Review – If He’s Wicked by Hannah Howell

Hannah Howell is comfort reading for me, and she is one of those historical authors that I have reread so many times. But I’ll admit, when she left the Murray/Macenroy families I kind of just stopped. I wasn’t sure I wanted a new commitment, and a new family. So I just kind of avoided her for the past 6 years, until earlier this year when Highland Guard came out and it reminded me why even the books that don’t blow me away make me so happy to settle in and read them. So I looked around and realized Oh heck, there’s like 7 books in this “new” series, where do I even start? Well at the beginning actually, so I got my Houston library card and settled myself on the waiting list.

And once I started reading this, I remembered the other reason I passed this book over, and consequently the series as a whole. It was my old bugaboo; spousal infidelity. Granted, in this case Julian’s wife is one of the most evil women imaginable, but yeah, this is not my favorite trope. It wasn’t so bad, because Beatrice is so completely, irredeemably, evil, but that is kind of another issue for me, the cardboard evil woman. But, we never see them living as husband and wife, so it is not the worst handled way for this trope. I judged it tolerable.

Honestly, I don’t have a ton to say about this book. The paranormal aspects are fun and like the Murray’s times 100, plus it looks like we have a fun cast of familial characters to dig into. I liked the hero and heroine though they might be a tad too blandly perfect. And the story was oddly happy despite any horrible things that happened. So it was a pleasant way to while away a few hours. I don’t regret reading it and would recommend it to fans of wall paper historicals who like to glom series, as I will likely keep reading the rest of it.