Review copy was received from Publisher. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
In Bed with the Earl by Christi Caldwell Narrator: Tim Campbell
Series: Lost Lords of London #1
Published by Brilliance Audio on March 17, 2020
Genres: Historical Romance
Length: 10 hours, 33 minutes
Format: Audiobook
Source: Publisher
Goodreads
Amazon, Audible
To solve a mystery that’s become the talk of the ton, no clues run too deep for willful reporter Verity Lovelace. Not even in the sewers of London. That’s precisely where she finds happily self-sufficient scavenger Malcom North, lost heir to the Earl of Maxwell. Now that Verity’s made him front-page news, what will he make of her?
Kidnapped as a child, with no memories of his well-heeled past, Malcom prefers the grimy spoils of the culverts to the gilded riches of society. Damn the feisty beauty who exposed the contented tosher to a parade of fortune-hunting matchmakers. How to keep them at bay? Verity must pretend to be his wife. She owes him.
The intimacy of this necessary arrangement—Verity and Malcom thrust together in close quarters—soon sparks an irresistible heat. But when the charade ends, the danger begins. Will love be enough to protect them from a treacherous plot devised to ruin them?
Being a woman in a historical romance in London kind of sucks and yet I find myself whisked away to another place and time anytime I pick up a book by Christi Caldwell. In Bed with the Earl, the first book in the Lost Lords of London series, is exactly my kind of tale with the headstrong female trying to break the norms of society and a man who is broken but just needs the right kind of woman to love him through all of his scars, both physical and emotional.
Verity is my kind of heroine. She has spunk and isn’t afraid of much in this world, well except for losing her job, being thrown out on the street with no way to care for and feed her younger sister. The normal stuff. So, trying to find the lost Earl of Maxwell when he is trying very hard not to be found by anyone is nothing compared to that. Even if it means she might have to go down into the sewers to look for him.
Ah Malcom, he is just broken enough for me to really love. Kidnapped as a child, he doesn’t remember anything of his past and has become a brutal adversary in the sewers of London. He doesn’t want anything to do with his new life as the Earl and even less to do with all the gossip reporters searching for him. Verity though, she intrigues him, and even though she is more trouble than he is prepared for, there is just something about the spunky reporter that calls to him as much as it infuriates him. He’ll give her a story but Verity is going to have to give him something in return.
The characters in this story were good. As much as I liked Verity and Malcolm, some of the side characters were my favorites, from the other toshers Malcom kept around him, to Verity’s surprising sister, they added dimensions to the story that raised it from okay to really good.
A solid start to a new Historical Romance series for Christi Caldwell
Narration:
Tim Campbell is no novice to the narration of Historical Romance and brings a very nice voice and tone to the book. I really enjoyed his performance of the moody Earl of Maxwell and the incredibly spunky Verity. I’m sure my enjoyment of this book was greater due to his narration. I listened to this at my usual 1.5x speed.
Listen to a clip: HERE
About Tim Campbell
Tim Campbell is an award winning actor and singer who lives in Los Angeles, CA. He works primarily in audiobook narration and voice over and has narrated hundreds of titles spanning almost every genre. He has won or been nominated for almost every major award in the audiobook industry, including most recently a 2018 Audie, a 2019 Audie (nom), a 2019 Voice Arts Award, and several Independent Audiobook and Audiofile Magazine Earphones awards.
He lived and trained in the UK and Germany, narrates as both an American and a Brit, and has studied performance diction in German, Italian, French, Spanish and Japanese, and Latin. He specializes in accents, dialects, and character work and holds three degrees in theater and music as well as graduating from the esteemed two year Great Books Colloquium of Pepperdine University.
In his other, musical life, Tim sings regularly with the LA Master Chorale, Los Angeles Opera, and in studio sessions for TV and Film. Highlights include principal ensemble in Candide at LA Opera, Courfeyrac in Les Miserables at Fresno Grand Opera, Jud in Oklahoma with Cabrillo Music Theater, and Anthony in Sweeney Todd with Pacific Opera Project and singing on the soundtrack for Star Wars IX: The Rise of Skywalker and films such as Creed 2, Venom, and many others.
About Christi Caldwell
USA TODAY Bestselling author CHRISTI CALDWELL blames Judith McNaught’s “Whitney, My Love!” for luring her into the world of historical romance. While sitting in her graduate school apartment at the University of Connecticut, Christi decided to set aside her notes and pick up her laptop to try her hand at romance. She believes the most perfect heroes and heroines have imperfections, and she rather enjoys torturing them before crafting them a well deserved happily ever after!
Christi makes her home in southern Connecticut where she spends her time writing her own enchanting historical romances, chasing around her feisty seven-year-old son and caring for her twin princesses in training!
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Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
- Robin Audio20
It’s not an author I’ve tried but maybe I should, it looks good
I’ve enjoyed a lot of her books. She is does HR well.
i find it interesting when i find a peripheral character more to my liking than the main characters. then, i wonder if the author will write their story
Right. Sometimes they are so great since they are meant to be the comic relief but sometimes they are someone I really want to see in a book down the road.