Tracey Anne Warren's "The Bed and the Bachelor"

Grade: C-

passion rating: warm

Ms. Warren’s latest Byrons of Braebourne historical romance is proof that an author’s competency with prose doesn’t inherently translate into a well-written book. Ms. Warren is a capable writer with a knack for description and settings. However, in this book, her proficiency does not extend to her plot or her characters. I found the former dreary and the latter unlikely.

Drake Byron is a brilliant scientist who has always put his work before his heart. Oh, he has the obligatory mistress he can pleasure several times in an evening, but he’s never come close to falling in love or even to believing any woman could understand his research-oriented life-style. He’s currently working on an unbreakable cipher to further stymie the French during the final years of the Napoleonic Wars. He takes great pains to make sure his work is secure, so he stores it in a safe, the key to which he wears around his elegant yet manly neck.


Drake hires the absurdly young and requisitely lovely Sebastianne Dumont to be his new housekeeper. Sebastianne, who is using the alias Anne Greenway, has been planted in Drake’s household by the cartoonishly evil Vacheau — a henchman working for bad guys somehow connected to Napoleon. Vacheau has threatened to destroy Sebastianne’s father and two young brothers if she doesn’t steal the cipher and turn it over to the French. Sebastianne has been picked for this unsavory task because she speaks perfect English and is English on her mother’s side. She hates to mislead Drake and his warm and caring staff (I am, of course, referring to those who work for him) but she must in order to save her family.


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