Review: Much Ado About Lady MacBeth by Rebecca Cohen

Rating: 4🌈

Rebecca Cohen dives back into Elizabethan England with Much Ado About Lady MacBeth. A enlarged, rewritten version of a short story, it takes place in the same universe as Cohen’s historical Crofton Chronicles.

Those are favorite books of mine featuring a certain Earl and actor Sebastian, who is very present here! It’s wonderful to see him again, and the Earl, if only in mentions.

Cohen centers her story around the activities and actors of King’s Men, the company of players at the Globe theatre, in London, England. The two main characters are actively hostile towards each other, upcoming actors who each seek the same roles.

David Bell, who’s family lives in the slums, barely surviving, is about to age out of female roles. But he’s still wanting to play Lady MacBeth before he leaves female roles behind. The descriptions of the poverty and living conditions are concise yet impactful.

His rival for that role and others? The person known for making disparaging remarks about him? That would be the lovely Jacob Milner. Pretty of face, but with a nasty word for him. And the current favorite with plenty of money behind him. His middle class background is also well defined and believable.

Cohen sets the stage with Shakespeare’s verse, plays, good old fashioned mystery, misconceptions, and a healthy sexy romp or two.

All while keeping within the laws and morals of the times where same sex relationships were illegal and men could be gallows bound if caught.

It’s still got the feeling of a shorter story but with a fuller heart. The characters are well done and Cohen’s universe and understanding of the times is well established.

It’s a sweet historical romance and a lovely edition to The Crofton Chronicles , especially if you’re a fan like me.

I’m recommending it!

https://www.goodreads.com › showMuch Ado About Lady Macbeth by Rebecca Cohen – Goodreads

Synopsis:

Jacob Milner might have the face of an angel and the legs of a sinner, but his poisonous tongue would taint even the prettiest visage.

A Shakespearean era enemies to lovers MM Romance

David Bell has risen from the London slums to be one of the up-and-coming stars of the King’s Men, the company of players at the Globe theatre. On the cusp of being too old for female roles, he yearns to play one more part before he leaves the skirts behind: Lady Macbeth. But he is not alone in that desire, and his nemesis, Jacob Milner, a soft-bellied popinjay who has never known day’s work in his life, is also vying for the part.

Sparks have flown between them before, but the fiery barbs and risqué name calling are hiding a different passion. But even if they do manage to put their animosity behind them, Jacob has another problem, his father is trying to marry him off to the daughter of Baron Runcorn.

Modern Crofton series:

🔹Saving Crofton Hall #1 (orig released 2014

🔹Making History at Crofton Hall

🔹Below Stairs at Crofton Hall

🔹Getting Married at Crofton Hall-TBR September 2022

A spin-off from The Crofton Chronicles-historic romance series

🔹The Actor and The Earl #1

🔹Duty to the Crown #2

🔹Forever Hold His Peace #3

Review: Below Stairs at Crofton Hall (Modern Crofton #3) by Rebecca Cohen

Rating: 4.5 🌈

Just that fantastic cover draws you to Below Stairs at Crofton Hall, third story in the Modern Crofton series by Rebecca Cohen.

Yes, that’s definitely Karl Vinter, new under butler, on the cover. The very portrait of his profession. Karl is maybe one of my favorites, aside from the main couple of course, and Dara.

From his unexpected exit from his last employer to the way he starts making Crofton Hall and it’s inhabitants, his home and extended family, is a subtle and charming story.

It’s a two-way love story. For Karl is in need of a place and people who not only accept him enthusiastically in every aspect, but allow him, through respect and kindness, to shine and grow his responsibilities (and friendships) in ways he never expected. And Crofton Hall, Ben, Ashley, Dara, get a subtly inspired under butler who’s becoming one of them, and irreplaceable.

Watching Karl fall in love with Crofton Hall, maneuvering through the hallways, and staff,and realizing he’s finally home? It’s everything.

The other element? That’s Val Blake, a younger gardener who’s come off an abusive relationship, lost a business, and a home. All at once. Prickly, basically a emotional mess when we meet him, Val and Karl start a friends with benefits relationship that fraught with anxiety and issues from the beginning.

Honestly it’s not really a relationship I rooted for. I liked Karl far more than Val. And while Val was admitting he was parroting the same toxic characteristics as his ex, it took a while and some pain he inflicts, before he seeks therapy. Realistically true to a person recovering from being gaslighted. It wasn’t until the end that he turned around, and it still seemed a little bit fast for everything that went before.

Maybe I got the timeline wrong and it had been longer since they’d seen each other.

Val’s section was written to feel like you had a window into the mindset of someone who was still so screwed up by the person who’s narcissistic personality had damaged him so badly to the point he was using it himself. It felt real, he was a train wreck, and he needed help.

That’s terrific writing.

The relationship between Karl and himself? Along the same lines. I loved Karl so much and Val had just started his therapy that I’d almost have loved to have seen them have a 2-part story to pull it out naturally.

But I’ll settle for this . That was a lovely ending. And of course there’s a fabulous secondary or even main romantic thread running with Ben and Ashley, that follows directly into the next story to be released in September.

Ben and Ashley’s thread is a romantic winner and absolutely sigh worthy at the end.

Highly recommending all the stories. It’s fantastic reading full of great characters and entertaining, romantic, and heartwarming plots.

Read them all in the order they are written.

BUY LINKS

Cover Design: Garrett Leigh – Black Jazz Design

Modern Crofton

🔹Book #1 – Saving Crofton Hall – Buy Here

🔹Book #2 – Making History at Crofton Hall – Buy Here

Modern Crofton series:

🔹Saving Crofton Hall #1 (orig released 2014

🔹Making History at Crofton Hall

🔹Below Stairs at Crofton Hall

🔹Getting Married at Crofton Hall-TBR September 2022

A spin-off from The Crofton Chronicles-historic romance series

🔹The Actor and The Earl #1

🔹Duty to the Crown #2

🔹Forever Hold His Peace #3

Karl Vinter joins the staff at Crofton Hall as the new under butler. He’s too busy to bother with relationships, but he’s more than happy to explore a friends with benefits arrangement with gardener, Val Blake. He couldn’t imagine a more perfect way to settle into is his new life at Crofton Hall. Pity pesky things like feelings start to get in the way.

Meanwhile, Ben Redbourn, 16th Earl of Crofton, is trying to find the perfect way to propose to Ashley, his boyfriend. He’s going to need all the help he can get, especially after at least one misstep and that he’s never given Ashley any indication he wants to get married.

This is the third Modern Crofton novel, featuring Benjamin Redbourn, the 16th Earl of Crofton and descendant of Anthony Redbourn, 1st Earl of Crofton from my historical series, The Crofton Chronicles.

Review: Making History at Crofton Hall (Modern Crofton #2) by Rebecca Cohen

Rating: 4.75 🌈

I fell in love with Crofton Hall when I started reading Rebecca Cohen’s historical romance series, The Crofton Chronicles. That featured Anthony, the 1st Earl of Crofton and the man who would forever hold his heart, the Elizabethan actor Sebastian Hewel. Those three books followed the incredible story of the twin Hewel siblings, a engagement that went weirdly, wonderfully awry, and then how two men thwarted the monarchy, the laws and the ton to stay together for their remaining days. All under disguises and slights of hand. Fantastic reading and a grand romance.

The first in the new series, Saving Crofton Hall, I read when it was written in 2014. Again. I loved being back in Crofton and watching the descendants of Anthony start to discover some of the secrets the Hall had kept hidden all these years.

Then nothing. The series was forgotten.

But now the author is writing this series once more and it’s amazing to return not only to Crofton Hall in the present but also to the fabulous love story of Anthony and Sebastian as their love letters and true romance is revealed to the present day occupants and people of Crofton Hall. And many more.

In every book we get two couples. The main couple of Ben Redbourn, 16th Earl of Crofton, and Ashley Niven, Events Manager at Crofton Hall, continues as their relationship deepens, moves past more obstacles that bring up Ashley’s sense of inferiority and inequality. How that’s worked out through their personalities and with help is real, a little painful and loving.

They are the series couple.

After them each book has its own couple to feature. Here’s its historian, Dara Callaghan, and TV producer, Nathan Lorimer. Both brought to Crofton Hall because of the TV series to be filmed there about the mystery of a extra casket in the ancient family vault and the identity of the person inside.

Dara gets hired to sort through what’s essentially rooms or buildings worth of history that Crofton Hall has stored within herself, including the letters and documents about the relationships of Anthony and Sebastian. Between Nathan and Dara, Ben and Ashley, and others the hidden story of a lifetime unfolds.

So does slowly a romance between Dara and Nathan. I have always loved Cohen’s ability to create such incredible characters that resonate so within the story. Nathan who’s grieving still the loss of his husband and trying to figure out how to move forward into another relationship. And Dara, the Irish romantic, who wants a real relationship, a man with a gentle heart, obsessed with history.

Great characters with stumbling blocks to a romance but friends all around who are there to lend a ear or bit of guidance to get both on the path to a working relationship.

It’s such a pleasure to read. It’s sexy, fun, with smart, dialogue. Everything just flies together so beautifully.

I highly recommend this series and the historical romance series that preceded it. I love the characters, the relationship dynamics, and the entwining threads of loves, lives, and families.

Read them in the order they are written for a grand and entertaining time!

Cover Design: Garrett Leigh – Black Jazz Design

Modern Crofton

Book #1 – Saving Crofton Hall – Buy Here

Book #2 – Making History at Crofton Hall – Buy Here

Modern Crofton series:

🔹Saving Crofton Hall #1 (orig released 2014

🔹Making History at Crofton Hall

🔹Below Stairs at Crofton Hall

🔹Getting Married at Crofton Hall – TBR September 2022

A spin-off from The Crofton Chronicles-historic romance series

🔹The Actor and The Earl #1

🔹Duty to the Crown #2

🔹Forever Hold His Peace #3

Making History at Crofton Hall – Goodreads

Crofton Hall is buzzing with anticipation for the filming of the Secret Histories TV special about a scandalous affair that has been hidden for over four hundred years.

The hall’s new historian, Dara Callaghan, is drawn not just by the hall’s rich history but to TV producer, Nathan Lorimer. Nathan is finally ready to start dating again, several years after the death of his husband. There’s something about Dara, a quietly spoken Irishman, and the romance that surrounds Crofton Hall, that makes him want to take a chance.

Meanwhile, Ben Redbourn, 16th Earl of Crofton, is trying to persuade his boyfriend Ashley Niven that he’d like to don doublet and hose and play Sebastian to his Anthony. But Ashley’s not having any of it… until someone else agrees to the take the part of the 1st Earl of Crofton’s lover.

This is the second Modern Crofton novel, featuring Benjamin Redbourn, the 16th Earl of Crofton and descendant of Anthony Redbourn, 1st Earl of Crofton from my historical series, The Crofton Chronicles. While designed to be read as a standalone, events that lead to this novel follow chronologically from Saving Crofton Hall.

Trigger warnings: discussion of grief and dealing with bereavement

Love Historicals? Don’t Miss the Review Tour and Giveaway for Rebecca Cohen’s Anthony, Earl of Crofton

Buy Links: Amazon US | Amazon UK | Universal Link

Cover Design: Garrett Leigh @ Black Jazz Design

Length: 66,000 words approx.

Blurb

A tale set in Stuart England, where the king’s life depends on his most loyal of subjects.

Anthony Redbourn, Earl of Crofton, delights in his reputation as a charming rogue. Life is never quiet at the court of King James I, especially with his good friend and secret lover, Sebastian Hewel, by his side. As an actor with the celebrated King’s Men, Sebastian has his own admirers, but neither man has eyes for anyone else.

When a plot against His Majesty is uncovered it threatens Anthony and Sebastian’s charmed lives, and they are dragged into the political intrigue and the race to save the king from danger. Fear that a traitor is linked to the King’s Men leaves Sebastian and Anthony with no choice but to stage a very public dissolution of their friendship, so Anthony can be free to be the patron of a new rising actor, and Sebastian can be the prodigy of another noble.

It is a dangerous game they are playing to expose the plotters and still find a way to meet in secret, as Anthony is adamant that they will not sacrifice the love they have fought so hard to win. They will do whatever it takes to protect the king’s life, and their commitment to each other.

Author Bio

REBECCA COHEN spends her days dreaming of a living in a Tudor manor house, or a Georgian mansion. Alas, the closest she comes to this is through her characters in her historical romance novels. She also dreams of intergalactic adventures and fantasy realms, but because she’s not yet got her space or dimensional travel plans finalised, she lives happily in leafy Hertfordshire, England, with her husband and young son. She can often be found with a pen in one hand and sloe gin with lemon tonic in the other.

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Read Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words Review here. We highly recommend it.

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