I found this story delightful. Class difference, a little bit grumpy/sunshine. I was absorbed in the story, and laughing, and it was sweet, and the characters and events made sense. I'm very pleased. ( )

Usually, I get bored with 1800s British stratified social intrigue.

But Jack is such a guarded shit, and Oliver is such a dorky wounded soldier, I was captured. As they figure out what to do with this attraction between them, they also deal with said social boundaries in satisfying ways.

I don't know how "realistic" this is historically. I'm not a historian. I accept the "magical" parts of the sex, too, so there you go. There is detail in their emotional learning curves and detail in the settings, I enjoyed the other characters, and the plot. So, all the stars. ( )

Nov 2021 - Jack Turner, private eye and fixer, and Oliver Rivington, former officer in the British army and injured war veteran. From different social strata. They fall in love, in spite of Jack's fierce resistance.

What narrator Gary Furlong lends to this story elevates it to a gorgeous romance.

He gives the larrikin, fiesty Jack and the gentle, honourable Oliver such appropriate voices - he voices all the characters perfectly. I'll definitely be looking out for more novels read by him.

(Later - Sep 2023) I've picked up this to read again, not sure if I had read it, nearly two years later. It's a wonderful novel, I've finished the whole thing in a day or two. At the same time as I hear the narration I remember hearing it before - it seems evidence of how well I listened, and how good Cat Sebastian is at spinning her tales.

...the way she builds tension and develops the relationship between Oliver and Jack, two misfits where being found out as gay is the overriding pressure in their lives - in Regency England. Their lives are a catalogue of steps to help them stave off the loneliness of being outsiders.

Strange to say, what with the praise I gave Gary Furlong two years ago, I had forgotten his name and I wonder if I have read much narrated by him since? Even stranger is that these days I mostly choose what to read next by narrator, not author or series. So it was worth picking up this book again if only to be reminded of Gary Furlong's name. ( )

I'm a big fan of historical romance when it has excellent characters. Delighted to find a new series to love. ( )

My first Cat Sebastian novel, and her debut as well! Can't say I'm unimpressed. I'll definitely be reading more of her work.

At times this book was hilarious, at others witty and smart, and other times introspective. I had a great sense of Jack and Oliver's characters, without an excess of exposition, and how they viewed things from opposite perspectives most of the time. It was most fun when they were riling each other up just to get under each other's skin. It was easy to see how they grew to like each other too, the chemistry was definitely there.

Overall, it was a quiet little story where the mystery plot didn't matter so much and the romance developed at a somewhat medium pace, but it was an enjoyable and easy read. ( )