Status Updates From Surrender the Night

Only a book from 80s will have a heroine suntanned face described as attractive in 1847

Her heart had gone the way of her virginity: sneakily.

The story got so intriguing with the Hungarian Revolt, but the h is ruining it for me. She is selling guns to rebels. Yea, that's going to work out well for everybody! I feel so sorry for her husband

I'm trying to like this book, but the pacing is so slow

Slow beginning. I'm ready for the intrigue that CM does so well

love that it starts with an insane party and a really gross accident. romance should be DISGUSTING.

They are not having sex yet but he's TeacHinG hEr hOW to SwiM 😭

~romance~

What year did we decide that all historicals had to be Regencies with tepid politics because I truly believe we lost something great

Yeah, sure. Who wouldn't fall for a petulant control freak with no discernible life skills who allowed his aunt to choose you on his behalf for a marriage of convenience, but won't follow the agreed-upon contract & release you even though he's still besotted with his deceased wife, who cheated on him & treated him like crap? But...but...he taught you how to fish! IT MUST BE LOVE. 😱

I am so bored. If this was an unknown author I'd already have DNF'd, but I'll give it another 50 pages out of respect for Monson. If I'm not into it by then, bye-bye.

The style of this is soooo different from STORMFIRE, or even RANGOON. It's much more...lighthearted. Cheesy. I'm not sure I like it. Monson normally has a vivid darkness to her prose, but there are only flashes of it here -- it seems to be more about Eliza's dry humor than anything else. *scratches head*

"I may be shy, Signor Rossi, but did you really think me demure? Only a creature made either of mush or metal could agree to marry a total stranger. I rather doubt the princess chose me because she thought Prince Sztarai could squeeze me through his fingers."

Let there be sleep after death...Let me not be lonely for her. Let my desire be as ashes, my heart as a stone lost in a dark river.

Death has many faces: cruel and kind and mischievous. I've been both his friend and foe, but I always see him clearest when he comes to play with children.

"I came back," she murmured. "What more do you want? "

His fingers knotted in her hair. "More than a damned scrap of paper between us. I want blood of my blood, bone of my bone. Your hard little heart and your stubborn, scheming brain."

Oddly enough, Chapter 1 starts with dead birds start falling from a silk cloth that is stretched across the ballroom ceiling. And the birds that survive being suffocated crash into the chandeliers and frescoes.

We also find out that Eliza is "was trapped like one of the frantic birds that had begun this whole adventure." As Eliza is entering the carriage, Princess Elizabeth von Schmerling is watching her.

I'm intrigued to see what happens next.

So the prologue is called "The Gilded Snare" and is only a paragraph long.

Eliza's panic has "soared to the screeching point". By the by, Eliza has "golden eyes".

Also Prince Miklos Sztarai and Lake Como are only minutes away.

I'm reading this thanks to Open Library. Right now I'm reading the prologue.