A Solider and His Rules by Olivia Elliot [ARC Review]

*I’d like to thank NetGalley, BookGo Social and Olivia Elliott for providing me with a free ARC in exchange for an honest review. 

“A Soldier and his rules” is Olivia’s Elliott second full-length novel in the Pemberton series and follows the story of Lady Patience Pemberton and Lord Richard Winter.

Patience is an artistic gifted spinster who has given up on two things: finding a husband and looking good in an empire waist dress. No wonder she is tremendously looking forward to painting the dowager viscountess Winter and perhaps kickstart a successful career in art. Shortly before sitting with the elderly woman, Patience runs into her son Lord Richard Winter. Already angered by comments made by her parents, Patience confronts the aristocrat after overhearing him making distasteful comments about young women at a ball. Afraid that her actions might endanger painting Lady Winter, Patience is unaware that her action had a reverse effect. Intrigued by the woman who doesn’t seem an inch afraid of him, Richard can’t stop thinking about the curvy Lady Pemberton. Though sworn off to marry ever again after experiencing the worst at war, Richard has a hard time staying away from the woman he shares so much in common with. When he takes the place of his mother in her painting endeavours, the tension goes from a simmer to a boil. But Lady Pemberton is about to be promised to another man, and Richard’s reputation is blocking his road to her parents’ approval, but an unchaperoned stay at Richard’s country estate might change it all…

“A Soldier and his rules” was a pleasant regency romance which was very reminiscent of Netflix’s Bridgerton. Both of the main characters, Patience and Richard, were well crafted and convincing. I liked how Patience had her growth in her career but also in the way she pursues the things she wants. She is a very compassionate character who finds herself often at the wimp of others because of her nature. Though being a dreamer through and through I loved how she was completely naive and a total romantic. Richard on the other hand had much greater struggles to overcome. I certainly have to highlight how well his panic attacks were written. PTSD can be difficult to depict, but I think Elliott has done a good job, showing the hardship of struggling with this condition. Sometimes I wish there was little more depth in Richard’s obsession with rules as well as his difficult relationship with his father. His family’s reputation played a huge part on why Patience’s parents were against her affiliation with the man, but I felt like it could have been explored a little bit more and maybe how it coincides with Richard’s PTSD and rule confinement. 

My favourite side characters had to be James, Richard’s younger brother, and Grace, Patience’s younger sister. Both of them had such fun and bubbly personalities that often added a certain light heartedness to the heavy plotlines. Not to mention Potato the pug who was menace to Lady Pemberton’s life and the solace to Grace’s daydreaming.

The overall writing style is closer to the one you often find in contemporary rather than historical romance. Additionally, the characters certainly have a modern edge to them which not everyone enjoys. However, I think novels like this make the genre of historical romance more accessible to readers of other genres as well as non-English speakers seeking to read in English. It is a very simple style which is certainly not my personal favourite, but something I do not mind too much if the rest of the story is rather convincing. 

Though the novel has quite the number of plotlines, in the end everything is wrapped up rather neatly and I feel I can already tell who will be the next main character in the following installation. I certainly appreciated how even the side characters had their little arch, perfectly setting up the rest of the series as well as giving a glimpse into the future of the prior story. 

The romance was sweet and definitely captivated me with its ups and downs. The beginning felt a little sudden as the couple kissed rather unexpectedly in my opinion. However, in the end I started appreciating the inability of the main characters to hold back their attraction to each other. It definitely had its charm to have two people who are very much into each other.

Overall, a pretty decent second novel by an upcoming historical romance author. I’ll definitely check out the rest of the series moving forward.