Earls Trip by Jenny Holiday Published by Kensington Books on April 23, 2024
Genres: Fiction / Romance / Historical / Regency, Fiction / Romance / Romantic Comedy, Fiction / World Literature / England / 19th Century
Pages: 336
Format: Paperback
Source: Library
Buy on Amazon
AS SEEN ON THE TODAY SHOW!
"This is a witty, charming, character-driven story that is honestly one of the best historical romances I’ve read in years." —Julia Quinn, bestselling author of the Bridgerton novels on the TODAY Show
Ted Lasso meets Bridgerton for a 19th century spin on The Hangover in USA Today bestselling author Jenny Holiday’s laugh-out-loud bromantic comedy featuring three Regency-era Earls on their annual trip – ride-or-die buddies offering one another unconditional support in everything from Lady problems to family woes.
From the author of CANADIAN BOYFRIEND, the perfect romp for fans of Evie Dunmore, India Holton, Virginia Heath, Manda Collins, and Suzanne Allain!
Even an earl needs his ride-or-dies, and Archibald Fielding-Burton, the Earl of Harcourt, counts himself lucky to have two. The annual trip that Archie takes with his BFFs Simon and Effie holds a sacred spot in their calendars. This year Archie is especially eager to get away until an urgent letter arrives from an old family friend, begging him to help prevent a ruinous scandal. Suddenly the trip has become earls-plus-girls, as Archie’s childhood pals, Clementine and Olive Morgan, are rescued en route to Gretna Green.
This…complicates matters. The fully grown Clementine, while as frank and refreshing as he remembers, is also different to the wild, windswept girl he knew. This Clem is complex and surprising—and adamantly opposed to marriage. Which, for reasons Archie dare not examine too closely, he finds increasingly vexing.
Then Clem makes him an indecent and quite delightful proposal, asking him to show her the pleasures of the marriage bed before she settles into spinsterhood. And what kind of gentleman would he be to refuse a lady?
In addition to arcs and influenced purchases, I also am a sucker for the library. And not just the treasure trove waiting for me to check out to my ebook reader, but the delicious, delightful display of glossy new titles prominently eye-catching and ready for me to snap up and add to my ridiculous TBR stack.
I am disappointingly unpredictable in churning out reviews, mostly because – life. Regency Reader is a passion project, which means I sneak in the research and writing in my dwindling down time, assisted by my webmaster who is equally spread too thin. This is all to say that I will be on a bit of a slow response journey through December (a post will be forthcoming), but I do plan to release a flurry of book reviews to get you started (or finished) on your GoodReads book body count (or Storygraph, which I am migrating to). And in approximately six months time, I will also share some exciting news which will account for some of that lack of down time.
But I digress. Because I want to talk about this pretty pink novel I snapped up on my latest visit to the library, Jenny Holiday’s Earls Trip.
Jenny Holiday was new to me, and I am admittedly skeptical about a cartoon cover, but the back looked intriguing and I do love a good no-strings-attached-lessons-in-love trope. And the cover is beautiful, if trendy, and the title cute in just the right, soapy rom com way.
There is a lot of action in what is likely meant to be the keep-them-in-stitches rom com path, although maybe my funny bone is not in tune. I mean, I liked the action and was entertained, but I didn’t laugh and found the first half, such as it is, so exposition-heavy that it felt a bit of a slog.
I don’t think that will be every reader’s experience.
There is a lot to like about the book. Focus on found family (although that comes with some mentions of childhood trauma/abandonment), unveiling your own pride/prejudice (especially about siblings), and sex positivity. There is also the introduction of vegetarianism, although to be fair it would have been called, during the Regency era, the vegetable regimen diet and less developed than it would be by the Victorian era. So there was some research/historical misses but let’s get real, with a book like Earls Trip, you aren’t really expecting historical depth.
There is also a wonderful focus on male friendships which I found endearing and some growth with a sibling relationship.
The characters (see exposition comments) are well developed, although more on paper than by action if that makes sense. Like I got a great sense of what they thought about stuff, especially the male MC, but I was still a little hard pressed to see how their actions were playing that out. I also honestly had a hard time with the MC’s mutual interest, beyond being childhood playmates. The way the MC sees the female MC seemed more like objectification in some cases than love (ie, look at that wild woman who is feral in the forest). It gets a little bit better as they begin their lessons-in-love, and the characters also learn a bit more about themselves.
There are some mature subjects, including death and grief, memory loss and care, and attempted blackmail. There is also some violence, though not graphically described (gun shots, fight, and hunting). There are a few intimate scenes on page that are not overly graphic, but still beyond kisses only. On the whole, this is recommended for readers who like heat across the board.
Like I suppose every other book, this is one that you will love, hate, or find forgettable. I have landing squarely in the latter category, likely to not remember it beyond a few hazy scenes that may come to mind. That’s not to say that it wasn’t a thoroughly enjoyable read, just not as funny as I had hoped given the promises of the premise.
I would consider reading this author again, understanding her writing style although the set up in the end of this book was more confusing than compelling. But if you are a reader looking for a cross between historical and a contemporary rom com, this may be a great read for you.
