Georgia Books

Trudy Roundtree, young and recently widowed is back in the small town of Ogeechee, Georgia, where she grew up. Her cousin, Police Chief Henry Huckabee under some pressure from his relatives, has hired Trudy as one of two full time police officers in Ogeechee. Trudy is determined to come to terms with the double grief of losing her young husband and her beloved grandmother by doing a bang up job on the police force. So just after returning from homicide school, when the body of a young woman is found in an abandoned icebox, Trudy is faced with solving her first solo decades-old murder. Hen lets her have a free rein with the case, since he is too busy, and he also "knows" that this murder is too old to be solved easily. Trudy interviews the town librarian and looks at back issues of the Ogeechee newspaper and notices that in 1969 a Donnie Burkhalton died in an automobile accident. She also discovers that his fiancée left him and disappeared on the same day. Dental records show that Donnie's fiancée is the victim. Although the case is over 30 years old, Trudy is determined to see justice done by catching a killer although she is hampered both by the lack of clues and physical evidence. This series is rapidly getting to be one of my favorites. Trudy is a likable feisty southern young woman, who thinks it's her duty to raise the male consciousness of her cousin Henry, this results in some very funny dialog. DEATH AND THE ICEBOX gives an accurate depiction of what life is like in a small southern town. Trudy is independent, upbeat and believes police work is what she is meant to do. The mystery itself is complex and there are plenty of suspects, Linda Barry does a wonderful job depicting the people and the small town southern sensibilities of Ogeechee, Georgia.

Ogeechee, Georgia with its population of 3,412 is just right for Trudy Roundtree who returned home after the death of her husband. She is the only female police officer in Ogeechee. She visits friends clearing a dump when an old icebox flies open and the body of a dead woman is found stuffed inside.

The autopsy shows that a blow to the head murdered the victim at least twenty years ago. Trudy has no idea of the identity of the woman but as she looks at back issues of the Ogeechee Beacon she notices that in 1969 a Donnie Burkhalton died in an automobile accident. She later discovers that his fiancée dumped him and disappeared on the same day. Dental records show that Donnie's fiancée is the victim. Although the case is over three decades old, Trudy is determined to see justice done by catching a killer.

DEATH AND THE ICEBOX is a cozy police procedural that gives an accurate depiction of what life is like in a small southern town. The heroine is independent, upbeat and believes police work is her calling. The mystery itself is complex and intricately woven into the story line and there is a plethora of suspects but the stumbling block in figuring out who the killer is comes down to motive. Nobody, at least on the surface, had any reason to see the woman dead. So Trudy has to delve deeper and recreate events that happened years ago. Using people's unreliable memories, Linda Berry knows how to keep her readers' interested so that they finish the book in one sitting.

Harriet Klausner

Small towns in the U.S. are riddled with strange murders in mystery books. Ogeechee, GA, is no exception. What IS exceptional is Trudy Roundtree, the only female police officer, constantly balancing the delicate relationships between herself and family and friends with the objectivity and scientific skills required by her job. In the latest of Trudy's adventures, happenstance reveals a decades-old murder of a young, unknown woman. While Trudy solves the puzzle, she also unwittingly and almost unwillingly strips away the barriers, excuses and self-defenses a number of neighbors have raised around themselves. A sensitive view of the unforeseen human consequences of crime, peopled with characters and an atmosphere in a town you wish you could visit yourself.

Linda Berry's DEATH AND THE ICEBOX is a cozy cold case mystery with a fun sleuth and an intriguing look into the past of a small southern town.

Ogeechee, Georgia police officer Trudy Roundtree visits Eric and Stacy Riggs while they are clearing land on site for their new home. When the old icebox is finally moved, the door opens to reveal the body of a young woman. Forensic science places the death some thirty years or so ago. In order to solve the case, Trudy must dig into small town history. With a population of 3412 people, nothing passes by the residents of Ogeechee and yet the the paucity of clues comes close to matching the almost non-existent physical evidence left at the crime scene of the town's dump. Between old newspaper clippings and the memory of the present day residents, will Trudy be able to garner enough clues to unearth the dark secrets of the past without placing herself or others at risk?

Written in first person narrative through the eyes of Trudy Roundtree, DEATH AND THE ICEBOX achieves a unique cozy small town and yet progressive tone through the character of the sleuth. Trudy's feminism and the game of horrorscopes she plays with her friends add a flair to this mystery as she assesses her boss and cousin, Henry Huckabee, and the other town residents who she and Stacy label and describe according to southern items like Vidalia Onions and Sugar Cane. The look at a small town's past through old newspapers and memories adds a wonderful sense of nostalgia that never turns too sweet on account of the cold murder case that underpins the search. Even as Trudy narrows in on the culprit and the motive, the reader discovers a new twist towards the end. Throughout this mystery, Linda Berry creates characters and subplots that intrigue. To the mystery buff's delight, the final clues are not thrown in at the end but in plain site but through inference throughout the narrative. Fortunately for the reader whose interest in the past and present Ogeechee residents grows, Linda Berry does not just drop her story once the murder is solved. Instead, without resorting to a quick epilogue to tie threads together, Linda Berry adds new insights and an intriguing glimpse into the current day ramifications of this solved cold case and her search for clues.

Imagine leaving your comfortable world as you knew it in the erly 1960's. Young white women; some from the north, some from the south. Rural and urban, college kids, middle class, working class and just plain poor. Heading to a dangerous world and joining the early days of the Civil Rights Movement. Leaving behind the scorn, disdain, and ridicule of family and friends. Walking into a climate of hate and bigotry, and joining in civil disobedience against segregation. Walking in the picket lines, sometimes fearing for your life; organizing, and joining in singing hymns of freedom. Going from tears of frustration to smiles of great joy, while hitching a ride on that freedom train and holding on for dear life.
One recent eveing at Northern Lights Book Store and Cafe in St. Johnsbury, Vt., 70 people heard two local women who participated passionately in that movement. The authors read from their book, Deep In Our Hearts: Nine White Women in the Freedom Movement.
The book is an eloquent and powerful one that takes us back to one of the most tumultuous periods in American history; the erly days of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Freedom Summer, voter registrations, lunch counter sit-ins and the rise of Black Power and the women's movement. Deep In Our Hearts is a collection of essays, that take us into the lives of a group of young women who were transformed by the Civil Rights Movement.
The audience listened as Penny Patch looked back and read softly. "I understand well that what was between us will never be again, but still, that experience remains at the core of who I am. The fact that some of us had deep friendships that crossed all racial lines is simply a miracle. For short periods of time, in those early yers, we leaped over all the history and all of the minefields between us."
Perched on a stool and sipping warm tea to sooth a sore throat, Theresa Del Pozzo read from the book. "My involement with the movement began as a moral reaction to the blatant injustice of segregation and the denial of basic human rights of African-Americans. Along the way I got an education in the intricate patterns of racism and began to experience what I think as the small-c culture of the African_American community: the wisdom, dignity, strength, humor, gentleness and creativeness of its everyday life and people. The experience of living within the black world changed forever the person I was to become and the way I live my adult life."
Listening to the authors as they told their stories one could not help but admire their courage and admire this courageous book. They stand as powerful testaments to a time when the goal of universal justice was truly in sight and to the hope that a new generation of blacks and whites will take up the challenge to make the world a better place.

Marvin Minkler of the North Star Monthly

Forty years ago, in regard to the "race question," white people in this country fell into five general categories: those who never gave a thought to race-based segregation and discrimination (the numbers of whom could probably be counted on one hand); those who through ignorance or paranoia thought that African-Americans were in one way or another "inferior" beings, which somehow justified our own brand of apartheid; those who knew or suspected that the "inferiority" premise applied to African-Americans was bogus but who profited from that fiction being maintained; those who knew or believed that the inferiority idea was false but who, through reluctance or apathy, chose to do or say nothing about it, and those who, deep in their hearts, knew that the inferiority thesis was false and cruelly unfair, knew that our apatheid system made a lie of all the claims of equality our nation prided itself on, and who chose to confront it in an attempt to bring segregation and discrimination to an end through personal involvement and direct action. The nine white women who contributed to this book the stories of their development and their involvement in the civil rights struggle were of that last category. They never really saw themselves as particularly strong or smart, although their writing shows them to be exceptionally articulate, and none of them were brought up by their families to become involved in that fight. They took it upon themselves to make their own stands and become part of that effort regardless of the personal risks. "Deep In Our Hearts" is aptly named - what springs out at us from their stories is their simple strength, the heart-deep commitment to social justice, that helped make this country face up to its promises to all of its citizens. That they came from genuinely different backgrounds reflects the diversity that sets our country apart and which puts the lie to common assumptions about them, such as that they were born of affluent families from the northeast and went south with Ivy League educations and high-flown notions of setting things right. What is also remarkable about their stories and their lives is that they have continued with that commitment to equality and fairness in varied ways; they never saw fit to rest upon their laurels once this nation recognized, in words at least, that racial segregation and discrimination were wrong and brought down the obvious barriers to equality. These little stories, none more than forty-eight pages long, also spell out how their subsequent involvement in combating the Vietnam War was a logical progression, the same struggle on a different front. Although some of them became front-line soldiers in the fight to free women from their own set of shackles, all of them contributed to modern feminism and women's rights more by their actions than by their words. To them, and to the many whose stories who are not in this book, we all owe a debt of gratitude. If not for them this country may not have been able to look itself in the eye in the bathroom mirror. The collective lesson of these stories is that one need not come from uncommon beginnings in order to develop the will to lead extraordinary, adventuresome, purposeful lives. Read their stories, be inspired without being preached to, and put some meat on the dry bones of history.

Just finished reading " Deep In Our Hearts", a book I'd like to strongly recommend. It captures on a very personal level, the spirit of the Civil Rights era, from the perspective of nine different white women who were deeply involved in the struggle to bring about more racial justice. It is a moving tribute to all the heroes of that very difficult time. To all who were involved at the time or those who are the least bit curious of "what went down", you cannot fail to admire the stories of these brave women. This is history (herstory) as it should be related-from the participants.

This collection of stories, detailing the lives of nine white women active in the fight to end racial segregation and discrimination in this country, is sure to touch your heart. It is a must read for anyone interested in learning more about the Civil Rights movement of the sixties. I couldn't put it down.

The struggle for a science of culture represents a lenthy contention, as to whether or not culture is a infrastructure or simply a superstructure. The empirical approach used in Harris's work, avoids the realm of philosophy and the abiding law of society, which however is presented as a fact of matter. The contention between the survival of the fittest and the early need to develop agricultural society, the human need not to inter marry were, in fact the effect of a culture in motion. The materialization of culture as a container of human activity opposed to the idea of culture being the sum of the contents obsures the reality; that both coexist and do represent as stated in book, the true Dilectical relationship. Harris's view while I feel is a honest reflection of culture and science does not apply its conclusions to the dominance of the struggle by men to dominant women in society. Cultural materialism does recognize the exploitation of people as the category of change demanded by society and not these shifts in the mode of production.

Marvin Harris' book, Cultural Materialism, is a must read for any student in the social sciences who intends to address issues of war and peace, environmental decline, and social justice. Written in clear, understandable language, the theory presented is compelling and fully relevant to the most pressing issues of today. The updated edition offers an introduction by Allen and Orna Johnson that "examines the impact that the book and theory had on anthropological theorizing." Compared to today's muddled and often unfathomable social theories-Cultural Materialism provides a practical and useful research approach relevant to any social issue and usable by those working for social change. Don't be put off by the title, the book and theory fully address all aspects of culture and in an evolutionally perspective. I particularly recommend the book and theory to those who work on environmental and social justice issues. Conservation biologists seeking to explore sociocultural issues, especially when addressing conservation planning implementation problems, would be well served appreciating the Cultural Materialist perspective.

Foundational. This book is the core of cultural materialist theory. I lays out in simple language a theory for describing and explaining the complexity that is human behavior and thought. Many have railed against cultural materialism for being too simplistic, for "naïvely" arguing for evolutionary, universal patterns throughout human societies. Harris spent his life fighting for a scientific approach to anthropology and this was his masterwork towards that goal.

He begins by discussing science in general; its beginnings, evolution and application. At the end of the chapter he says something which resonates throughout the rest of the book and his work. This statement provides a window into the character of Marvin Harris like nothing else Ive read. He says, "No other way of knowing is based on a set of rules explicitly designed to transcend the prior belief systems of mutually antagonistic tribes, nations, classes, and ethnic and religious communities in order to arrive at knowledge that is equally probable for any rational human mind. Those that doubt that science can do this must be made to show that some other ecumenical alternative can do it better. Unless they can show how some other universalistic system of knowing leads to more acceptable criteria of truth, their attempt to subvert the universal credibility of science in the name of cultural relativism, however well intentioned, is an intellectual crime against humanity."

Throughout the first part he discusses his theory. Beginning with the epistemological underpinnings of the theory and ending with application he thoroughly explains and attempts to preempt any questions that might arise. In the second half of the book he compares his theory to other anthropological explainations and descriptions of human behavior and ideas. He discusses sociobiology, Marxism, structuralism and psychological approachs to humans. He ends with a critique of postmodernism or obscurantism as he calls it in this book.

His theory is basically that we are motivated primarily by a few basic biopsychological drives. These drives lead us to produce things and reproduce ourselves. Production and reproduction, in relation with the environment, lead to the organizational structures and the symbols and ideologies of particular societies. This is a system. As such all of the parts feed back into each other so that a change in one part usually leads to a change in all other parts. The primary way change occurs in the system, however, is through alterations in the modes of production and reproduction or because of changes in the environment. This is because these are the only things that are tied directly to our basic biopsychological needs.

It is a shame that anthropology has lost Marvin Harris and his scientific, multi-linear evolutionary theories and wandered into the abyss of postmodernist, interpretationist mishmash.

This book will eventually be recognized as one of the most important of the 20th Century - but not until the 21st Century. In spite of what the previous reviewer said, it does indeed deal with male supremacy - and Cultural Materialism's explanation for male dominance is something that feminists should learn and understand, if they want to do something to end male supremacy.

Butty's account of coastal georgia is like walking through the pages of time. It is by far the best book on coastal georgia. Thanks buddy!

This book is a treasure trove of historical information on the entire McIntosh County area. If you live in/visit occasionally/or are interested in McIntosh county Georgia this book is a MUST HAVE.

Although to the passerby McIntosh County seems like a small rural coastal county in southern georgia, with not much to see yet (but about to develop) IT IS NOT -- McIntosh County may be one of the most historical counties in the entire south, "There's been a lot of water under that bridge." And this book will reveal all of it to a good detail!

This book is an excellant source of research for someone who enjoys historical reading about the golden isles of Georgia. Not many facts and tales are missing from this book! Excellant reading

Buddy seems to get "into" the people he writes about... he gives them substance, and dimension. He brings you into each generation he writes about. You almost feel the wind on your face, and the sea at your feet, with his discriptions. He goes beyond name, date, and place. He brings you to a point where you feel you are living the times. He not only goes into detail about a person, he goes beyond that person, to someone who was touched by that person, and recounts it. Therefore, we learn about them from two points of view. We learn what he finds by exploring a "paper trail", and we learn about what he finds from the things that have been passed down. I will tell you... I have never been as impressed about a book written about a town or place, or people, the way his book impressed me. His book made me want to go out and "explore"... and I did! I have learned more about the "out of the way places" here, in McIntosh Co GA,in his book, than anywhere else. His books are also extremely helpful where Genealogy in being researched. Buddy's books seem to make you feel like he is an "I want to know because..." type of person. And they don't leave you "hanging." He is very through.

The book is great. It gives information that is well organized. You can find restaurants according to location, cuisine, and star rating. You can also find information on best bakeries, best delis, best Sunday brunch, best view, etc. Highly recommend this book.

I'm often asked at work to make dinner reservations for our visiting clients, and The The Eclectic Gourmet Guide to Atlanta has always come to the rescue. Jane Garvey knows her restaurants and her city, and every recommendation has been right on. You just can't miss if you use this book.

This guide goes straight to the heart of Atlanta dining. There's no fluff or obligatory listings - Jane Garvey knows the city and can sniff out those hidden jewels better than most travel writers. I live in Atlanta and love referring to the book for those eclectic finds I might have forgotten. An out-of-towner will be delighted to dine like a real Atlantan instead of a tourist!

Whether it is food or wine, Jane has never steered us wrong. And this book is no exception!

This is an absolutely essential collection; more than that, it is filled with incredible and illuminating thinking and writing. A must-have.

This is the sort of book that makes every environmental scholar green with envy that they didn't pen it themselves. This book, together with only a few others, provides a powerful introduction to the growing field of ecocriticism. I have refered my students to this work and indeed found it to be very useful as a background reader and guide when penning my own recent book of ecocriticsm concerning contemporary nature writing about water - Deep Immersion: The Experience of Water.

In my investigations, this is the first collection of ecocritical essays that attempts to lay a foundation and project a future. Ecocriticism is gaining popularity and is being accepted as a serious mode of discourse for literary studies. This book will help people understand the background and fundamentals behind this new tradition in literary criticism

If any reader has interest in ecocriticism, never miss this canonical book! The introduction by Cheryll Glotfelty draws an important map for ecocritical studies. This book has collected almost the most crucial essays by the most important scholars on this (interdisciplinary) field. Besides, this book also introduces top fifteen choices for further recommended reading and other useful references (including books, periodicals, and professional organizations). The contributors are briefly introduced as well. With the help of Association for the Study of Literature and Environment, I believe you will learn much more as myself.

Monty Don is very cool. I've not seen him on television, but he comes across as defiantly insistent on the inescapable value of organic gardening for our souls and our bodies. A great read that you will treasure forever.

A great read. Made me want to get out there and start digging. Make everything sound so simple.

This is one of the most practical and comprehensive books on organic gardening I have come across. It is full of useful advice on the plants he,(Monty Don) grows in his own farm, turned garden. It is also nice that it is not your standard gardening book, that is, one that gives sterile advice on every species(hight:10',hardy to:-5 ect.). He even has information on taking care of small livestock(chickens,ducks) In order to "complete the livestock circle". All in all this book is a must on the bookshelf of any gardener, as much for inspiration from Montys beautyful british garden as for the wealth of practical advice it holds.

Inspiring, warm, homely, earthy... a book to read, not just for reference... Monty takes you so deep into his garden, you can feel the mud squishing under your wellies, smell the lavender and taste the ripe tomatoes, with the feel of gentle sunshine on the back of your neck, and the scent of a thousand sweet peas helping you to forget the scratches from the pruning job you just finished.

The book is written in England, about a English garden with a particular climate and environment. But the practises can be adopted anywhere: know your land, know the climate, experiment, and don't be afraid to make mistakes.

I will read this book over and over and over again. Sweet peas don't do so well in Sacramento as they used to back home in Leicestershire, but... maybe this year I'll try them at a time of year that suits them, not me!

The Lonely Planet guidebook series is known for combining travel tips with cultural and historical education, and the Falkland Islands guide is no exception. The detail of this book is outstanding, and the stories it describes are very interesting as well - these little islands have played a larger role in world affairs than the uninformed would ever expect.

If you are buying this in conjunction with the Antarctica book, please note that this book is much smaller - but given the relative size of each landmass, the difference makes sense.

We are planning a trip to the Falklands soon, and I have searched every available publication for information. Suffice to say, such information is in short supply. I was ecstatic when I found this book. If you are planning a trip to the Falklands and/or South Georgia, this is the only book you need. Its information is both varied and comprehensive. Of special interest to us was the section detailing every location to view each type of penguin found in the Falklands.

An interesting, if brief, guided tour of what has to be one of the most remote tourist destinations on the planet. The Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)are a British Colony in the South Atlantic, a few hundred miles off the South American coast, that are also claimed by Argentina---in 1982 the two countries fought a war over the islands. Points of interest are noted, and an overview of the land, the people (population only 2500, with about 80% living in the capital city of Port Stanley), the history, and the wildlife is provided. Included are about 30 pages on South Georgia, a remarkably picturesque, but largely uninhabited island even further out in the Atlantic. My only complaint was the lack of photographs of the Falkland countryside. It would have been nice to get a feel for the terrain---m.p.

I'm a fan of the Lonely Planet (LP) series, both for armchair travel and for actual travel. This is one of the most obscure destinations covered by LP, and has the added distinction of being written by LP founder Tony Wheeler. However, it is a mystery to me why a successful entrepreneur would want to go back to the drudgery of collecting information for this book.

These 200 pages cover the Falklands in infinite detail. Every remote sheep farm that has a room for rent is described in detail, most of which are accessible only by non-scheduled plane. Keep in mind that the Falklands have only 3500 people, and only one place that could be described as a town or village, which means that this guide has a greater pages-per-capita ratio than any other LP guide (except perhaps Antarctica). There is a large emphasis on wildlife, with 17 pages describing varieties of birds. Also, 18 pages are dedicated to the even more remote South Georgia Island (pop. 10), accessible only by ship. As in all LP guides, there is background on the history and economy, excellent maps, and (in these more recent guides) many color photos.

This book is an excellent resource for any who are studying the American frontier. I am currently using this book as a resource for my Master's thesis.

I found the narrative of this book very enlightening. The mind's eye could
see the descriptions of land and waterway problems of our ancestors. I recommend it for the historical value and the referenced materials. Enjoyed the comments made by the travellers on the roads and the inns in which they stopped.
Sadly, the maps were not of a very good quality. Too small and required a magnifying glass to read the numbers along the trails pictures.
Hopefully the next edition of the book will have enhanced maps of the roads and perhaps also an added overlay map with the counties through which the road ran for a better perspective of the route the roads took.

Enlarged beyond its earlier incarnation as an article in "The Alabama Review", this work has emerged as a highly valuable resource for readers and researchers of early Alabama history. Utilizing maps and exhaustive primary and secondary sources, the authors present evidence of the profound impact of the Federal Road upon the Alabama in its formative years. Here, the reader will learn that antebellum Alabama was far from a unified state, but rather a politically polarized collection of sectional counties, interspersed with tribal lands of the Creek, Cherokee, Choctaw and Chickasaw. North Alabama, with a citizenry constituted largely of emigres of Tennessee, Kentucky and North Carolina, held political power from Alabama's Territorial period (1817-1818) and through early statehood (1819-1840). Entering Alabama at a point roughly near present-day Columbus, Georgia/Phenix City, Alabama, and proceeding southwesterly to New Orleans, the Federal Road accomodated the massive influx of settlers emanating from Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia. This book reveals how the surge in America's westward expansion affected the present-day formation of Alabama. With pent-up demand for land, and a sympathetic Andrew Jackson in the White House, the Federal Road became the venue through which the white combatants prevailed in the Creek War of 1836-37. The resultant final removal of Creek and Cherokee tribes to Oklahoma, caused such a rush of new settlers into South and Central Alabama that Alabama's political structure underwent a drastic and lasting transformation. The shift in legislative power to South Alabama and, particularly, the Black Belt of Central Alabama, resulted in the 1846 removal of the state capitol from Tuscaloosa to Montgomery. The rise of the "Bourbon Democrats" of this region was to shape the landscape of Alabama politics for over 140 years thereafter. The authors, through scholarly, annotated research, offer the reader an opportunity to attain a thorough understanding of the significance of the Federal Road as the single most important element in the formation of Alabama's geography, government, economy and sociology. This reviewer highly recommends this book as not only valuable, but essential for anyone seeking to attain a thorough understanding of Alabama history.

Most enlightening. I was able to track my ancestors as they traveled thru Georgia and Alabama. With the aid of a good map, one can pinpoint their exact route. Highly recommend for anyone doing research on their family that settled in Georgia or Alabama.

Devlin and Georgia write well together and the story line is really good. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes romance and a little bit of spanking! I loved this book but then of course I could be bias since I love ALL of his books as well as the ones he co wrote with Georgia Lynd.

Fasten your seat belt, for you are about to go on an arousing adventure filled with action, romance, spanking and steamy sensual sex. A rugged but charming hero, a beautiful and mysterious heroine, intrigue, deceit, battles against injustice, spanking and erotic sex. What else could one want? Unlike Mr. O'Neill's previous solo work, "A Fine Deceit" is not a spanking story, but rather, a story which contains spanking. Although I came for the spanking I was hooked by the story. Every scene is beautifully crafted, with characters so finely drawn they elicit emotions ranging from love to hate, from respect to disgust, and do so from the story's outset.
"A Fine Deceit" is not your mother's historical romance. It will satisfy both the spanking aficionado and the vanilla fan who read bodice rippers secretly looking for spanking scenes. Actually, there will be no turning back for the vanilla fan once they read "A Fine Deceit" because stereotypical historical romances will no longer quench their erotic thirst.
Home to England from the latest war with France, Captain Drake finds himself seduced by the beautiful but willful Lady Roselind. His quest to find her and win her leads to heroics, romance, righting wrongs and a very satisfying conclusion.
Devlin O'Neill is a writer of erotic spanking fiction with whose excellent work I am familiar, but I was unfamiliar with Georgia Lynd, so I didn't know what to expect from this collaboration. Happy to say, like strawberries and cream, the two partner to provide an extremely tasty treat. Earlier I asked the question what else could one want? The answer is MORE! I certainly hope Mr. O'Neill and Ms. Lynd continue their very successful partnership.

A very similar book from the authors of "Lady Faulcon's Rogue" (hereafter referred to as LFR).

Those who have read most of Devlin O'Neill's other books, with the exception of LFR, or indeed read the description of this book as "heroic romance and erotica" on the back cover, may be expecting a rather different kind of novel from the one that the authors have actually written.

This book (like LFR) appears to have started out as an attempt to bridge the gap between romance and erotica, but the book as published is much more the former than the latter.

The story starts as a group of six men, the survivors of a company under the hero of the story Captain Drake, have arrived back in England from "the wars in France" and are on their way home on the road from Hull to York.

While they camp with a friendly band of gypsies, Captain Drake gets a nocturnal visit from a beautiful woman. On waking he wonders at first whether she was real, or just a lascivious dream, but he soon discovers that she is indeed real - the dignified lady of a nearby manor. Sending his men on, he remains in the area to try to discover what she is up to - and soon becomes involved in a love triangle, a legal fight over a disputed inheritance, and eventually a murder trial.

The historical romance which takes up 90% of the novel is so lacking in contemporary historical detail that it is impossible to say for certain what century the tale is meant to be set in or which set of French wars the authors were thinking of. The cover illustration shows a 17th or 18th century manor house, but the social conditions and weapons described in the book reflect a time much earlier than that. There is one reference to gunpowder, but none to muskets or rifles and some of Drake's men are archers, which suggests a setting in the hundred years war, probably the first half of the 15th century.

In one or two places words and practices from modern America have been transplanted to medieval England in a way which is unintentionally comic. For example at one point the Lady of the Manor warns her maids that if they let her down "the lot of you will find yourselves in the woodshed" (e.g. be taken there to be spanked.) The type of punishment might well have been common to both the 20th century Mid-Western USA and 15th century Yorkshire, but both the wording of the threat and the selection of the place of execution were so much more apposite to the former than the latter as to have me laughing out loud.

The lack of any real attempt to engage with any significant degree of detail either of major historical events or of social history means that this story cannot really qualify as a historical romance. However, but the quality of the writing is at least two or three rungs up the ladder from the average Mills and Boon romance. The fight scenes are exciting, the love triangle at the centre of the story works well, as does the detective story at the end of the book, and you can easily start to care about some of the characters. The plot and dramatic tension are fairly well managed.

The erotic element which makes up the remainder of the story includes three or four sex scenes, none of them particularly graphic, and there are half a dozen spanking scenes which are clearly aimed at those readers who find that sort of thing a turn-on. (Some are carried out by the hero and are fairly mild, several rather more severe beatings are inflicted by less sympathetic characters and the reader appears to be intended to empathise with the victims.)

A number of authors and publishers have been trying to build stories which bridge the gap between erotica and other genres - usually romance, but sometimes science fiction or fantasy. A few have been quite good, but most have been dire. The most common problem with the bad ones is that they fall between two stools by not having enough sex to satisfy most readers of erotica, while not being well enough written to create the reader empathy with the characters to work as a romance.

Devlin O'Neill and Georgia Lynd have avoided this problem by working hard on their characters, the plot, and the build-up of dramatic and emotional tension. What they have ended up with is two reasonably well written books which have only slightly more sex than many "mainstream" romances or thrillers published in the last few years. In consequence some readers of Mr O'Neill's other books who buy this book or LFR expecting more of the same are likely to be disappointed.

I hope the authors find enough other readers who enjoy this book to offset that problem, because both "A Fine Deceit" and "Lady Faulcon's Rogue" are a good enough effort to deserve more work in the same direction.

Devlin and Georgia have done it again! They have constructed another beautifully written bodice ripper! I loved Lady Faulcon's Rogue and I loved this one just as much. Has a dashing, strong, authoriative figure that will melt any woman's heart. The spanking he gives is an added bonus!

A Fine Deceit may not have spanking in every chapter but the book can stand alone for both vanillas and spankophiles alike! It is good that the authors can blend both worlds and audiences!
If you want a good book to curl up with and read A Fine Deceit is it! Hope you will read it and enjoy it as much as me!

I hope Georgia and Devlin decide to keep writing together since they make a womderful team!