Reviewed by Jess
TITLE: A Lord of Love
AUTHOR: Sara Dobie Bauer
PUBLISHER: Carnation Books
LENGTH: 35 pages
RELEASE DATE: March 19, 2019
BLURB:
During negotiations for a truce between the feuding Price and Morgan families, Lord John Morgan makes a shocking offer: he will give the Price family their land, in exchange for Harrison Price’s hand in marriage.
John has long been enamored with Harrison, the beautiful son of his late rival. Harrison is nineteen, inexperienced, and known for being cold and bitingly brilliant. The union seems impossible, but John is determined to win the affections of his young obsession.
Will the frigid Harrison concede, or will the object of John’s adoration leave him alone at the altar?
REVIEW:
How can such a short story steal my heart so completely? It’s flowery, formal, and even a little factually absurd, but A Lord to Love is a treat all the way through. And for those who love regency romances, it’s an absolute treasure!
If you require your historical romances to be by-the-book when it comes to accuracies of the time, you’ll have to hand-wave away the same-gender marriage plot in much the same way the author herself does—with complete confidence and no fanfare. Despite the leap in historical logic, we believe instantly in Lord Morgan’s plan to marry the longtime object of his faraway affections, the chilly and buttoned-up young Harrison Price. We don’t know right away how Harrison feels, but a brief fireside chat between the two men has their chemistry blossoming, and their stilted introduction doesn’t take long to turn into true love.
In 35 pages, Bauer has created a romance better than some authors do in hundreds. The men understand each other in short bursts of dialogue and careful readings of each other’s bodies, as if they have known each other all their lives. We know they are soulmates without the word having to be uttered. And it’s so apparent that Bauer loves this genre and loves writing in the regency language, so the story just flows with happiness and love for the setting and characters. It feels authentic and sharp on every page, and it makes us long for more, even though the story feels contained and finished.
Historical fiction fans who prefer long, sweeping regency tales with plenty of build-up may be underwhelmed by this quick story, but it ends up encapsulating what we all love about the genre so well that the length is not a huge hindrance. It’s sweet, sexy, and just perfect.
RATING: 
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