A Companion for the Count

Series: Clairvoir Castle Romances, Book 2

By: Sally Britton / Narrated By: Jessica Elisa Boyd

Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins

Wherein I spend a bit too much time on the narration, but hey! Lovely book overall!!!

I like Sally Britton, what can I say? And I’m taken in by a spiffy cover, wham! what can I say?

And I was somewhat underwhelmed by the first book of the Clairvoir Castle Romances, Mr. Gardiner and the Governess, thought it batted away customs of the era, had pretty much no tension, no real problems to be solved, so I kinda sorta said I did NOT Boo it, but I kinda sorta DID. What can I say? Well, at the end of THAT particular review, I knew I’d be onto the next book in the series, so here I finally am!

What can I say?

How ‘bout to start off? Charming, absolutely delightful. A slow building of the relationship, enough complications to keep things interesting, the occasional noticing that: Dang! that incidental touch left me breathless! But squeaky clean all things considered, and hey! m’ toes didn’t curl in discomfort, and I didn’t writhe in embarrassment cuz things were getting all risqué, and at no point did I eject my consciousness from my body to look down upon m’self and think: Wow, you really do haaaate steamy stuff, Gillian; get ahold of yourself!

The Ambassador, the Conte di Atella is due to visit Clairvoir Castle, and things are looking bad for the daughter of the Duke, Josephine. It’s kinda sorta expected that the conte will be wooing her, hoping to make a politically sound union between England and the newly-formed Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Josie can’t staaaand the thought of being hounded for three months, so she badgers her best friend and almost-sister, Emma (The well-born ward of the Duke, but this isn’t widely known), to get between her and the conte as much as possible. Emma is a good sport, she loves Josie dearly, and she feels such gratitude to the ducal family that she’s willing and ready to do so.

The conte Luca, however, is a bit of a stick in the mud, all about duty to his King and country, and is he a fish outta water or what? Josie baffles him, and her each and every rebuff just makes him even more determined to do it right. So when Emma, in a bit of frustration and fearing for her bosom friend’s future, makes a deal with him, that he learn what Josie likes and makes an effort to win her as a person and not just as a future Wife of the Ambassador, he takes her up on it. This throws the two of them together, in a not annoying way, and it provides Britton with plenty of plot/character development-fodder. Britton makes the most of the opportunities, and she crafts some memorable scenes wherein the Listener has a chance to see each character, Luca and Emma, as being enTIREly aDORable. Most reviewers cited the pasta-making scene, and I heartily concur: What could be sweeter than a Man’s Man rolling up his shirtsleeves and kneading pasta dough? Well, maybe Emma getting flour on her nose to go along with that beguiling escaped tendril of lovely hair cascading down her neck.

There are plenty of sweet scenes, and there are even a few scenes of political intrigue to go with betrayal that add a bit of spice to the story. Then too, each and every dadgummed character was lively, intelligent, displayed keen wit, and one of said characters even discovered secret passageways to go with a newly-developed talent for writing. A character with dreams who’s actually acting on them? Yes, please!

Okay, now to a bit of a ? for Jessica Elisa Boyd’s performance. I truly liked her performance in Book 1, and for the most part she was awesome here. But I MUST ding her for the first part of the book wherein it felt as tho’ she was but testing out her accent for Luca. Sicily? Okay. End result? Oh my, think not Italian so much as Transylvanian. Truly, I kept expecting Luca to suddenly turn into a bat, or get a hankering for blood, or to end the tale with a stake through his heart. I KNOW!!! And I’ll shut up now cuz Boyd seems to finally settle into a proper rhythm for Italian-esque lilts by the second half of the story. One more thing tho’ cuz I canNOT contain myself: For Luca’s snide and imperious secretary? Oh my, you can HEAR Boyd pinching her nose to get that nasal whine outta him, and nose-pinching is always roundly Boooo-ed on my end because I happen to believe that truly talented narrators do not have to resort to such practices to distinguish characters. Characters should be memorable based upon their actions, NOT because we can see the narrator in her booth with nose firmly pinched between thumb and forefinger. Okay okay okay, I’ll shut up now, for real. Because Emma’s voice was quite lovely and very much evocative of a strong, dependable, incredibly intelligent young woman with a bit o’ brass thrown in to make her even more interesting. All in all, a fine performance, and I’m sooo shut up now, do y’ see?

The best part of this whole book?

The fact that there are so many characters, and Britton’s talent is limitless. Book 3 coming up? Soon!

Onward, tally ho!!!