EDIT: re-read 17 Aug 2021 and upped the rating to 3 stars. While I can't say the book was stellar and it definitely was formulaic, I didn't feel quite as vitriolic about it as I did in the original review. Unobjectionable and forgettable but just what I was in the mood for at this moment.


So, full disclosure here: I read this series out of order (yes, just like the Turner series). Also, this was the eighth fluffy gay regency romance novel I had read within a five day time frame, squeezed in around an exhausting work schedule/skill evaluation in an unfamiliar climate that had me going from 5:30am to 9 or 10pm every night, while also being sick. I'm absolutely certain all of that had some bearing on my feelings for this book.
With that being said... I was bored. Guys, I was really bored. If there was conflict in this book, it had about as much bearing on it as a crack in the sidewalk has on a person's every day life. Mildly startling if you trip on it but forgotten five minutes later. I'm not saying everything has to be angst and melodrama but give me something, at least. I had zero emotional connection to anything that was happening in this book. Oh, a couple of cute, cheeky kids that are behaving exactly like kids and somehow all of the adults in the book except this one special person have forgotten how to properly interact with children. Oh, a stern grump who has a 180 on his personality because ??? He's getting laid, I guess??? There's a fiance in there somewhere for the vicar but it's okay because someone is going to conveniently fire him from being a vicar and thus all his problems are going to disappear. Hey, here's a touch of set up for the next book. HEA.