fictional crime. It's about the characters and how they fit and come together. It's about new and different characters and stories, and it's about the fact that I have a new auto-buy historical author.
I have more to say about this series, but I'm going to save it for an Obsessed. Be prepared.
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