My … 10 days in reading? Part 2

The first half of my re-reading binge was inspired by Moonlight Reader’s comment in her posts about wanting to get back to reading Tasha Alexander’s Lady Emily series.  This is a series I’d gotten caught up in years ago, but abandoned for reasons I couldn’t remember.  She put the series back on my radar, and I got to wondering whether I could get caught up in it again, or if I should just mark that series as abandoned, so I had MT pull the 9 books I have down from the shelves and buried myself in 19th century England.

Rather than try to review all of the books again here, I’m just going to list the book and include a thought or two about each one.  Because this is still going to make for a physically long post, I put it behind a ‘read more’. Suffice it to say that the series was very hit and miss for me up through book 9.  I remember the qualities that drove me to set the series aside originally, but there is also a lot to like about them (most of them, anyway).  Will I continue?  I’m still not sure.  Maybe.  At least, I might try one more.

	The first book in the series and it holds up rather well; solid characters and an interesting plot.
	Not as good as the first – the whole pretender to the throne thing didn’t interest me all that much, although I liked the cat burglar angle.  Bainbridge is a welcome addition to the cast of characters.
	A good story but my, isn’t Emily absolutely full of herself.  A level of bragging that I found distasteful, and at the same time, I had no patience for her inferiority complex around Colin’s former flame.
	My god this book was bad. I really disliked this book on re-read and I have no idea what 2014-me was thinking rating it 4 stars. What a bunch of sentimental rubbish this book was – so much angst and nonsense on top of a totally transparent plot.
	A hostile mother-in-law.  How original.  It probably says enough that I still liked her better than Emily.  Actually, I liked the MIL better than I liked Colin in this book.  But the plot was solid and, frankly, a bit disturbing, so I’ll stick with the original 3 stars.
	Now this was a good book.  Emotionally stable characters, solid plot.  The parallel journal entries were too melodramatic for me to do anything but roll my eyes at, but otherwise, very enjoyable.
	Meh.  Tried a bit too hard to make a very solidly plotted mystery more dramatic than it had to be.  It was good, but not as good as it could have been.  Also, I found it annoying that the author tells the reader how even Venetians can’t navigate Venice, then proceeds to describe in numbing detail, routes through Venice.
	Another really strong entry; I liked the play on class strictures and structures, and I thought the mystery an excellent one.  All around, this might be the one I enjoyed most so far.
	The story was compelling and disturbing, but something about the flow felt tedious.