Regency Christmas Courtship [Paperback]

I've been disappointed with the last couple of Signet Christmas Regency Anthologies but this year's offering was more in keeping with past standards.

Barbara Metzger led the way. A young, impoverished woman, Margaret Todd, works as a companion to a selfish elderly lady. As Christmas approaches she endeavours to shelter her two orphaned nieces in the empty house of Viscount Wolfram next door. The two nieces, believing that their aunt and the viscount would make an ideal pair of new parents, consult George E Phelber's "A Gentleman's Guide to Courtship" for guidance on how to get them together. If I've not missed the joke, George Felber is Edith Layton's husband!!

In Edith Layton's story, a magical puppy becomes the means of bringing together an impoverished governess and an haughty viscount. When the seven year old Marquess of Grenville comes to London to spend his holiday with the governess, the stray puppy he has acquired gradually becomes the deus ex machina in a gradually unfolding love match.

Andrea Picken's offering was my least favourite in this collection. She writes of a diplomat and a Russian heiress trapped in the snow in a road/cabin romance. Although others had sought to make a match between them, they were unaware of the identities of their intended one so blissfully fall in love. I found, however, I could not warm to the story or the characters and the whole thing was a little boring. I struggled to keep my mind on it.

Nancy Butler's contribution was the story of a bluestocking who has lived in London for some time. Finding it necessary to spend some time in the country, she meets up with a somewhat rough and ready Welshman and falls in love with him. Unfortunately, this story was also a bit contrived and I could not garner too much interest in the characters or their predicament.

The final offering was from Gayle Buck. I admit that despite reading widely in the Regency genre, I've never read anything by this author. I was very pleasantly surprised. Her story is about the marriage of two young people who don't really know each other very well and have, as a result, kept each other at arm's length in the formal way common at the time. This is a very well done picture of two people shedding inhibitions and confronting their feelings for each other in a very realistic and touching way. I thought this was better than the Layton or Metzger stories - something that surprised me enormously. I shall be looking out for more works by Gayle Buck.

All in all, this is a good read and I can recommend it.

I enjoyed all of the stories - except one, which I didn't even read. Edith Layton's story "The Dogstar" is the second of a series of stories about some very special puppies. The first was published several years ago in another Christmas Regency collection under the title "The Hounds of Heaven". The other four stories were good reads. Yes, the story about the Russian woman was a bit contrived, but it was fun!

As previously mentioned by other reviewers, I found the writing of Barbara Metzger and Edith Layton very enjoyable. I didn't like the plots of the stories written by Andrea Pickens or Nancy Butler; however, the most unrealistic/believable story written by Gayle Buck was a complete and total disappointment. Not only did her references to my lady and my lord in conversations between husband and wife sound more like they were speaking to servants, but there were a few mistakes with regard to social etiquette; an example: Lord Hallcroft crosses his legs during a visit with his Aunt in the presence of both his Aunt and his wife. Proper etiquette during that time did not permit a gentleman to cross his legs. Ms. Buck's attempt at being overly formal in the story also did not work for me . . . came across as boring.

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