For the month of March, we are to read a “Historical romance or fiction or mystery” and my choice is the sequel to Empress Orchid by Anchee Min, which I read for another TBR challenge some three years ago.

My fascination with history doesn’t just stop at wars, knights, and myths.  A large part of the curiosity has to do with the roles women play in those olden days.  Take the rare few female monarchs for example, Queen Elizabeth, Wu Ze Tian, Cleopatra, and the controversial Empress Cixi (Tzu Hsi), the kind of power play, politics and sacrifices they were inevitably drawn into sure make them intriguing figures to study.

The Last Empress, written in first person, traces the trials and heartaches the young widowed Empress Cixi experienced in trying to raise her young son, the heir to a doomed kingdom which has barely recovered from a damaging Opium War with several power hungry European nations. Now, in our part of the world, Cixi has always been portrayed, in drama, movies and TV serials, as a stern, insecure matriarch who refused to cede authority and government of the country over to her sons, first Emperor Tung Chih, and then Guang Hsu.

It has been an interesting month of reading with some historical romances by an acclaimed writer and contemporary works by new authors, thrown into my diet of fantasy romances that form the staple reading material on my bookshelf.

First, the historical romances. I’ve long enjoyed the woks of Eloisa James, who is well-known for weaving Shakespeare verses, and poetry into her novels, most of which are acclaimed best-sellers for the highly entertaining plots and engaging characters Ms James has created. I’ve not looked back since I first picked up Potent Pleasures, so it should be no surprise that my eyes lit when I saw her latest books, Desperate Duchesses and When the Duke Returns.

This latest Desperate Duchesses series, which James revealed in  is her take of “Desperate Housewives set in Georgian England”, has all the drama, intriguing affairs, delicious suspense, and relationship issues that happened in the television series, but with lots of romance and comical moments caused by the wilful and colossal misunderstandings perpetrated by the main characters involved. Stringing all these plot fillers together is the friendship amongst the four intelligent titled women, and the heartbreaks and emotional battles they go through before finding true happiness.

Amongst the many paranormal romance authors I’ve read, Jacquelyn Frank was one of the most memorable ones for the Nightwalkers race and the universe she’s created around them.

The irony of naming the various heroes of her books, excepting Damien, the Vampire Prince, after famous Biblical characters was not lost on fans. But brushing aside that transgression, the stories Ms Frank has created made for some incredibly enjoyable reading.

Take Damien and Noah, the latest two instalments in that series, for instance. The author up the ante by introducing a potentially explosive development in the union of Damien with Syreena, the Lycanthrope Princess who has intrigued him since Book 2 or 3. As if that’s not enough, towards the end of the book, the secret behind the powerful union was revealed and subsequently used by the rogue Nightwalkers led by Ruth with dire consequences. But enough of my rambling, if you’re not convinced of reading this racy, sensual paranormal, the synopsis here, and this stellar review by bookaholic Gin, should be persuasion enough, I hope.