Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday is hosted by Marcia at the Printed Page. This is the first time I've done this particular meme, but since I've started using PaperBackSwap I have a lot more books flowing into and out of my mailbox.

I'm looking forward to participating in and reading all the great posts that will be part of the March Classics Circuit, which features Georgette Heyer. Since I've already read the book I'll be posting on, I thought I'd acquire and read a few more so that I can get the most out of the tour.

An Infamous Army: A Novel of Wellington, Waterloo, Love and War arrived this week. I wanted to follow up my recent reread of Vanity Fair with another fictional account of Brussels on the eve of Waterloo, and this was recommended more than once including Library Journal on Amazon:

This must be the most accurately researched and detailed battle description that has ever appeared in a book of romantic fiction. The battle itself, and the weeks before and after it, forms the time line and backbone of this novel. The title refers to the Duke of Wellington's unkind nickname for the motley collection of national armies under his command in 1815 at Waterloo. Set in Brussels, as the French and Allied forces are converging, Heyer's story concerns the stormy courtship between Lady Barbara Childe and Col. Definitely a romance for the historically minded reader, there is no fluff here.

As did The Foundling. Here's what Amazon had to say about it:

One of readers', librarians' and booksellers' most frequently requested Heyers, The Foundling features Gilly, the seventh Duke of Sale.

A diffident young man of 24 years, easily pushed around by his overprotective uncle and the retinue of devoted family retainers who won't let him lift a finger for himself, the Duke sometimes wishes he could be a commoner. One day he decides to set out to discover whether he is "a man, or only a Duke."

Beginning with an incognito journey into the countryside to confront a blackmailer, he encounters a runaway school boy, a beautiful but airheaded orphan, one of literature's most appealing and well-spoken comic villains, and a series of alarming and even life threatening events from which he can extricate himself only with the help of his shy and lovely fiancé.

And Why Shoot a Butler? Again from Amazon's product description:

In an English country-house murder mystery with a twist, it's the butler who's the victim, every clue complicates the puzzle, and the bumbling police are well-meaning but completely baffled.

This gives me a good cross-section of Heyer--a historical, a Regency, and a mystery. A perfect antidote to endless winter.

Fever Pitchby Nick Hornby also arrived, and I put New York and Scenes of Clerical Life on hold so that I could dive into this memoir of one Brit's obsession with football, aka soccer.

Finally, volume two (So Lively a Chase) of Laura Hile's wonderful Elizabeth Eliot story, Mercy's Embrace, arrived from Amazon.

Dare I hope for another snow storm to keep me inside next weekend to enjoy these riches? Nay, I can read whether it's snowing or not...preferably NOT!