BOOK REVIEW: Keeping the Castle by Patrice Kindl

KEEPING THE CASTLE
by Patrice Kindl
Viking's Childrens, 2012
ISBN13: 9780670014385
YA/Adult Romance (Clean)

ABOUT THE BOOK

Seventeen-year-old Althea is the sole support of her entire family, and she must marry well. But there are few wealthy suitors--or suitors of any kind--in their small Yorkshire town of Lesser Hoo. Then, the young and attractive (and very rich) Lord Boring arrives, and Althea sets her plans in motion. There's only one problem; his friend and business manager Mr. Fredericks keeps getting in the way. And, as it turns out, Fredericks has his own set of plans . . . This witty take on the classic Regency--Patrice Kindl's first novel in a decade--is like literary champagne!
  
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (written by author, from Goodreads)


I was born in Alplaus New York in 1951, the youngest of four daughters. My father is a mechanical engineer, my mother a housewife. My family is very nice – I like them all a lot. As a child I loved animals and read obsessively.

We had (still have) a family cottage on Lake George. The people who live next door are life-long friends. On summer weekdays during my childhood there were ten females in the two houses, no males. As a result of this background I feel that I understand girls better than boys, which is why I write primarily for girls.

After high school I went to Webster College in St. Louis, Missouri. Oddly enough, given the location, it was a well-thought-of theater school. I attended for a year and a half and then (this was the 60’s, early 70’s) dropped out and decamped for New York City and a real drama school (not a liberal arts college like Webster). I appeared in a few television commercials, waitressed, auditioned and did a little modeling.

After three or four years of this sort of thing I realized I was going nowhere fast. I came back upstate and worked, at first full-time and then, after I married and my son was born, part-time, as a secretary at a consulting engineering firm called Encotech. As a result, I am an excellent touch typist today, which is handy for a writer.

I only began writing seriously when I was in my late thirties and was first published in my early forties. While I worked on OWL IN LOVE (my first book) I became involved in a program called Helping Hands, in which I raised two monkeys to be aides to quadriplegics. You can check it out at www.helpinghandsmonkeys.org. You can see a photograph of Kandy on this page and Susi on the FAQ page.
 
My husband Paul is president of Encotech (that’s where I met him). My son Alex is 25. He and his art rock band Bible Study (no religious connotation) live with us part-time. They rehearse directly over my office, so it is lucky that I think they are great musicians (Click here to listen to one of their songs). The vocalist is one of America’s few female Master Falconers. When the band is in residence we also have several hawks or falcons.

REVIEW

I'll say right here at the beginning of this review that I have a special love for clean regency romances that are humorous. And this book definitely falls into that category.  Althea made me laugh from the first chapter where she informs a suitor who is proposing to her that yes she will marry him, because he has money.  He is insulted and storms off, despite the fact that he wants to marry her because she is beautiful.  The interactions of Althea and Mr. Fredericks though are the best.  They are so much alike and yet neither seems to recognize it.  Althea thinks Mr. Fredericks is rude (he often is very blunt in his opinions and curiosity) and yet when he leaves, life is suddenly rather boring. While Althea is at first interested in Lord Boring, a new neighbor, with looks, manners, and money, she slowly realizes that he is not exactly what she thought he was. If you enjoy, regency stories that are clean but full of humor and snort-inducing moments, I highly recommend this one.