Rears & Vices

I'm always on the hunt for historically grounded nautical romance, and this one reeeeeeally hit the spot. There's never any doubt that this book takes place in the 1810s. It has the exact level of historical/nautical detail I like, which is enough that I feel immersed and can believe the setting but not so much that I have no idea what anyone's talking about and stop having fun. The plot: There's a lot of maritime adventure, but it's less Pirates of the Caribbean and more Master and Commander. There's a fair bit of discussing logistics, chatting in cabins, etc., to the point that I suspect this book won't be for everyone, but it will VERY MUCH be for some people. I do think there are some areas where the plot could have been streamlined or reshuffled a bit, not because it drags at all (it doesn't), but because certain plot threads or emotional events would occur and then be put aside in the next chapter while the characters deal with something else. It's not unrealistic, but does make for a sort of choppy read at times. The romance/characters: Rears & Vices is told entirely from the main character Everard's POV, which I think was a good choice. This is a poly romance, so the three main characters are in a throuple by the end of the book, but I will say most of the book feels like a romance about a couple that occasionally throws their poor pal D'Arcy a bone. Everard's dynamic with his former lieutenant D'Arcy, whom he had a previous relationship (situationship?) with…

I loved reading this love story about second chanses and new loves. It's not easy to write GOOD poly romance, but E.M. Caro really surprised me with their unique writing style. I loved how the connection between the men deepend and was explored. It was wonderful, and I wanted more. This author is one I will be looking out for. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for letting me give my honest feedback

“Rears and Vices” is a difficult book to review, because I both admired it enormously and, at times, found it enormously frustrating. In the realm of admiration and satisfaction: E.M. Caro must have immersed themself in the history of the early US, of Caribbean colonialism, and of privateering and piracy. I don’t think anything less would have allowed them to write a novel so richly textured — you know that sense you sometimes get, that the writer knows much more about the background and the characters than appears on the page? I felt that here, and I don’t know how to describe the resulting experience of reading better than to say that there’s a kind of safety in it, this by contrast with the kind of “historical” romance set in, for example, mid-14th-century England and in which someone survives (and suffers no lingering damage from) an infected crossbow wound to the shoulder. (IYKYK.) Anyway, words can’t express how grateful I am to read a historical novel with a fully realized setting, and with three such fascinating principals: Everard Anderson d’Anglada, a Royal Navy captain with a tanked career, a complicated family history, and a sideline in seditious pamphleteering; Preston D’Arcy, his rather mysterious former first lieutenant, now also a captain, auburn-haired and not so unrequitedly in love with Everard; and Vitaliy Gray / Vitya / Henry Crause / V. Varfolomey, a pirate. Or a privateer. Or a revolutionary. Or all of those, as well as, briefly, Everard’s lover,…