Sounds like you and I might share some tastes in reading matter, Sherry! I have also read some of Nancy Butler's work, and enjoyed it.
You've intrigued me, too - I must get around to trying Madeline Hunter some time. I'd heard that she was writing Regencies, but with so much going on in my life over the last six months or so (and such a huge TBR - that's To Be Read - pile) I haven't had a chance.
I can't help but feel that Nora Roberts is overrated and dreadful. What have I missed? Somebody enlighten me....
I'm right there with you on the overrated and dreadful.
Same with Catherine Coulter, whose historicals sell in the millions, but she (a) can't write without making endless grammatical errors; (b) has a very simplistic style, with lots of repetition; (c) has a poor grasp on context, meaning that her books are full of anachronisms - characters behaving in a way they would not have in the time-period, dialogue which is so out of place it makes me wince (including Americanisms out of the mouths of members of the English aristocracy
) and so on; (d) uses silly and unbelievable plot contrivances. I've only ever read two of her books. In one of them, a minor character did secret intelligence work for the government. He promptly announced this to the heroine, a woman he'd only just met!
(Mind you, Coulter is not alone in getting historical details wrong. I recently read a Regency in which the hero had 'biscuits' (the implication was of American-style hot biscuits) for breakfast!
)
Sherry, if you enjoy angsty plots which have rather more to them than your average frothy romance, then try some of Mary Jo Putney's earlier work (I really don't much care for what she's been writing lately). In The Rake, the hero is an alcoholic, and his fight against addiction is painful and gripping. In Thunder and Roses, the hero is tormented by a painful past. Mary Balogh, too, writes excellent, well-researched regencies, well up to the high standards I demand of my reading matter.
And, if you can get hold of them, I
strongly recommend Jean Ross Ewing - mostly for Illusion, though the sequel, Flowers Under Ice, is also very enjoyable.
If you're interested, you can get a better idea of my reading tastes
here Wendy
