2020 romantic fantasy, seventh and last of its loose series. Vivian
Porter's inquiry agency is humming along, so she does a favour for a
friend by looking into strange goings-on at a boarding house outside
Oxford.
I think this may be the least romancey of the series so far.
Vivian is something other than human, and present under false
pretences; and Cadmus Michaels has quite enough to deal with in his
trauma from the Colonial Service, a parlous financial situation, and
various other problems, without worrying about breaking his
confirmed-bachelor habits.
Perhaps there isn't quite the same sense of destined connection as in
some romances; they've grown to like and trust each other, certainly,
but I don't find that as directly cognate with romantic love as they
apparently do. (How terrible it would be to have only one member of
the opposite sex – there are homosexual characters in these books, but
none of the protagonists yet – with whom one could have a proper
conversation!)
The usual odd Lake dialogue is present here as always, but the balance
of the story is plot over romance, which is rather unexpected having
read her others. It works, though, and I like to be surprised a bit.
There's also quite a bit of how things go wrong when humans mess with
non-human magic, not through malice, simply because they aren't
equipped for it.
I'm glad to see that these books aren't falling into formula beyond
what's necessary for them to be romances at all.
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