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A Christmas Promise
Alternate cover found here.
A love that cannot be bought or sold proves to be the greatest gift of all, in this heartwarming classic that demonstrates once again why New York Times bestselling author Mary Balogh is among the most celebrated authors of historical romance.
Weddings are supposed to be joyous occasions—especially when a couple seems as well matched as Randolph Pierce, Earl of Falloden, and his bride-to-be, Eleanor Transome. Ellie brings to the marriage a vast dowry, while Falloden, though distant, is handsome, tremendously desirable, and possessed of a title most young ladies can only dream of sharing.
Yet Ellie is not most young ladies. She knows that she must honor her dear father’s dying wish for her to wed the proud earl, but she dreads a lifetime in a union without love—and how can Falloden claim to love her when he married her only for her fortune? As Christmas descends upon the Falloden manor, the warmth of the season may yet melt away the trappings of duty and wealth, leaving behind only a man and a woman destined for each other’s arms.
A love that cannot be bought or sold proves to be the greatest gift of all, in this heartwarming classic that demonstrates once again why New York Times bestselling author Mary Balogh is among the most celebrated authors of historical romance.
Weddings are supposed to be joyous occasions—especially when a couple seems as well matched as Randolph Pierce, Earl of Falloden, and his bride-to-be, Eleanor Transome. Ellie brings to the marriage a vast dowry, while Falloden, though distant, is handsome, tremendously desirable, and possessed of a title most young ladies can only dream of sharing.
Yet Ellie is not most young ladies. She knows that she must honor her dear father’s dying wish for her to wed the proud earl, but she dreads a lifetime in a union without love—and how can Falloden claim to love her when he married her only for her fortune? As Christmas descends upon the Falloden manor, the warmth of the season may yet melt away the trappings of duty and wealth, leaving behind only a man and a woman destined for each other’s arms.
304 pages, ebook
First published December 1, 1992
361 people are currently reading
1955 people want to read
About the author
Mary Balogh
200 books6,337 followersMary Jenkins was born in 1944 in Swansea, Wales, UK. After graduating from university, moved to Saskatchewan, Canada, to teach high school English, on a two-year teaching contract in 1967. She married her Canadian husband, Robert Balogh, and had three children, Jacqueline, Christopher and Sian. When she's not writing, she enjoys reading, music and knitting. She also enjoys watching tennis and curling.
Mary Balogh started writing in the evenings as a hobby. Her first book, a Regency love story, was published in 1985 as A Masked Deception under her married name. In 1988, she retired from teaching after 20 years to pursue her dream to write full-time. She has written more than seventy novels and almost thirty novellas since then, including the New York Times bestselling 'Slightly' sextet and 'Simply' quartet. She has won numerous awards, including Bestselling Historical of the Year from the Borders Group, and her novel Simply Magic was a finalist in the Quill Awards. She has won seven Waldenbooks Awards and two B. Dalton Awards for her bestselling novels, as well as a Romantic Times Lifetime Achievement Award.
Mary Balogh started writing in the evenings as a hobby. Her first book, a Regency love story, was published in 1985 as A Masked Deception under her married name. In 1988, she retired from teaching after 20 years to pursue her dream to write full-time. She has written more than seventy novels and almost thirty novellas since then, including the New York Times bestselling 'Slightly' sextet and 'Simply' quartet. She has won numerous awards, including Bestselling Historical of the Year from the Borders Group, and her novel Simply Magic was a finalist in the Quill Awards. She has won seven Waldenbooks Awards and two B. Dalton Awards for her bestselling novels, as well as a Romantic Times Lifetime Achievement Award.
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December 15, 2023
Yet again, it’s time to re-post this review of my favorite Christmas romance.
****
With the holiday season fast approaching, some readers look for good Christmas novels. I'm re-posting this review because A Christmas Promise is just fabulous -- warm, heart-breaking, and funny.
* * * *
I generally don't care for Christmas-related romances, but Mary Balogh overcame all of my prejudices with this one. I'm surprised at myself, but this truly deserves five stars.
Eleanor Transome is a cit, the daughter of a fabulously wealthy coal merchant. Although she has been educated to be a proper lady, she has no desire to elevate her social standing and yearns only to marry her second cousin Wilfred. He, however, is a mere clerk and has told her that he cannot marry her as he has no prospects and refuses to live off of his wife's wealth.
Randolph Pierce has recently succeeded his spendthrift cousin as Earl of Falloden. He is virtually penniless, but he cannot bring himself to sell his beloved ancestral home Grenfell Park. When Eleanor's father buys up all of Randolph's debts and offers to forgive them if Randolph marries Eleanor, Randolph is repulsed but tempted. He knows that his true love's father will never let her marry an impoverished earl.
Randolph reluctantly decides to marry Eleanor, and Eleanor agrees to marry Randolph, but only because her father is on the verge of death and she will do anything to make him happy in his final days.
At this point, experienced romance readers may spot a resemblance to Georgette Heyer's A Civil Contract, one of her best Regencies. While that book, however, is largely melancholy, this one takes a more optimistic turn.
Neither Randolph nor Eleanor is happy about this marriage, and they get off to a terrible start. When Eleanor's father dies shortly thereafter, Eleanor can't even grieve, and Randolph decides that she is a cold, social-climbing bitch. She thinks him an equally cold, wastrel snob.
Things begin to change, however, when they journey to Grenfell Park for Christmas. To spite Randolph and to obey her father's request that she let off mourning and celebrate Christmas, Eleanor invites her entire extended family for the holiday -- twenty loud, boisterous, and vulgar aunts, uncles, and cousins. Randolph has already invited four aristocratic friends who have nowhere else to go, thinking that they five will get in a lot of shooting.
At Grenfell Park, Eleanor and Randolph begin to develop an unwilling attraction, but they continue to spar with hurtful words and actions. There is a lot, perhaps too much, internal dialog, as both spouses begin to see one another in a new light. The arrival of Eleanor's family brings in lots of humor; my favorite being their addressing the earl as "Randy."
Balogh sets out an entirely credible story, as Eleanor and Randolph gradually change and eventually fall in love with one another.
This book made me smile. I'll bet you will too.
****
With the holiday season fast approaching, some readers look for good Christmas novels. I'm re-posting this review because A Christmas Promise is just fabulous -- warm, heart-breaking, and funny.
* * * *
I generally don't care for Christmas-related romances, but Mary Balogh overcame all of my prejudices with this one. I'm surprised at myself, but this truly deserves five stars.
Eleanor Transome is a cit, the daughter of a fabulously wealthy coal merchant. Although she has been educated to be a proper lady, she has no desire to elevate her social standing and yearns only to marry her second cousin Wilfred. He, however, is a mere clerk and has told her that he cannot marry her as he has no prospects and refuses to live off of his wife's wealth.
Randolph Pierce has recently succeeded his spendthrift cousin as Earl of Falloden. He is virtually penniless, but he cannot bring himself to sell his beloved ancestral home Grenfell Park. When Eleanor's father buys up all of Randolph's debts and offers to forgive them if Randolph marries Eleanor, Randolph is repulsed but tempted. He knows that his true love's father will never let her marry an impoverished earl.
Randolph reluctantly decides to marry Eleanor, and Eleanor agrees to marry Randolph, but only because her father is on the verge of death and she will do anything to make him happy in his final days.
At this point, experienced romance readers may spot a resemblance to Georgette Heyer's A Civil Contract, one of her best Regencies. While that book, however, is largely melancholy, this one takes a more optimistic turn.
Neither Randolph nor Eleanor is happy about this marriage, and they get off to a terrible start. When Eleanor's father dies shortly thereafter, Eleanor can't even grieve, and Randolph decides that she is a cold, social-climbing bitch. She thinks him an equally cold, wastrel snob.
Things begin to change, however, when they journey to Grenfell Park for Christmas. To spite Randolph and to obey her father's request that she let off mourning and celebrate Christmas, Eleanor invites her entire extended family for the holiday -- twenty loud, boisterous, and vulgar aunts, uncles, and cousins. Randolph has already invited four aristocratic friends who have nowhere else to go, thinking that they five will get in a lot of shooting.
At Grenfell Park, Eleanor and Randolph begin to develop an unwilling attraction, but they continue to spar with hurtful words and actions. There is a lot, perhaps too much, internal dialog, as both spouses begin to see one another in a new light. The arrival of Eleanor's family brings in lots of humor; my favorite being their addressing the earl as "Randy."
Balogh sets out an entirely credible story, as Eleanor and Randolph gradually change and eventually fall in love with one another.
This book made me smile. I'll bet you will too.
November 4, 2025
Re-read 11/2025
Outstanding enemies to lovers romance, with carefully written character and relationship development.
Plus, marriage of convenience (one of my favourite tropes in hr).
All time favourite.
---------------
Re-read 08/2024:
The best enemies to lovers romance I've ever read.
All time favorite.
Marriage of convenience with two extremely unwilling MCs who are forced by circumstances and resent each other from the start.
The slow rapprochement was very satisfying to read, as were obviously the parts when the MMC asks for forgiveness (!), and the last part when FMC and MMC start to care for each other and we finally get to see them falling in love.
It's rare that the MMC is the first one to acknowledge the growing connection and love.
Excellent story telling.
Everything I wrote in my first review still stands (be aware of the TW below).
-------------
Read 12/2022
What a beautiful, beautiful novel this is... I seem to love Mary Balogh 's older books even more than her recent ones.
Her writing is fantastic. The pacing is very slow, it' s nearly painful to watch the main characters' journey to happiness.
Mary Balogh is a genius at starting a romance with the two MC's at opposite corners, despicing each other, treating each other with cold disdain, and oh so slowly paving a way toward each other. It's impressive how she managed to keep me invested and nearly doubting there could eventually be a hea. The MCs in this novel are so very precious it was painful reading how much they hurt on the inside.
Love it... this is one of my favorites by Mary Balogh!
5 stars.
TW: hero meets his mistress (off page) twice in the first weeks after the marriage. He later asks his wife for forgiveness, at a time when they still don't like each other but he is ashamed of his behaviour.
Outstanding enemies to lovers romance, with carefully written character and relationship development.
Plus, marriage of convenience (one of my favourite tropes in hr).
All time favourite.
---------------
Re-read 08/2024:
The best enemies to lovers romance I've ever read.
All time favorite.
Marriage of convenience with two extremely unwilling MCs who are forced by circumstances and resent each other from the start.
The slow rapprochement was very satisfying to read, as were obviously the parts when the MMC asks for forgiveness (!), and the last part when FMC and MMC start to care for each other and we finally get to see them falling in love.
It's rare that the MMC is the first one to acknowledge the growing connection and love.
Excellent story telling.
Everything I wrote in my first review still stands (be aware of the TW below).
-------------
Read 12/2022
What a beautiful, beautiful novel this is... I seem to love Mary Balogh 's older books even more than her recent ones.
Her writing is fantastic. The pacing is very slow, it' s nearly painful to watch the main characters' journey to happiness.
Mary Balogh is a genius at starting a romance with the two MC's at opposite corners, despicing each other, treating each other with cold disdain, and oh so slowly paving a way toward each other. It's impressive how she managed to keep me invested and nearly doubting there could eventually be a hea. The MCs in this novel are so very precious it was painful reading how much they hurt on the inside.
Love it... this is one of my favorites by Mary Balogh!
5 stars.
TW: hero meets his mistress (off page) twice in the first weeks after the marriage. He later asks his wife for forgiveness, at a time when they still don't like each other but he is ashamed of his behaviour.
December 3, 2016
DNF at 21%
In all fairness, I probably went into this with the wrong expectations. It's Mary Balogh, so I didn't bother to check reviews (and I seem to be in the minority with my opinion, anyway) and the cute cover and promise of a "heartwarming classic" promised a sweet Christmas story. Which, at least for the first 20%, is not what you get in my opinion. I am sorry to say this, but I found this neither heartwarming nor sweet. I've discussed this with people who've read and liked the book, and while I agree that this would be a more historically accurate portrayal of two people in their circumstances (and I applaud the author for a substantial plot that differs from the mainstream), to me it was too bleak and depressing to finish. I didn't like spending time with the characters, their actions (especially the wedding night...) made me uncomfortable, and so I decided to abandon this, I am sorry to say.
The plot (as least as far as I got): the hero just inherited his title and astronomical debts from his predecessor. One night, a coal merchant shows up, says he's dying and that his last wish is to see his daughter made a Viscountess. So he bought up the hero's debts and offers to settle them- if the hero marries the daughter. Otherwise he will call in the debts, which would result in the hero being send to a debtors prison. She will come with a massive dowry that will allow him to repair his estates and start over. So he agrees to marry her, and that's as far as I've gotten.
As I mentioned, I didn't get very far with this book. So aside from the wedding night, what bothered me was that both hero and heroine let their prejudices get the better of them. He thinks she a cold, vulgar, scheming, conniving bitch of "cit"- and treats her as such. She thinks he's a wastrel (without bothering to check how he came to be in so much debt), a cold aristocrat who is basically a waste of space- and treats him as such. They loath each other on sight because of their prejudices and treat each other like crap in my opinion. And I don't care if they end up happy, this amount of hostility makes me uncomfortable. And has me doubting that I'd end up believing they're in love at the end...
And then there was the wedding night from hell. I don't really want to relive it, so these quotes will have to do:
"He had expected a meek, submissive wife. He felt a surge of anger, and with it the desire to wipe that look from her eyes. The desire to hurt her, to humiliate her."
Lovely start. Add to that her recollection of this:
"contemplating the full horror of what had just happened- of what he had done to her and of the way she had reacted ... She had never been so terrified as she had been when her husband came to her",
and I am more than creeped out. I had to stop reading this scene several times.
And let's not forget this priceless gem from our "hero":
"He felt shame for his roughness, and hatred against her for having provoked it."
Yeah. Sure. Blame the poor 19-year-old for your inability to treat her with even a modicum of common courtesy.
I really tried to read just one more chapter after this, but I just couldn't. But honestly, I seem to be the total minority here, so please don't avoid this book. Just maybe go in knowing what to expect. I know that if I had know about any of this I wouldn't have read it. I'm not judging the book, really, I can see why other people enjoyed it, but sadly, it's just not for me.
Also, a pretty big trigger warning for others, they are both in love with other people at the beginning. The hero is in love with a girl he wants to marry AND keeps a mistress (he spends the day before the wedding with her and immediately after the wedding night, his first thoughts are about the mistress as well...). The heroine thinks she's in love with someone from her own class (he's a clerk and daddy disapproves...), and because she can't have him, she agrees to the marriage, hating the hero even more because he's not the man she loves. Personally, I didn't mind that under the circumstances, but I think it should be mentioned.
In all fairness, I probably went into this with the wrong expectations. It's Mary Balogh, so I didn't bother to check reviews (and I seem to be in the minority with my opinion, anyway) and the cute cover and promise of a "heartwarming classic" promised a sweet Christmas story. Which, at least for the first 20%, is not what you get in my opinion. I am sorry to say this, but I found this neither heartwarming nor sweet. I've discussed this with people who've read and liked the book, and while I agree that this would be a more historically accurate portrayal of two people in their circumstances (and I applaud the author for a substantial plot that differs from the mainstream), to me it was too bleak and depressing to finish. I didn't like spending time with the characters, their actions (especially the wedding night...) made me uncomfortable, and so I decided to abandon this, I am sorry to say.
The plot (as least as far as I got): the hero just inherited his title and astronomical debts from his predecessor. One night, a coal merchant shows up, says he's dying and that his last wish is to see his daughter made a Viscountess. So he bought up the hero's debts and offers to settle them- if the hero marries the daughter. Otherwise he will call in the debts, which would result in the hero being send to a debtors prison. She will come with a massive dowry that will allow him to repair his estates and start over. So he agrees to marry her, and that's as far as I've gotten.
As I mentioned, I didn't get very far with this book. So aside from the wedding night, what bothered me was that both hero and heroine let their prejudices get the better of them. He thinks she a cold, vulgar, scheming, conniving bitch of "cit"- and treats her as such. She thinks he's a wastrel (without bothering to check how he came to be in so much debt), a cold aristocrat who is basically a waste of space- and treats him as such. They loath each other on sight because of their prejudices and treat each other like crap in my opinion. And I don't care if they end up happy, this amount of hostility makes me uncomfortable. And has me doubting that I'd end up believing they're in love at the end...
And then there was the wedding night from hell. I don't really want to relive it, so these quotes will have to do:
"He had expected a meek, submissive wife. He felt a surge of anger, and with it the desire to wipe that look from her eyes. The desire to hurt her, to humiliate her."
Lovely start. Add to that her recollection of this:
"contemplating the full horror of what had just happened- of what he had done to her and of the way she had reacted ... She had never been so terrified as she had been when her husband came to her",
and I am more than creeped out. I had to stop reading this scene several times.
And let's not forget this priceless gem from our "hero":
"He felt shame for his roughness, and hatred against her for having provoked it."
Yeah. Sure. Blame the poor 19-year-old for your inability to treat her with even a modicum of common courtesy.
I really tried to read just one more chapter after this, but I just couldn't. But honestly, I seem to be the total minority here, so please don't avoid this book. Just maybe go in knowing what to expect. I know that if I had know about any of this I wouldn't have read it. I'm not judging the book, really, I can see why other people enjoyed it, but sadly, it's just not for me.
Also, a pretty big trigger warning for others, they are both in love with other people at the beginning. The hero is in love with a girl he wants to marry AND keeps a mistress (he spends the day before the wedding with her and immediately after the wedding night, his first thoughts are about the mistress as well...). The heroine thinks she's in love with someone from her own class (he's a clerk and daddy disapproves...), and because she can't have him, she agrees to the marriage, hating the hero even more because he's not the man she loves. Personally, I didn't mind that under the circumstances, but I think it should be mentioned.
April 3, 2018
I read this as part of the Drunk Literacy series on my channel. My roommates and I each read a Christmas-themed romance book and then review them. I ranted about this book quite a lot while I was drunk.
I will soberly tell you here that this book isn't the greatest. The writing style is alright but the plot (and sex scenes!!) leaves more to be desired. The only thing I liked was Eleanor's family.
Watch the crazy drunken rant here: https://youtu.be/IvWTSHMhceA
I will soberly tell you here that this book isn't the greatest. The writing style is alright but the plot (and sex scenes!!) leaves more to be desired. The only thing I liked was Eleanor's family.
Watch the crazy drunken rant here: https://youtu.be/IvWTSHMhceA
December 13, 2013
I’m not someone who specifically seeks out Christmas-themed books to read around this time of year, but I’ve had this on my TBR pile for a while now, and it caught my eye when I was scrolling through my Kindle looking for my next read - so I thought, “why not?”
A Christmas Promise pushes two of my favourite buttons – the arranged marriage and a nice dollop of angst before we get to the HEA – as our two protagonists, an impoverished earl and the daughter of a wealthy coal merchant, enter into a hasty marriage and seem determined to make the worst of it.
Randolph Pierce, Earl of Falloden has recently inherited his title and encumbered estates from a dissolute cousin and needs money desperately if he is to be able to maintain his family home of Grenfell Park. He has been urged to sell the estate in order to pay off the debts, but he has an affection for the place, having spent his childhood there, and he does not wish to sell.
Eleanor Transome’s father, Joseph, is a self-made man, wealthier than many of the ton but despised by them for his lowly origins and cruelly labelled a cit. He is dying, and wants to ensure that his beloved daughter will be cared for after his death, so he sets himself to finding a husband for her. Having decided that Lord Falloden will be a good choice, he beards the earl in his London home to propose the match.
While annoyed at Transome’s presumption, Falloden knows he has little alternative but to agree if he is to remain solvent, and the pair are married within a few days. Their first meeting did not go well, leaving both with a poor opinion of the other, and these impressions are compounded during the early days of their marriage.
Randolph believes Eleanor to be nothing but a cold-hearted, social-climber while the new countess believes her husband to be a profligate snob; and they make no bones about making those opinions very clear to each other.
When Eleanor is told (erroneously, in fact) that her husband is keeping a mistress, she decides to exact her revenge in a way she thinks will upset him the most, and invites her entire family to Grenfell Park for Christmas, believing Falloden will find them loud and vulgar. Her family – consisting of numerous uncles, aunts, cousins and offspring – has always been close and they have always spent Christmas together. Her father’s dying wish was that Eleanor not mourn too long and that she made sure she had a very happy Christmas – for him - and she is determined to honour that wish.
Although he is somewhat surprised to discover just how many of his wife’s relatives will be joining them over the festive season, Randolph retains his composure – having already realised that that is one of the best ways to annoy his wife. But when the family appears, he very quickly finds that he enjoys their boisterous company, and that he is envious of the way they can act spontaneously, and find enjoyment in the simplest of things. All his life, he has been conscious of his position as the scion of a noble family, and it emerges that his boyhood Christmases were rather dull, with Christmas Day coming and going much as any other day of the year. (Can I get a “Bah! Humbug!” for Randolph’s starchy grandmother?!)
But now, his home is filled with laughter and love and light – and he likes it.
While everyone throws themselves into getting the house ready for Christmas, Randolph and Eleanor are starting to see each other differently. While I can agree with others that perhaps Eleanor held on to her misconceptions about her husband for too long, I can also see why she was doing it. It’s clear to the reader that her supposed coldness has nothing to do with a lack of emotion and everything to do with the fact that she feels things deeply, and had no wish to display her true emotions in front of the stranger she was expected to marry. Her natural reaction to feeling embarrassed or hurt is to stand her ground and lash out – and she continues to do this long after Randolph has realised that he wants to make a go of their marriage, throwing his tentative overtures back into his face.
But she has started to admit to herself that her opinions about her husband’s snobbery and profligacy are wrong, and that she yearns for tenderness from him. There’s a lovely, angsty scene when he’s about to take her to bed where her internal voice is almost screaming at her to ask for more than an emotionless sexual act, but she just can’t do it. Her inner defence mechanisms are so strong that she can’t let them down, and while on the one hand, I was frustrated by her pig-headedness in continuing to think the worst of Randolph, on the other I felt sorry for her because she was so paralysed by her fears as not to be able to ask for or enjoy such essential, human requirements – comfort and affection.
The misconstrued – and misconstruing – spouses do, of course, come to a better understanding of one another, in a way that is both emotionally satisfying and very naturalistic. The writing is gorgeous; the characterisation all round is fantastic and the love scenes, while not at all explicit, are hot, serving to remind yet again that in the hands of a truly skilled author, less can be more.
This is one of those books in which Christmas actually plays a key role, rather than just being there in the title as a marketing ploy for a story that could have taken place at any time of the year. There’s much to celebrate for the wonderful Transome family, even as they deal with the loss of a beloved brother, uncle and father; and for Eleanor and Randolph, there’s a new beginning and a promising future.
It’s a truly heart-warming read for any time of the year, but I think it’s best savoured on a cold winters’ evening with a steaming cuppa and your favourite chocolates! And maybe a few tissues on hand, just in case.
A Christmas Promise pushes two of my favourite buttons – the arranged marriage and a nice dollop of angst before we get to the HEA – as our two protagonists, an impoverished earl and the daughter of a wealthy coal merchant, enter into a hasty marriage and seem determined to make the worst of it.
Randolph Pierce, Earl of Falloden has recently inherited his title and encumbered estates from a dissolute cousin and needs money desperately if he is to be able to maintain his family home of Grenfell Park. He has been urged to sell the estate in order to pay off the debts, but he has an affection for the place, having spent his childhood there, and he does not wish to sell.
Eleanor Transome’s father, Joseph, is a self-made man, wealthier than many of the ton but despised by them for his lowly origins and cruelly labelled a cit. He is dying, and wants to ensure that his beloved daughter will be cared for after his death, so he sets himself to finding a husband for her. Having decided that Lord Falloden will be a good choice, he beards the earl in his London home to propose the match.
While annoyed at Transome’s presumption, Falloden knows he has little alternative but to agree if he is to remain solvent, and the pair are married within a few days. Their first meeting did not go well, leaving both with a poor opinion of the other, and these impressions are compounded during the early days of their marriage.
Randolph believes Eleanor to be nothing but a cold-hearted, social-climber while the new countess believes her husband to be a profligate snob; and they make no bones about making those opinions very clear to each other.
When Eleanor is told (erroneously, in fact) that her husband is keeping a mistress, she decides to exact her revenge in a way she thinks will upset him the most, and invites her entire family to Grenfell Park for Christmas, believing Falloden will find them loud and vulgar. Her family – consisting of numerous uncles, aunts, cousins and offspring – has always been close and they have always spent Christmas together. Her father’s dying wish was that Eleanor not mourn too long and that she made sure she had a very happy Christmas – for him - and she is determined to honour that wish.
Although he is somewhat surprised to discover just how many of his wife’s relatives will be joining them over the festive season, Randolph retains his composure – having already realised that that is one of the best ways to annoy his wife. But when the family appears, he very quickly finds that he enjoys their boisterous company, and that he is envious of the way they can act spontaneously, and find enjoyment in the simplest of things. All his life, he has been conscious of his position as the scion of a noble family, and it emerges that his boyhood Christmases were rather dull, with Christmas Day coming and going much as any other day of the year. (Can I get a “Bah! Humbug!” for Randolph’s starchy grandmother?!)
But now, his home is filled with laughter and love and light – and he likes it.
While everyone throws themselves into getting the house ready for Christmas, Randolph and Eleanor are starting to see each other differently. While I can agree with others that perhaps Eleanor held on to her misconceptions about her husband for too long, I can also see why she was doing it. It’s clear to the reader that her supposed coldness has nothing to do with a lack of emotion and everything to do with the fact that she feels things deeply, and had no wish to display her true emotions in front of the stranger she was expected to marry. Her natural reaction to feeling embarrassed or hurt is to stand her ground and lash out – and she continues to do this long after Randolph has realised that he wants to make a go of their marriage, throwing his tentative overtures back into his face.
But she has started to admit to herself that her opinions about her husband’s snobbery and profligacy are wrong, and that she yearns for tenderness from him. There’s a lovely, angsty scene when he’s about to take her to bed where her internal voice is almost screaming at her to ask for more than an emotionless sexual act, but she just can’t do it. Her inner defence mechanisms are so strong that she can’t let them down, and while on the one hand, I was frustrated by her pig-headedness in continuing to think the worst of Randolph, on the other I felt sorry for her because she was so paralysed by her fears as not to be able to ask for or enjoy such essential, human requirements – comfort and affection.
The misconstrued – and misconstruing – spouses do, of course, come to a better understanding of one another, in a way that is both emotionally satisfying and very naturalistic. The writing is gorgeous; the characterisation all round is fantastic and the love scenes, while not at all explicit, are hot, serving to remind yet again that in the hands of a truly skilled author, less can be more.
This is one of those books in which Christmas actually plays a key role, rather than just being there in the title as a marketing ploy for a story that could have taken place at any time of the year. There’s much to celebrate for the wonderful Transome family, even as they deal with the loss of a beloved brother, uncle and father; and for Eleanor and Randolph, there’s a new beginning and a promising future.
It’s a truly heart-warming read for any time of the year, but I think it’s best savoured on a cold winters’ evening with a steaming cuppa and your favourite chocolates! And maybe a few tissues on hand, just in case.
November 19, 2016
Read this for 12 Tasks of the Festive Season:
Task the Third: The Holiday Party:
- Read a book where a celebration is a big part of the action. Examples would include holiday parties, country house hunting/weekend parties, weddings, etc.
This meets the holiday party criteria, the heroine's family and a couple of the hero's friends gather at their home for a week to celebrate Christmas.
He felt disgust and shame at what he was doing. He was marrying for money.
I had a couple friends tell me they thought pretty highly of this book and I see why. Eleanor's father is dying and he wants to make sure that she is settled so he buys the debts of an Earl and tells him he'll forgive them if he marries his daughter. Randolph inherited the debts along with the earldom but sees no way out of it, so he decides to marry who he calls the cit because Eleanor's father made his money in coal. So, our heroine knows she's being married for money and our hero knows he's being married for position in society. This leads to them being very cold to one another.
She had done what she always did when she was afraid or angry or both. She had given as good as she had got.
With her father dying and having had a bad experience with aristocrats Eleanor throws up one heck of a wall and cold shoulder toward Randolph, he eventually ends up calling her "hedgehog". Which is a nickname I never thought I would delight in but oh did I. I think some will be annoyed/angry with how cold Eleanor was but I get her, she was in self-protection mode and not wanting Randolph to see her hurt because that would shame her. I did think their dagger throwing, especially on Eleanor's side went on a tad too long, I think we should have seen a stronger turning about around the 60% mark.
Was it that he wanted the physical closeness to her in the hope that it would bring some emotional closeness too?
This was originally published in 1992 and it has aged very well but it also has a more realistic telling of how people would have acted during this time than a lot of currently published historicals. Don't get me wrong, Eleanor is an extremely strong character but she asks for permission from her husband and acknowledges she has to obey him in certain situations. To me, she is all the better because of this realistic take, her strength is even more evident in how she maintained her sense of self in the face of the "rules" of her time. Thinking back, Randolph was probably a better man than I gave him credit for while reading. He was the one who seemed to want to give them a chance and walked further across the bridge that separated them. However, since I know it is a deal breaker for some,
If you're looking for holiday reading, this needs to be at the top of your list. The wintry and holiday atmosphere is fantastic in this story. They go sledding, picking holly, Christmas carols are sung, Christmas pageants, snowball fights, a family gathering, and etc. The hero and heroine's relationship might be a bit too prickly for some but I loved how real it felt. The wariness of being involved in an arranged marriage, the guarded standoffish of distrustfulness, and the eventual getting to know someone and coming together. This was a moving holiday read.
"Do we like each other?" she asked.
"Yes," he said. "We do."
Task the Third: The Holiday Party:
- Read a book where a celebration is a big part of the action. Examples would include holiday parties, country house hunting/weekend parties, weddings, etc.
This meets the holiday party criteria, the heroine's family and a couple of the hero's friends gather at their home for a week to celebrate Christmas.
He felt disgust and shame at what he was doing. He was marrying for money.
I had a couple friends tell me they thought pretty highly of this book and I see why. Eleanor's father is dying and he wants to make sure that she is settled so he buys the debts of an Earl and tells him he'll forgive them if he marries his daughter. Randolph inherited the debts along with the earldom but sees no way out of it, so he decides to marry who he calls the cit because Eleanor's father made his money in coal. So, our heroine knows she's being married for money and our hero knows he's being married for position in society. This leads to them being very cold to one another.
She had done what she always did when she was afraid or angry or both. She had given as good as she had got.
With her father dying and having had a bad experience with aristocrats Eleanor throws up one heck of a wall and cold shoulder toward Randolph, he eventually ends up calling her "hedgehog". Which is a nickname I never thought I would delight in but oh did I. I think some will be annoyed/angry with how cold Eleanor was but I get her, she was in self-protection mode and not wanting Randolph to see her hurt because that would shame her. I did think their dagger throwing, especially on Eleanor's side went on a tad too long, I think we should have seen a stronger turning about around the 60% mark.
Was it that he wanted the physical closeness to her in the hope that it would bring some emotional closeness too?
This was originally published in 1992 and it has aged very well but it also has a more realistic telling of how people would have acted during this time than a lot of currently published historicals. Don't get me wrong, Eleanor is an extremely strong character but she asks for permission from her husband and acknowledges she has to obey him in certain situations. To me, she is all the better because of this realistic take, her strength is even more evident in how she maintained her sense of self in the face of the "rules" of her time. Thinking back, Randolph was probably a better man than I gave him credit for while reading. He was the one who seemed to want to give them a chance and walked further across the bridge that separated them. However, since I know it is a deal breaker for some,
If you're looking for holiday reading, this needs to be at the top of your list. The wintry and holiday atmosphere is fantastic in this story. They go sledding, picking holly, Christmas carols are sung, Christmas pageants, snowball fights, a family gathering, and etc. The hero and heroine's relationship might be a bit too prickly for some but I loved how real it felt. The wariness of being involved in an arranged marriage, the guarded standoffish of distrustfulness, and the eventual getting to know someone and coming together. This was a moving holiday read.
"Do we like each other?" she asked.
"Yes," he said. "We do."
November 24, 2018
A very early Balogh, and I think that shows. It's a great Christmas book, and a wonderful Marriage of Convenience story. I particularly enjoyed how well they were setup to dislike one another. Yeah, they could have overcome lots by talking things out. But they had no realistic basis for that communication to happen, starting with having no reason to trust one another.
I loved how well suited they were and how their strengths were set against each other to start. Eleanor's stoicism in adversity makes Randolph misread her and his congenial personality make her misread him in like manner. So they spend much of the novel talking past each other and while that normally frustrates me, in this case it was well-earned and beautifully delivered. Which made it a joy to see them come to appreciate those strengths as they each learned to understand the other better.
Holding this back from five stars are a lot of the surrounding characters. The Transomes (Eleanor's family) were a bit much and way too accepted by all. Yeah, they were kind but also boisterous and intrusive and it felt like Balogh put her thumb on the scale by having every reaction to them be amused, or at least tolerant. Randolph's friends were shallow, too, though in different ways. And having all the cross-party pairing up resolve so amicably strained credulity past breaking.
So I'm going with four stars for a light, fun read with a central romance that works very well. The Christmas bits were a nice backdrop, even if I think things were way too smooth.
A note about Steamy: There are at least three explicit sex scenes putting this in the middle of my steam tolerance. There's lots more sex happening, but it's mainly referenced rather than shown. Which is just as well because it was the magical kind that couldn't really work that way. Except the first which was outstandingly well-done as showing their conflict and dissatisfaction with one another manifest in their (lack of) sexual intimacy.
I loved how well suited they were and how their strengths were set against each other to start. Eleanor's stoicism in adversity makes Randolph misread her and his congenial personality make her misread him in like manner. So they spend much of the novel talking past each other and while that normally frustrates me, in this case it was well-earned and beautifully delivered. Which made it a joy to see them come to appreciate those strengths as they each learned to understand the other better.
Holding this back from five stars are a lot of the surrounding characters. The Transomes (Eleanor's family) were a bit much and way too accepted by all. Yeah, they were kind but also boisterous and intrusive and it felt like Balogh put her thumb on the scale by having every reaction to them be amused, or at least tolerant. Randolph's friends were shallow, too, though in different ways. And having all the cross-party pairing up resolve so amicably strained credulity past breaking.
So I'm going with four stars for a light, fun read with a central romance that works very well. The Christmas bits were a nice backdrop, even if I think things were way too smooth.
A note about Steamy: There are at least three explicit sex scenes putting this in the middle of my steam tolerance. There's lots more sex happening, but it's mainly referenced rather than shown. Which is just as well because it was the magical kind that couldn't really work that way. Except the first which was outstandingly well-done as showing their conflict and dissatisfaction with one another manifest in their (lack of) sexual intimacy.
July 12, 2020
Un'autrice che non conoscevo nel panorama dei romance storici e, sicuramente, rileggerò.
La storia è incentrata su un matrimonio combinato, tanto per cambiare, tra Eleanor Transome, figlia di un facoltoso commerciante di carbone e Lord Randolph Falloden. In realtà, più che un matrimonio combinato, lo definirei più un matrimonio estorto: essendo il nobiluomo caduto in rovina a causa della pessima gestione del patrimonio da parte dei suoi predecessori, gli viene proposto, dal padre della bella Eleanor, il saldo di tutti i debiti che gravano sul suo nome, se avesse acconsentito a sposare la sua figliola in tempi brevi. Il perché viene richiesta tanta celerità lo scoprirete leggendo e, per i tempi, è forse una delle più espansive forme di affetto filiale.
Se qualche volta mi prendessi la briga di leggere le trame dei libri che acquisto e parcheggio nel kindle, forse, potrei evitare di leggere novelle natalizie con trentasei gradi all'ombra. Già! È un romanzo perfetto da leggere durante le vacanze di Natale, con una "Stella Cometa" come protagonista e un insieme di personaggi molto folcloristici, che, seppur tutti gradevoli, a volte sembra togliessero il palcoscenico ai due protagonisti, davvero degni di nota.
"«E allora quella sarà la mia stella di Betlemme, perché sento che è così» mormorò il conte all’orecchio di sua moglie. «La tua e la mia.» Eleanor restò immobile contro di lui, a guardare il cielo, con la testa contro la sua spalla, in silenzio. Durò per un po’, quel magico silenzio, un silenzio durante il quale Randolph si sentì più vicino a lei di quanto mai si fosse sentito vicino a chiunque altro. Un silenzio durante il quale arrivò a credere che fossero una cosa sola, perché erano marito e moglie. Un silenzio in cui si innamorò perdutamente di lei."
Appuntatelo come lettura da leggere quando avrete un bel camino acceso e un albero addobbato sullo sfondo.
La storia è incentrata su un matrimonio combinato, tanto per cambiare, tra Eleanor Transome, figlia di un facoltoso commerciante di carbone e Lord Randolph Falloden. In realtà, più che un matrimonio combinato, lo definirei più un matrimonio estorto: essendo il nobiluomo caduto in rovina a causa della pessima gestione del patrimonio da parte dei suoi predecessori, gli viene proposto, dal padre della bella Eleanor, il saldo di tutti i debiti che gravano sul suo nome, se avesse acconsentito a sposare la sua figliola in tempi brevi. Il perché viene richiesta tanta celerità lo scoprirete leggendo e, per i tempi, è forse una delle più espansive forme di affetto filiale.
Se qualche volta mi prendessi la briga di leggere le trame dei libri che acquisto e parcheggio nel kindle, forse, potrei evitare di leggere novelle natalizie con trentasei gradi all'ombra. Già! È un romanzo perfetto da leggere durante le vacanze di Natale, con una "Stella Cometa" come protagonista e un insieme di personaggi molto folcloristici, che, seppur tutti gradevoli, a volte sembra togliessero il palcoscenico ai due protagonisti, davvero degni di nota.
"«E allora quella sarà la mia stella di Betlemme, perché sento che è così» mormorò il conte all’orecchio di sua moglie. «La tua e la mia.» Eleanor restò immobile contro di lui, a guardare il cielo, con la testa contro la sua spalla, in silenzio. Durò per un po’, quel magico silenzio, un silenzio durante il quale Randolph si sentì più vicino a lei di quanto mai si fosse sentito vicino a chiunque altro. Un silenzio durante il quale arrivò a credere che fossero una cosa sola, perché erano marito e moglie. Un silenzio in cui si innamorò perdutamente di lei."
Appuntatelo come lettura da leggere quando avrete un bel camino acceso e un albero addobbato sullo sfondo.
December 27, 2022
Rilettura in inglese.
Io adoro questo libro.
Ogni anno, in questo periodo, io DEVO leggere questa storia.
Per me, è tra i racconti con più sentimenti natalizi che ho letto.
Imperdibile.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
EDIT
Rilettura Natale 2017
Io adoro questo libro.
Il giusto mix di sentimenti Natalizi, commozione e divertimento.
EDIT
Rilettura Natale 2019
La mia lettura annuale natalizia 🎄 ... anche quest'anno non poteva mancare 💗
EDIT
e anche quest'anno non ho resistito 🤗
Io adoro questo libro.
Ogni anno, in questo periodo, io DEVO leggere questa storia.
Per me, è tra i racconti con più sentimenti natalizi che ho letto.
Imperdibile.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
EDIT
Rilettura Natale 2017
Io adoro questo libro.
Il giusto mix di sentimenti Natalizi, commozione e divertimento.
EDIT
Rilettura Natale 2019
La mia lettura annuale natalizia 🎄 ... anche quest'anno non poteva mancare 💗
EDIT
e anche quest'anno non ho resistito 🤗
March 31, 2016
I'm not sure what to make of this story. It's well written and definitely had me absorbed, but on some levels it didn't work for me. I found there to be more things wrong than right.
* The sexual scenes between the two were just that, sexual with absolutely no romance. Not my idea of romance.
* Most of the book they spent sniping and hating each other. She misses her father and is bitter for being forced to grant a dying man his wish and marry the hero. He is bitter for not being able to marry the woman he loves, but forced to marry a "Cit" in order to save his estate.
* He keeps his mistress and visits her in the beginning. I could get my head wrapped around the visits given the forced MOC. But what I despised most about it, was he actually gifts the mistress with a ruby bracelet bought by the heroine's money.
* There were way too many characters brought into the Christmas scenes. I had a hard time keeping track of them, their relationship and their impact to the story. Was that necessary?
Usually Balogh paints a gloomy start but carefully builds a road to HEA that is credible and believable to me. This time the change was so dramatic and so quick, I couldn't get there.
* The sexual scenes between the two were just that, sexual with absolutely no romance. Not my idea of romance.
* Most of the book they spent sniping and hating each other. She misses her father and is bitter for being forced to grant a dying man his wish and marry the hero. He is bitter for not being able to marry the woman he loves, but forced to marry a "Cit" in order to save his estate.
* He keeps his mistress and visits her in the beginning. I could get my head wrapped around the visits given the forced MOC. But what I despised most about it, was he actually gifts the mistress with a ruby bracelet bought by the heroine's money.
* There were way too many characters brought into the Christmas scenes. I had a hard time keeping track of them, their relationship and their impact to the story. Was that necessary?
Usually Balogh paints a gloomy start but carefully builds a road to HEA that is credible and believable to me. This time the change was so dramatic and so quick, I couldn't get there.
January 22, 2025
Ellie’s coal merchant father, with only days to live, buys all the debts the new Earl of Falloden inherited from his wastrel cousin and tells Falloden he can either marry his daughter or go to debtor’s prison.
Ellie agrees to marry the earl because she wants to grant her father’s dying wish and because the man she loves just dumped her.
Obviously a match made in heaven.
The earl assumes Ellie is a stone cold, title-grasping, social-climbing harpy, a vulgar, uncultured cit. Well, he got the harpy part right. Ellie assumes the earl is a profligate spendthrift, an inveterate gambler, and a cold, superior aristocrat. Well, she got the cold, superior aristocrat part right.
Falloden’s cold snobbishness drags on too long, but he does attempt civility in the face of Ellie’s animosity. Ellie’s shrewish comments, however, shut down every attempt on Falloden’s part. It was unprovoked vitriol, it was unpleasant, and it was unjustified. I think the author miscalculated how long the bad beginning of the marriage should last, and forgot to write the communication and understanding necessary to fix it.
So Balogh failed to turn this battleground into a love story, and the characters’ “I love you’s” at the end were completely unconvincing based, as they seemed to be, on nothing more than the fact they were married and having sex. “I misjudged you and we’re married, therefore I love you” just doesn’t do it for me.
I’m sorry that Christmas and Ellie’s terrific family got caught in the crosshairs, because those parts of the story were delightful. Those folks can come to my house for Christmas Eve anytime.
Ellie agrees to marry the earl because she wants to grant her father’s dying wish and because the man she loves just dumped her.
Obviously a match made in heaven.
The earl assumes Ellie is a stone cold, title-grasping, social-climbing harpy, a vulgar, uncultured cit. Well, he got the harpy part right. Ellie assumes the earl is a profligate spendthrift, an inveterate gambler, and a cold, superior aristocrat. Well, she got the cold, superior aristocrat part right.
Falloden’s cold snobbishness drags on too long, but he does attempt civility in the face of Ellie’s animosity. Ellie’s shrewish comments, however, shut down every attempt on Falloden’s part. It was unprovoked vitriol, it was unpleasant, and it was unjustified. I think the author miscalculated how long the bad beginning of the marriage should last, and forgot to write the communication and understanding necessary to fix it.
So Balogh failed to turn this battleground into a love story, and the characters’ “I love you’s” at the end were completely unconvincing based, as they seemed to be, on nothing more than the fact they were married and having sex. “I misjudged you and we’re married, therefore I love you” just doesn’t do it for me.
I’m sorry that Christmas and Ellie’s terrific family got caught in the crosshairs, because those parts of the story were delightful. Those folks can come to my house for Christmas Eve anytime.
December 22, 2020
Here's my Christmas promise: Never to read A CHRISTMAS PROMISE again. Perhaps its old age is partly to blame for some of the issues I have with this story first released in 1992.
In theory I should love this. It's a marriage of convenience with an impecunious peer forced to marry the daughter of a super-rich coal merchant. I like MOCs. It also has some Christmas spirit in it past the halfway point, with the hero's friends and the heroine's family getting together at the hero's country estate to celebrate the holidays. I like Christmas and romances that include a bit of the meaning of Christmas instead of just having the romance incidentally happening around that time.
But this marriage of convenience and the two people in it left a bad taste in my mouth for most of the story. They start out the marriage hating each other, with false assumptions about the other's character. He assumes she's a cold, unfeeling woman who is marrying him for the prestige of his title. He doesn't even believe she loves her own father or grieves his passing. And she believes him to be a hedonistic wastrel, who has lost all his money on gambling, drinking and loose women, not realizing it was the previous earl who had accrued massive debts which our hero, out of pride, is honoring.
They are horrid to each other and the bedroom scenes are cringe-worthy hate-sex scenarios, lacking any tenderness. Neither one reaches out to the other or tries to make a success of the marriage. Well, the sexually-untalented and borderline-rapist husband does try at times to improve their relationship out of the bedroom, just to be shot down by the uncooperative wife. They never seem to be on the same page at the same time and never, never, ever communicate to each other. No, instead Balogh has the reader on a never-ending loops of repetitive thoughts of both H and h. If only she had allowed us to mediate between the two, this could all have been cleared up in a page or two.
Instead, this was super frustrating to read. I wanted to knock both parties up the sides of their heads to get some sense into them. Balogh supplies us with a passel of relatives and friends to entertain us, but they weren't enough to make up for the mean-spirited couple. All in all, not my favorite Balogh holiday story. There are better ones in her anthologies CHRISTMAS MIRACLES and CHRISTMAS GIFTS.
In theory I should love this. It's a marriage of convenience with an impecunious peer forced to marry the daughter of a super-rich coal merchant. I like MOCs. It also has some Christmas spirit in it past the halfway point, with the hero's friends and the heroine's family getting together at the hero's country estate to celebrate the holidays. I like Christmas and romances that include a bit of the meaning of Christmas instead of just having the romance incidentally happening around that time.
But this marriage of convenience and the two people in it left a bad taste in my mouth for most of the story. They start out the marriage hating each other, with false assumptions about the other's character. He assumes she's a cold, unfeeling woman who is marrying him for the prestige of his title. He doesn't even believe she loves her own father or grieves his passing. And she believes him to be a hedonistic wastrel, who has lost all his money on gambling, drinking and loose women, not realizing it was the previous earl who had accrued massive debts which our hero, out of pride, is honoring.
They are horrid to each other and the bedroom scenes are cringe-worthy hate-sex scenarios, lacking any tenderness. Neither one reaches out to the other or tries to make a success of the marriage. Well, the sexually-untalented and borderline-rapist husband does try at times to improve their relationship out of the bedroom, just to be shot down by the uncooperative wife. They never seem to be on the same page at the same time and never, never, ever communicate to each other. No, instead Balogh has the reader on a never-ending loops of repetitive thoughts of both H and h. If only she had allowed us to mediate between the two, this could all have been cleared up in a page or two.
Instead, this was super frustrating to read. I wanted to knock both parties up the sides of their heads to get some sense into them. Balogh supplies us with a passel of relatives and friends to entertain us, but they weren't enough to make up for the mean-spirited couple. All in all, not my favorite Balogh holiday story. There are better ones in her anthologies CHRISTMAS MIRACLES and CHRISTMAS GIFTS.
December 15, 2010
This one was a difficult read for me. I can say that Mary Balogh certainly isn't afraid to "push the limits" of romancelandia, and she certainly does so with A Christmas Promise.
This marriage does not start out good...at all. It is an arranged marriage. Randolph will marry for money in order to get out of debts, and in return, Eleanor will become a member of the peerage. They have an intense dislike, even hate, for each other right off the bat.
******Warning****** for those that hate cheating in their romances, Randolph has a mistress and beds her twice after their marriage takes place.
I think one of the reasons this went immediately to PBS was that I really disliked Eleanor. Mary Balogh even lets the reader into Eleanor's head in order to understand her motives/reactions...and I STILL did not like her. For me, I have to like (or at least understand) the characters. I felt that Eleanor was far more haughty and nasty than Randolph. I needed more from her character...and when she finally broke at the end of the book, it was too late for me.
It is an emotional book, and some my love it....but IMHO Balogh has done much better (Heartless, A Temporary Wife, and A Precious Jewel).
This marriage does not start out good...at all. It is an arranged marriage. Randolph will marry for money in order to get out of debts, and in return, Eleanor will become a member of the peerage. They have an intense dislike, even hate, for each other right off the bat.
******Warning****** for those that hate cheating in their romances, Randolph has a mistress and beds her twice after their marriage takes place.
I think one of the reasons this went immediately to PBS was that I really disliked Eleanor. Mary Balogh even lets the reader into Eleanor's head in order to understand her motives/reactions...and I STILL did not like her. For me, I have to like (or at least understand) the characters. I felt that Eleanor was far more haughty and nasty than Randolph. I needed more from her character...and when she finally broke at the end of the book, it was too late for me.
It is an emotional book, and some my love it....but IMHO Balogh has done much better (Heartless, A Temporary Wife, and A Precious Jewel).
December 28, 2020
4.5 for this republished Regency, in digital format. Eleanor's dying father, who made his fortune in coal, bought a penniless peer for her. Elenear immediately realizes she must marry said peer, to give papa peace of mind. A death-bed wedding ensues. The newlyweds instantly dislike each other. He thinks her cold and grasping. She thinks him a lofty wastrel.
To keep her "Christmas Promise" to her dying da, Eleaor must celebrate the holiday. In part because she is lonely and sad (deeply missing her falther), and in part to thumb her nose at her noble husband, the new bride decides to throw a Christmas party at their estate and to invite her extended family -- boisterous, bourgeois bumpkins, one and all.
But her kin know how to keep Chrismas -- how to kick back and carouse! They are also kind and gruff and surprisingly knowledgable. Our noble nob enjoys himself, and no one is more surprised.
What else happens during the holiday house party? Love, of course.
This reissued Regency kept me engrossed, but it is a Balogh, and thus sometimes emotionally heavy, if you’re up for that. Quite good, with a sweet twist at the end.
If you like this convenient marriage trope, try A Civil Contract by Georgette, The Heyer.
To keep her "Christmas Promise" to her dying da, Eleaor must celebrate the holiday. In part because she is lonely and sad (deeply missing her falther), and in part to thumb her nose at her noble husband, the new bride decides to throw a Christmas party at their estate and to invite her extended family -- boisterous, bourgeois bumpkins, one and all.
But her kin know how to keep Chrismas -- how to kick back and carouse! They are also kind and gruff and surprisingly knowledgable. Our noble nob enjoys himself, and no one is more surprised.
What else happens during the holiday house party? Love, of course.
This reissued Regency kept me engrossed, but it is a Balogh, and thus sometimes emotionally heavy, if you’re up for that. Quite good, with a sweet twist at the end.
If you like this convenient marriage trope, try A Civil Contract by Georgette, The Heyer.
November 23, 2024
3.5 Stars!
A Christmas Promise is what I believe the kids call a bodice ripper. Just looking at the cover you know what you're going to get. Ellie and Randolph enter a marriage of convenience. They hate each at first but eventually fall madly in love.
In my continuing trip through the Romance genre I've found that I enjoy the Marriage of Convenience trope and as long as the man isn't an orgre I like these more classic Romance reads. I'm in my Christmas Romance mood so I'll probably read a few more before returning to my usual doom and gloom reads.
No recommendation but I enjoyed this book a whole lot.
A Christmas Promise is what I believe the kids call a bodice ripper. Just looking at the cover you know what you're going to get. Ellie and Randolph enter a marriage of convenience. They hate each at first but eventually fall madly in love.
In my continuing trip through the Romance genre I've found that I enjoy the Marriage of Convenience trope and as long as the man isn't an orgre I like these more classic Romance reads. I'm in my Christmas Romance mood so I'll probably read a few more before returning to my usual doom and gloom reads.
No recommendation but I enjoyed this book a whole lot.
December 15, 2024
He desired her. He desired his wife and she would submit herself to him.
It was his heart that was cold. His body was on fire.
That quote is 90% of the book in a nutshell. So if you expect a cozy Christmas love story with romantic fireworks, let me tell you: you will be disappointed.
Like many of Mary Balogh's books, this one tells the story of a marriage of convenience: A bankrupt earl, 28 years of age, is forced into a marriage with a 19-year-old girl by her terminally ill father, a rich coal merchant. Both are in love with someone else and have false assumptions about the other, so they are bitter and off to a bad start from their first meeting. All hope is pinned on the Christmas holiday at Grenfell Park, the earl's principal seat in Hampshire, and hope is eventually rewarded, but it's a long and rocky road.
First published in 1992, the age of this book really shows. I don't think that any author would write a romance like this today, let alone a Christmas romance. It's full of hatred and mistrust, false assumptions and prejudices, and terrible sex. Eleanor's defloration is borderline rape, even though she's lustful for unknown reasons, and the following sexual encounters don't show the earl as a gifted lover, either. It takes a very long time for Falloden and Eleanor to overcome their initial feelings and find love, and in the meantime, there are a lot of highly frustrating setbacks when they already seem to be on the right track.
But the book still hooked and intrigued me. Maybe because it felt very real, just as you would imagine a marriage of convenience in that era. I loved the slow development of their relationship, even though I repeatedly wanted to shake both MCs to their senses. I also loved how hard Falloden tries – again and again – to turn their marriage into at least a friendship, and how he slowly recognizes his wife's true character behind her defenses, how he softens and doesn't give her the quarrels she wants. And I absolutely loved their final scene in the conservatory when they finally, finally commit to each other.
In real life, there's probably no chance that Falloden would have accepted Eleanor's vulgar working-class relatives as easily as he does, but then again, how could he not? They are gold, especially the uncles. The lot simply invades the earl's home, completely ignoring the class difference and being their warm, noisy, and happy selves. They even call Randolph, the man who is rarely addressed by his first name, Randy! They make Christmas at Grenfell Park a special celebration with all their love and laughter, decorating and singing, and give the book a wonderful Christmas vibe.
So, despite many frustrating moments, there are many great scenes–enough to make me adore the book. I don't think it's for everyone, but I can definitely see myself reading it again next year.
"The Bethlehem star is whichever star you want it to be," Uncle Ben said. "Whichever one leads you to peace and hope and love. Whichever one feels like the right star is the right star."
She stood still against him, looking upward, her head against his shoulder, saying nothing. It was a magical silence for a while, a silence during which he felt closer to her than he had ever felt to another person. A silence during which he could believe that they had become one because they were man and wife. A silence during which he fell all the way in love with her.
It was his heart that was cold. His body was on fire.
That quote is 90% of the book in a nutshell. So if you expect a cozy Christmas love story with romantic fireworks, let me tell you: you will be disappointed.
Like many of Mary Balogh's books, this one tells the story of a marriage of convenience: A bankrupt earl, 28 years of age, is forced into a marriage with a 19-year-old girl by her terminally ill father, a rich coal merchant. Both are in love with someone else and have false assumptions about the other, so they are bitter and off to a bad start from their first meeting. All hope is pinned on the Christmas holiday at Grenfell Park, the earl's principal seat in Hampshire, and hope is eventually rewarded, but it's a long and rocky road.
First published in 1992, the age of this book really shows. I don't think that any author would write a romance like this today, let alone a Christmas romance. It's full of hatred and mistrust, false assumptions and prejudices, and terrible sex. Eleanor's defloration is borderline rape, even though she's lustful for unknown reasons, and the following sexual encounters don't show the earl as a gifted lover, either. It takes a very long time for Falloden and Eleanor to overcome their initial feelings and find love, and in the meantime, there are a lot of highly frustrating setbacks when they already seem to be on the right track.
But the book still hooked and intrigued me. Maybe because it felt very real, just as you would imagine a marriage of convenience in that era. I loved the slow development of their relationship, even though I repeatedly wanted to shake both MCs to their senses. I also loved how hard Falloden tries – again and again – to turn their marriage into at least a friendship, and how he slowly recognizes his wife's true character behind her defenses, how he softens and doesn't give her the quarrels she wants. And I absolutely loved their final scene in the conservatory when they finally, finally commit to each other.
In real life, there's probably no chance that Falloden would have accepted Eleanor's vulgar working-class relatives as easily as he does, but then again, how could he not? They are gold, especially the uncles. The lot simply invades the earl's home, completely ignoring the class difference and being their warm, noisy, and happy selves. They even call Randolph, the man who is rarely addressed by his first name, Randy! They make Christmas at Grenfell Park a special celebration with all their love and laughter, decorating and singing, and give the book a wonderful Christmas vibe.
So, despite many frustrating moments, there are many great scenes–enough to make me adore the book. I don't think it's for everyone, but I can definitely see myself reading it again next year.
"The Bethlehem star is whichever star you want it to be," Uncle Ben said. "Whichever one leads you to peace and hope and love. Whichever one feels like the right star is the right star."
She stood still against him, looking upward, her head against his shoulder, saying nothing. It was a magical silence for a while, a silence during which he felt closer to her than he had ever felt to another person. A silence during which he could believe that they had become one because they were man and wife. A silence during which he fell all the way in love with her.
December 28, 2021
4.5 stars! Oooooh, I loved this one! It was a perfect shot of angst to keep the holidays nice and spicey! This story is about an arranged marriage between a debt-ridden peer and a young lady from the merchant class (GASP!). The h's father is ridiculously wealthy, having worked his tail off for many years, and his dying wish is only to ensure his daughter's security and position before he dies. He identifies as an eligible husband for his daughter an honest earl with a strong sense of duty, a crumbling estate, and massive debts. The debts are not this earl's but his immediate predecessors'; while he could default on them legally and without repercussions, he wants to pay the debts free and clear. The arrangement is agreed upon at the 11th hour, with little time left in the wealthy merchant's life to see the wedding for himself. Both H and h feel somewhat coerced into the arranged marriage and both assume the worst of each other (H thinks the h is probably a soulless social climber who will not be accepted into the ton for love or money; h thinks the H is probably a gold-digging spendthrift with a gambling/drinking/whoring problem.). Thus, the marriage begins on rocky terms.
After the wedding and h's father's anticipated death, the couple heads out to the country estate, where they will live for the next year. H, hoping to get in some hunting, invites several peer pals, four of whom take up the invitation. At the H's encouragement, h invites some family (21 in all!!) members to spend Christmas in the country. Merriment and hilarity ensue! Eventually, our couple discovers that they were totally wrong about the other and suddenly are brimming with love for the other. Until that point, there is a healthy amount of self-doubt and miscommunication. A perfect recipe for a little holiday angst.
After the wedding and h's father's anticipated death, the couple heads out to the country estate, where they will live for the next year. H, hoping to get in some hunting, invites several peer pals, four of whom take up the invitation. At the H's encouragement, h invites some family (21 in all!!) members to spend Christmas in the country. Merriment and hilarity ensue! Eventually, our couple discovers that they were totally wrong about the other and suddenly are brimming with love for the other. Until that point, there is a healthy amount of self-doubt and miscommunication. A perfect recipe for a little holiday angst.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 16, 2017
I'm still confused about how to review this book, i thoroughly enjoyed reading this book but i absolutely hated the first half of the book. The cold and emotionless wedding night scene left me shocked and very angry. The lack of communication between the H and h drove me crazy, the heroine shocked me the most. Never met her type before! I took some deep breathes before resuming reading, i was quite distressed by each protagonists actions. I will have to re read this book definitely!!! However, the second part of the book was awesome thank god, the story redeems itself and found myself enjoying the hell out of it! The h relatives were super funny calling the H "Randy" haha I loved the snow fights, sledding, Christmas decorations and the HEA
July 28, 2018
The hero sleeps with his mistress after getting married to the heroine.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 26, 2019
3.65 stars
Amiable hero is getting more and more sexier for me 😜😜
Full of pride that led to so much misunderstanding.
And all were solved happily with the helped of Christmas spirits.
But 2 more couples with the same mould? A bit too much into the spirit I think 😅😅.
And quite liberal. Reminding me a lot of most Kleypas' novels.
Amiable hero is getting more and more sexier for me 😜😜
Full of pride that led to so much misunderstanding.
And all were solved happily with the helped of Christmas spirits.
But 2 more couples with the same mould? A bit too much into the spirit I think 😅😅.
And quite liberal. Reminding me a lot of most Kleypas' novels.
December 5, 2015
Yeah, just no. The only saving grace of this book were the family members of the MC. The rest of it was just really kind of annoying and kinda scary/creepy.
I used to read romance books ALL of the time when I was a kid. Long story short, the Harlequin Presents were cheap at my used book store when I was a kid and I had very little money as a kid, so those were the books I got. One of the lessons I learned from them was to be HONEST and COMMUNICATE, because holding feelings and thoughts inside ended up in assumptions and stupid arguments and lots of emotional pain and agonizing over said pain. This book followed that trope to a T. Let the eye rolling begin.
The parts that made me decide to give this book one star instead of two are: 1) he had a mistress after he was married. Not for very long, but it was still cheating. And OMG, HOW are ALL of the characters in these historical romance books not COMPLETELY riddled with VD?!? The female MC is a virgin, natch, but HE'S usually a stud of the first order. Odds are he's bound to come into contact with SOMEthing by the time he weds and beds his virgin wife. And since it was specifically stated that he had a mistress, it's not like he was chaste and safe.
2) The wedding night sex scene was so rapey it made me gag. What made it even worse was that the male MC NEVER REALIZED that his virgin bride, who had been verbally attacking him earlier that day, was SCARED and TERRIFIED and even though it was down-played by the author, it WAS mentioned that it HURT her. And the male MC was TURNED ON by his encounter with her. And he never realized how she felt, though to be honest, she never told him, but he never tried to help her to relax or explain things to her. In FACT, when he bedded her, he was ANGRY with her and WANTED to make her suffer. It was stated quite a few times that he could have made it easier on her by making it quick, but then he would get angry and turned on and DRAW IT OUT WITH NO CONCERN FOR HIS POSSIBLY HURTING HER.
And then after they had more intimate moments, they fell in love. Not through getting to know each other and mutual respect and friendship, since they were at each other throats being defensive over assumptions they made, not facts, but cuz the dirty dingo is what makes people get all starry eyed, even if they hate each other when they aren't rumpling up the bed sheets.
This book was utter garbage to me because, even though she knew her role and was willing to play her part as a wife, she was scared and didn't really want to do it.
One star. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
I used to read romance books ALL of the time when I was a kid. Long story short, the Harlequin Presents were cheap at my used book store when I was a kid and I had very little money as a kid, so those were the books I got. One of the lessons I learned from them was to be HONEST and COMMUNICATE, because holding feelings and thoughts inside ended up in assumptions and stupid arguments and lots of emotional pain and agonizing over said pain. This book followed that trope to a T. Let the eye rolling begin.
The parts that made me decide to give this book one star instead of two are: 1) he had a mistress after he was married. Not for very long, but it was still cheating. And OMG, HOW are ALL of the characters in these historical romance books not COMPLETELY riddled with VD?!? The female MC is a virgin, natch, but HE'S usually a stud of the first order. Odds are he's bound to come into contact with SOMEthing by the time he weds and beds his virgin wife. And since it was specifically stated that he had a mistress, it's not like he was chaste and safe.
2) The wedding night sex scene was so rapey it made me gag. What made it even worse was that the male MC NEVER REALIZED that his virgin bride, who had been verbally attacking him earlier that day, was SCARED and TERRIFIED and even though it was down-played by the author, it WAS mentioned that it HURT her. And the male MC was TURNED ON by his encounter with her. And he never realized how she felt, though to be honest, she never told him, but he never tried to help her to relax or explain things to her. In FACT, when he bedded her, he was ANGRY with her and WANTED to make her suffer. It was stated quite a few times that he could have made it easier on her by making it quick, but then he would get angry and turned on and DRAW IT OUT WITH NO CONCERN FOR HIS POSSIBLY HURTING HER.
And then after they had more intimate moments, they fell in love. Not through getting to know each other and mutual respect and friendship, since they were at each other throats being defensive over assumptions they made, not facts, but cuz the dirty dingo is what makes people get all starry eyed, even if they hate each other when they aren't rumpling up the bed sheets.
This book was utter garbage to me because, even though she knew her role and was willing to play her part as a wife, she was scared and didn't really want to do it.
One star. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
December 25, 2024
A Christmas Promise by Mary Balogh (1992) is a wonderful story for the holiday season.. only 210 pages; I loved it.
🎁 It’s about a bought bridegroom, Lord Randolph Falloden who’s on the brink of ruin. A wealthy coal merchant buys up his debts, and makes him an offer: marry his daughter Eleanor.
🎁 Eleanor agrees to marry Randolph as it’s her dying father’s wish. However, he thinks she’s a social climber, and he’s filled with disgust and shame at what he was doing. Marrying for money.
🎁 This is a great class differences story…both dislike each other intensely. Randolph is harsh and proud and Eleanor is cold as marble, and their interactions at times are emotionally painful for each of them. There’s plenty of angst.
🎁 Eleanor’s large boisterous extended family arrive to celebrate Christmas… there’s snowball fights, carols, sledding, charades, church etc. The author’s written a splendid contrast between the newlyweds and their cold relationship, and the warmth and fellowship of the holiday season. Exquisite prose… a slow burn romance, sentences to savor slowly and reread. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🎁 It’s about a bought bridegroom, Lord Randolph Falloden who’s on the brink of ruin. A wealthy coal merchant buys up his debts, and makes him an offer: marry his daughter Eleanor.
🎁 Eleanor agrees to marry Randolph as it’s her dying father’s wish. However, he thinks she’s a social climber, and he’s filled with disgust and shame at what he was doing. Marrying for money.
🎁 This is a great class differences story…both dislike each other intensely. Randolph is harsh and proud and Eleanor is cold as marble, and their interactions at times are emotionally painful for each of them. There’s plenty of angst.
🎁 Eleanor’s large boisterous extended family arrive to celebrate Christmas… there’s snowball fights, carols, sledding, charades, church etc. The author’s written a splendid contrast between the newlyweds and their cold relationship, and the warmth and fellowship of the holiday season. Exquisite prose… a slow burn romance, sentences to savor slowly and reread. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
November 13, 2018
One of the beauties of joining a reading challenge is that it can give you the oomph needed to choose an older book from off yours or the library's shelves. I am not a new fan of the author, but I did come along later in her writing career so there are plenty of older backlist books that I still want to read. Slowly, but surely I am getting to them.
A Christmas Promise is one of my favorite historical romance premises, but one that has to be handled just so for me to enjoy it. I speak of the forced marriage scenario. In this case, we have a man who inherited his dissipated cousin's title, but also his tremendous debts. To save his family home and honor, Randolf Pearce will let a wealthy coal merchant strong arm him into marrying his only daughter. He was nearing an understanding with another lady and had a mistress. He hates the very thought of exchanging the title the man wants for his daughter for the money to settle debt so he goes forward with steely determination that is met by the frigid disgust in his intendeds eyes. Eleanor Transome is doing this for her dying father and nothing else. She has been ill-treated by the upper classes and expects more of the same by her would-be husband whom she assumes is a spendthrift gaming who idled away his family fortune and now will do the same with hers.
The pair are icily hostile from the beginning and cut each other deeply to protect their own hurts and vulnerabilities, but a country house Christmas on Randolf's family estate with a few of his friends and Elly's boisterous middle class relations might be just what is needed to thaw this pair and give love a chance.
This one started out with a pair of people as distant as two mismatched, hostile people can get. The author captured the class differences and misunderstandings that would come with such an arrangement. They both had their reasons for accepting and for loathing each other. I cringed with how they ripped at each other and felt the doubt that they were going to make it work even on a civilized polite level. Then, slowly and sometimes it was two steps forward and three steps back, things changed as their eyes were opened to their misconceptions and who the person was they had married. I thought the author brought all this about in a steady and well-developed way. First of all, the troubles were balanced so that both carried the fault. But, secondly, things didn't resolve too soon, but neither did it happen too late.
The angst of their tumultuous early days of marriage was balanced byt the holiday actives and the surrounding cast of characters in her family and his friends. All the Regency era Christmas traditions from hunting for mistletoe and bringing in the Yule Log, carolers and wassail, children's concert and Christmas service, gifts for the estate workers and family games in the drawing room, sleigh rides and playing in the snow. Elly's family were so spontaneous and fun. I loved watching Randolf appreciate their warmth and spirit and tentatively join in.
So, it was a well done forced marriage scenario that also delivered on the old-time holiday cheer and sparkle of romance in the air. I would definitely recommend it to those seeking an older read and just that trope.
A Christmas Promise is one of my favorite historical romance premises, but one that has to be handled just so for me to enjoy it. I speak of the forced marriage scenario. In this case, we have a man who inherited his dissipated cousin's title, but also his tremendous debts. To save his family home and honor, Randolf Pearce will let a wealthy coal merchant strong arm him into marrying his only daughter. He was nearing an understanding with another lady and had a mistress. He hates the very thought of exchanging the title the man wants for his daughter for the money to settle debt so he goes forward with steely determination that is met by the frigid disgust in his intendeds eyes. Eleanor Transome is doing this for her dying father and nothing else. She has been ill-treated by the upper classes and expects more of the same by her would-be husband whom she assumes is a spendthrift gaming who idled away his family fortune and now will do the same with hers.
The pair are icily hostile from the beginning and cut each other deeply to protect their own hurts and vulnerabilities, but a country house Christmas on Randolf's family estate with a few of his friends and Elly's boisterous middle class relations might be just what is needed to thaw this pair and give love a chance.
This one started out with a pair of people as distant as two mismatched, hostile people can get. The author captured the class differences and misunderstandings that would come with such an arrangement. They both had their reasons for accepting and for loathing each other. I cringed with how they ripped at each other and felt the doubt that they were going to make it work even on a civilized polite level. Then, slowly and sometimes it was two steps forward and three steps back, things changed as their eyes were opened to their misconceptions and who the person was they had married. I thought the author brought all this about in a steady and well-developed way. First of all, the troubles were balanced so that both carried the fault. But, secondly, things didn't resolve too soon, but neither did it happen too late.
The angst of their tumultuous early days of marriage was balanced byt the holiday actives and the surrounding cast of characters in her family and his friends. All the Regency era Christmas traditions from hunting for mistletoe and bringing in the Yule Log, carolers and wassail, children's concert and Christmas service, gifts for the estate workers and family games in the drawing room, sleigh rides and playing in the snow. Elly's family were so spontaneous and fun. I loved watching Randolf appreciate their warmth and spirit and tentatively join in.
So, it was a well done forced marriage scenario that also delivered on the old-time holiday cheer and sparkle of romance in the air. I would definitely recommend it to those seeking an older read and just that trope.
December 19, 2011
I am a Mary Balogh fan but not of this book. It's a dismal Christmas story. A wealthy middle class father arranges a marriage for his daughter with an aristocrat drowning in inherited debts. It's hate at first sight. Each stereotypes and believes the worst of the other. They marry and the father dies the next day. One thing I found implausible was that the daughter, Ellie, believes that her father who had doted on her and been devoted to her would arrange a marriage with someone as dissolute as she (falsely) believed her husband to be. Balogh does such a good job building the animosity between the characters that their reconciliation is unbelievable. Lots of pages wasted on internal thoughts of the characters reinforcing their class prejudices. And the husband's best friend who truly is prejudiced against the middle class falls in love and reverses his beliefs?! Lastly, the earl's assertions of "marital rights," especially on their wedding night, verges on rape. We're supposed to believe that love grew from that - not hardly.
May 23, 2016
I love to read any books of Ms Balogh. This one was not different.
I read the similar plot numerous times, yet I liked every scene of the book and couldn't put it down until at the end of it. I liked MCs very much and could understand their conflict and prejudice. It was nice to read, again, they had perfectly normal problems and could defeat them with talking and tried to respect with each other. These actions helped them to build a family, friendship then love.
Christmas theme and family values were described elegantly and warmed you like a blanket through the end.
Although, heroine was quite mature according to her age, I just admitted that at that time young people might have been more mature than us.
I read the similar plot numerous times, yet I liked every scene of the book and couldn't put it down until at the end of it. I liked MCs very much and could understand their conflict and prejudice. It was nice to read, again, they had perfectly normal problems and could defeat them with talking and tried to respect with each other. These actions helped them to build a family, friendship then love.
Christmas theme and family values were described elegantly and warmed you like a blanket through the end.
Although, heroine was quite mature according to her age, I just admitted that at that time young people might have been more mature than us.
January 15, 2016
"4.5 stars" A Christmas Promise is a different sort of romance, at least in the way it progresses. Mary Balogh is an author I've come to appreciate for her unique take on romance and this book was no exception. In this story, the hero and heroine are essentially forced into an arranged marriage by her father. The heroine's father isn't a bad man, just one who is dying and has very little time left. He loves his daughter very much, calling her his precious jewel, and he wants to make an advantageous marriage for her and see her settled with a man he believes he can trust before leaving this mortal plane. He did his research extremely well and chose an earl who has a reputation as an honorable man, then buys up all the man's debts to persuade him to marry his daughter. As someone of the merchant class, it was about the only way he could see his daughter married to a titled gentleman in short order. Although neither of them would have been so crass as to say so to his face and mar the man's final days, his actions cause the hero and heroine to basically hate each other at first sight. Then they must find a way to move on from that inauspicious beginning to live amicably with one another, although neither believes that they'll ever fall in love.
Randolph and Eleanor couldn't be more different from each other if they tried. Randolph unexpectedly inherited the title of Earl of Falloden from a cousin who passed on without an heir, and in the process, he also inherited a mountain of debt. His parents died when he was young, so he was raised by his grandparents on the estate that now belongs to him. He's been taught all his life what he can and cannot do as a proper gentleman and has never really deviated from the prescribed rules of polite society. Eleanor is the daughter of a wealthy coal merchant. Her father had her educated as well as any proper lady, but she's still a hated cit who is considered to be crass and vulgar and has never felt like she fits in with polite society. As such she has little use for the ton. It was her father's dream, not hers, to see her married to a gentleman. She wants to marry someone she loves and would be just as happy with a man who has no money or title at all.
When Randolph and Eleanor first come together, they're like oil and water. They're simply two strangers who have no idea who the other person in their relationship is and each of them also bring their preconceived notions of what the other is like into the marriage. She thinks that because her father bought Randolph, he's probably a spendthrift and a profligate gambler who'll lose every penny of her father's money the second he gets his hands on it. He thinks she's rather vulgar and just a cit who was selfishly looking to marry above her station. He also believes that she's cold and unfeeling because she has a tendency to button up her emotions when he's around, when in reality she's simply uncomfortable expressing herself in the presence of a stranger. It all makes for a very awkward situation for both of them in the beginning, but neither has much choice in the matter. Randolph needs the money to restore his estate and avoid debtor's prison through no fault of his own, while Ellie would never dream of going against the wishes of a dying father she adores. At first, Randolph and Ellie seem determined not to like each other and to make each other suffer, but gradually, as they observe the other's behavior and open their hearts to the magic and joy of the holiday season, they manage to work through their anger at the situation and finally see one another for the decent and caring person each of them is.
Normally I wouldn't care much for a romance in which the hero and heroine are at odds for so long, because it doesn't seem to leave a lot of room for actual romance. Initially neither Randolph nor Ellie were particularly interested in pleasing one another. Even the sex is terrible at first, and and for those who abhor cheating of any kind, he keeps his mistress for a short time, visiting her twice, though it's barely a mention. None of this would typically be my cup of tea, but I ended up really liking the story anyway because of how very realistic and genuine it seems. When I took the time to think about how each of these individuals were plucked from their normal lives and essentially forced into a marriage neither of them wanted, it makes sense that they'd both be angry and resentful. Both were also in love (or at least fancied themselves in love) with other people beforehand, which only exacerbated the situation. When taking all this into consideration as well as the fact that they quite suddenly found themselves married to a complete stranger in a matter of a mere week's time, I could totally understand their feelings. Granted their communication could have been better. They often think of things they should say or do, but then their anger gets in the way of them being more pleasant and doing the right thing. They tend to engage in a dance of taking two steps forward then one step back for a large part of the story, but gradually they start to see the other person for who they really are and slowly but surely begin to trust and then fall in love with one another. The only reason I knocked off a half star is because even after Randolph starts to warm up to Ellie and begins treating her with more respect, she can still get a little biting and sarcastic with her comments. I understood where she was coming from, but perhaps it drug on just a tad too long.
Otherwise A Christmas Promise was a wonderful story that perfectly showcased the magic of Christmas. Ellie's family was absolutely delightful. I love how they joyously celebrate the holiday and how all of them get Randolph to come out of his sheltered world a bit. He's quite surprised to find himself enjoying their boisterous antics and even joining in, despite knowing his grandparents would be appalled at their vulgarity. Randolph and Ellie's romance may not have been a grand affair, but I really enjoyed seeing how they grew to care for one another through the quiet subtlety in their shared moments of amity. There are a number of secondary romances brewing in the background as well, which was the icing on the cake. Overall A Christmas Promise was another enjoyable read and a perfect compliment to the holiday season from Mary Balogh, who is masterful at creating very human relationships and flawed but likable characters.
Randolph and Eleanor couldn't be more different from each other if they tried. Randolph unexpectedly inherited the title of Earl of Falloden from a cousin who passed on without an heir, and in the process, he also inherited a mountain of debt. His parents died when he was young, so he was raised by his grandparents on the estate that now belongs to him. He's been taught all his life what he can and cannot do as a proper gentleman and has never really deviated from the prescribed rules of polite society. Eleanor is the daughter of a wealthy coal merchant. Her father had her educated as well as any proper lady, but she's still a hated cit who is considered to be crass and vulgar and has never felt like she fits in with polite society. As such she has little use for the ton. It was her father's dream, not hers, to see her married to a gentleman. She wants to marry someone she loves and would be just as happy with a man who has no money or title at all.
When Randolph and Eleanor first come together, they're like oil and water. They're simply two strangers who have no idea who the other person in their relationship is and each of them also bring their preconceived notions of what the other is like into the marriage. She thinks that because her father bought Randolph, he's probably a spendthrift and a profligate gambler who'll lose every penny of her father's money the second he gets his hands on it. He thinks she's rather vulgar and just a cit who was selfishly looking to marry above her station. He also believes that she's cold and unfeeling because she has a tendency to button up her emotions when he's around, when in reality she's simply uncomfortable expressing herself in the presence of a stranger. It all makes for a very awkward situation for both of them in the beginning, but neither has much choice in the matter. Randolph needs the money to restore his estate and avoid debtor's prison through no fault of his own, while Ellie would never dream of going against the wishes of a dying father she adores. At first, Randolph and Ellie seem determined not to like each other and to make each other suffer, but gradually, as they observe the other's behavior and open their hearts to the magic and joy of the holiday season, they manage to work through their anger at the situation and finally see one another for the decent and caring person each of them is.
Normally I wouldn't care much for a romance in which the hero and heroine are at odds for so long, because it doesn't seem to leave a lot of room for actual romance. Initially neither Randolph nor Ellie were particularly interested in pleasing one another. Even the sex is terrible at first, and and for those who abhor cheating of any kind, he keeps his mistress for a short time, visiting her twice, though it's barely a mention. None of this would typically be my cup of tea, but I ended up really liking the story anyway because of how very realistic and genuine it seems. When I took the time to think about how each of these individuals were plucked from their normal lives and essentially forced into a marriage neither of them wanted, it makes sense that they'd both be angry and resentful. Both were also in love (or at least fancied themselves in love) with other people beforehand, which only exacerbated the situation. When taking all this into consideration as well as the fact that they quite suddenly found themselves married to a complete stranger in a matter of a mere week's time, I could totally understand their feelings. Granted their communication could have been better. They often think of things they should say or do, but then their anger gets in the way of them being more pleasant and doing the right thing. They tend to engage in a dance of taking two steps forward then one step back for a large part of the story, but gradually they start to see the other person for who they really are and slowly but surely begin to trust and then fall in love with one another. The only reason I knocked off a half star is because even after Randolph starts to warm up to Ellie and begins treating her with more respect, she can still get a little biting and sarcastic with her comments. I understood where she was coming from, but perhaps it drug on just a tad too long.
Otherwise A Christmas Promise was a wonderful story that perfectly showcased the magic of Christmas. Ellie's family was absolutely delightful. I love how they joyously celebrate the holiday and how all of them get Randolph to come out of his sheltered world a bit. He's quite surprised to find himself enjoying their boisterous antics and even joining in, despite knowing his grandparents would be appalled at their vulgarity. Randolph and Ellie's romance may not have been a grand affair, but I really enjoyed seeing how they grew to care for one another through the quiet subtlety in their shared moments of amity. There are a number of secondary romances brewing in the background as well, which was the icing on the cake. Overall A Christmas Promise was another enjoyable read and a perfect compliment to the holiday season from Mary Balogh, who is masterful at creating very human relationships and flawed but likable characters.
January 13, 2013
First, Mary Balogh is just so darn easy to read. (I have a recent re-issue so the cover is different.) Lovely delineation of characters and their conflict. In this case, an extorted, arranged marriage brings together a cit's proud, pugnacious daughter honoring her father's dying wish and an honorable earl who inherits crushing debts from his predecessor. Both have every reason to dislike the other but they marry because each must.
Neither understands the other, each believing the worst interpretation of ambiguous statements and reactions from their different class perspectives. He assumes she is cold; she assumes he is condescending and profligate. However, she remains prickly and combative far longer than he does. For a long time. A long, long time. (Warning: I have realized I have a kink about saintly-ish men and the bitchy women they love despite a ridiculous amount of bitchiness and this falls into that crevice.) Lots of misunderstanding ensues and persists without let up. Much of the book's middle was assumptions and inner monologues at cross purposes, with very little, antagonistic dialogue or anything else for that matter. They yearned silently to themselves for detente but never say a peep. Wore me out.
However, Balogh brings the warmth, wonder and hope of the season to life in wonderful scenes with him meeting and hosting her huge, boisterous family once, all have gathered for the Christmas holiday at the earl's country house. Man and wife slowly see one another fairly, without the blinders of bias. Thank God. That was lovely.
Balogh explores the same class conflict turf here as in A Matter of Class (wonderful), that being the discomfort of the old-line, cash-strapped aristocracy facing the up and coming social ambitions of rich 'vulgarians' in England at this time. Here, there is more stereotyping and a less nuanced and elegant examination. The Transomes are hard-working, loving, expressive while the earl is stiff, bound by tradition and emotionally constipated by his rigid, unaffectionate upbringing. But he loosens up and, when she pulls the stick from her ass, and all is joy.
Not my favorite. For what it's worth, A Matter of Class has the edge for me.
Neither understands the other, each believing the worst interpretation of ambiguous statements and reactions from their different class perspectives. He assumes she is cold; she assumes he is condescending and profligate. However, she remains prickly and combative far longer than he does. For a long time. A long, long time. (Warning: I have realized I have a kink about saintly-ish men and the bitchy women they love despite a ridiculous amount of bitchiness and this falls into that crevice.) Lots of misunderstanding ensues and persists without let up. Much of the book's middle was assumptions and inner monologues at cross purposes, with very little, antagonistic dialogue or anything else for that matter. They yearned silently to themselves for detente but never say a peep. Wore me out.
However, Balogh brings the warmth, wonder and hope of the season to life in wonderful scenes with him meeting and hosting her huge, boisterous family once, all have gathered for the Christmas holiday at the earl's country house. Man and wife slowly see one another fairly, without the blinders of bias. Thank God. That was lovely.
Balogh explores the same class conflict turf here as in A Matter of Class (wonderful), that being the discomfort of the old-line, cash-strapped aristocracy facing the up and coming social ambitions of rich 'vulgarians' in England at this time. Here, there is more stereotyping and a less nuanced and elegant examination. The Transomes are hard-working, loving, expressive while the earl is stiff, bound by tradition and emotionally constipated by his rigid, unaffectionate upbringing. But he loosens up and, when she pulls the stick from her ass, and all is joy.
Not my favorite. For what it's worth, A Matter of Class has the edge for me.
December 28, 2020
LETTURA DI GRUPPO NATALIZIA E&L
Innanzi tutto, grazie Tsukino per aver proposto questo libro. E' il libro più dolce\amaro e natalizio che abbia letto. Romantico a dir poco. Bello davvero. Mi ha fatto piangere, mi ha scaldato il cuore e mi ha fatto esultare. Divertente e dolce.
Da leggere senza ombra di dubbio a Natale.
Elli e Rudolph troppo belli. Così testardi orgogliosi, ma entrambi chiedono solo di essere amati.
Triste davvero Le prime pagine mi hanno trafitto il cuore dal dolore. Ma fortunatamente, finisce con riempirmi il cuore di amore.
Scusate la recensione striminzita, ma mi è difficile esprimere quello che mi ha fatto provare. Da leggere per capire.
Innanzi tutto, grazie Tsukino per aver proposto questo libro. E' il libro più dolce\amaro e natalizio che abbia letto. Romantico a dir poco. Bello davvero. Mi ha fatto piangere, mi ha scaldato il cuore e mi ha fatto esultare. Divertente e dolce.
Da leggere senza ombra di dubbio a Natale.
Elli e Rudolph troppo belli. Così testardi orgogliosi, ma entrambi chiedono solo di essere amati.
Triste davvero Le prime pagine mi hanno trafitto il cuore dal dolore. Ma fortunatamente, finisce con riempirmi il cuore di amore.
Scusate la recensione striminzita, ma mi è difficile esprimere quello che mi ha fatto provare. Da leggere per capire.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 16, 2023
The blurb says it all.
The novella has 150 pages of pure hate to love (aka strong dislike to love) with MOC trope.
The novella has 150 pages of pure hate to love (aka strong dislike to love) with MOC trope.
August 20, 2011
Such a wonderful read,Randolph-Eleanor both are forced to marry,both despise each other there's misunderstanding between then which leads them to think worse of each other but as time passes by these two start to understand each other,respect each other and fall in love with each other but then still there's the misunderstanding and the persons whom they thought they loved but then they realise it was not love just attraction/infactuation
Randolph thinks Eleanor is cold marble who does'nt feels any emotions and also there's Dorothea whom he loved but he had to marry Eleanor,he even keeps a mistress but he feels guilty and he ends it but then Eleanor comes to know of it and she despises him even more.Eleanor feels really lonely and after the death of her father she is more lonely but she never cries which leads Randolph to think she is cold and unfeeling woman
But as they spent time together for christmas and thanks giving they come to know each other understand each other,Eleanor wants tenderness and love but she keeps quiet cause their marriage is MOC,but then the misunderstandings are cleared,Randolph comes to understand why did'nt Eleanor cried at funeral and later and he feels really ashamed of his behaviour,guilty for isolating Eleanor and making her lonely and he realises what a treasure he has with him his love his wife his true family
What i really liked was their marriage had a rough start and they despised each other but by spending time and talking out they start to understand trust and respect each other which slowly leads to love,there are no villians only misunderstandings
Wonderful Christmas Read
Recommend it
Randolph thinks Eleanor is cold marble who does'nt feels any emotions and also there's Dorothea whom he loved but he had to marry Eleanor,he even keeps a mistress but he feels guilty and he ends it but then Eleanor comes to know of it and she despises him even more.Eleanor feels really lonely and after the death of her father she is more lonely but she never cries which leads Randolph to think she is cold and unfeeling woman
But as they spent time together for christmas and thanks giving they come to know each other understand each other,Eleanor wants tenderness and love but she keeps quiet cause their marriage is MOC,but then the misunderstandings are cleared,Randolph comes to understand why did'nt Eleanor cried at funeral and later and he feels really ashamed of his behaviour,guilty for isolating Eleanor and making her lonely and he realises what a treasure he has with him his love his wife his true family
What i really liked was their marriage had a rough start and they despised each other but by spending time and talking out they start to understand trust and respect each other which slowly leads to love,there are no villians only misunderstandings
Wonderful Christmas Read
Recommend it
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