This was my first Darcy Burke book, and while not all of it resonated with me, I will definitely be reading more of her work in the future.

I appreciated the thoughtful approach to the obvious PTSD and trauma effects on both Max and Ada. Ultimately though, I couldn't quite get myself to enjoy Ada and her endless optimism. I really think this is a case of the reader not quite jiving with the character(s). You can't please all the people all the time, and this just wasn't my time.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC, my opinions are freely given.

I loved the other books in the series and couldn’t wait to read Ada Treadway and Maximillian Hunt, Viscount of Warfield.
Ada is the bookkeeper at the Phoenix Club. She is enlisted by the owner to help out an old friend of his with the estate accounts. When Ada arrives to help with the estate, she finds it is not in a good condition and meets the Viscount Maximillian Hunt. He is grumpy and growly with everyone around him even with Ada. She decides to not let him put her off and finish her work. Slowly, she starts wearing him down. Both of them have scars from the past. Impossible is the retelling of Beauty and the Beast. A good retelling, I think. It captured the essence of the classic story and made it fir for the historical context of the plot.
Their romance is beautiful, and it develops really well. From reluctance to attraction to love it all seems realistic in the way it unfolds. Ada has a past that has scarred her so does Max. Both the characters show a different ways of dealing with grief and difficult circumstances.
I loved this book. It is engaging and has good characters. I wasn’t sure what to expect because these are characters we haven’t known about much in the previous books, especially Max. I must say it was a pleasant surprise. It was exactly what I needed a historical romance with good characters. The Beauty and the Beast aspect was unexpected, but it is one of my favorite fairytales, so overall I loved reading it.

Loved reading the engaging and entertaining romance story. Ada Treadway's boss asks her to help a friend of his, Maximillian Hunt, the Viscount Warfield. Max doesn't want Ada in his house with her cheerful personality putting his ledgers in order, but Ada's optimism puts a spark in Max to start caring about his tenants. Read the highly recommended, wonderfully written, and must read story of an elusive, unpleasant man who finds love again.
I just reviewed Impossible by Darcy Burke. #Impossible #NetGalley
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While this one wasn't necessarily bad, it just wasn't great. I've enjoyed the other books in this series, so I'm not sure where this one went wrong. It had some compelling plot points but as a whole, it had some lacks.

And I think the main lack was the romance. Almost nonexistent in the first half, our characters were suddenly in love in the second. I know that this was supposed to be a Beauty and the Beast retelling, and I appreciate it for not being instalove, but come on. There was no chemistry, and then the author tried to drench them in chemistry. It missed the mark.

I'll admit though, I really liked our hero, Max. His character arc was precious, and I was rooting for him the entire time. I almost wish this hadn't been split narration, and had instead only been narrated by him. Ada's chapters were a bit insufferable, and didn't carry the same power as his.

Even though I didn't love this one, I'll be keeping an eye out for more of Burke's books. They're always guaranteed to be fun reads, even with their problems.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing a free copy in exchange for an honest review

I enjoyed this, especially how she handled Max’s PTSD and reaction to the war and personal losses he had to endure. I had not read the prior books before reading this one, and I do think it would’ve fleshed out the other characters and backstories more if I had read them.

I didn’t see the point to the “conflict” at the end, without spoiling. Ada realizes very quickly that it’s not going to happen, and Max forgives her just as quick. Had it been introduced earlier in the book as a complication, that would’ve made things more juicy.

Spoiler Alert: be warned, there are a few.

I am very upset with this story. It is about an independent young lady who is sent to her employer's friend's estate to try to help the friend transition from soldier to discount because over the past 3 years, he went from soldier to wounded recluse.
But the reader doesn't know that until about third of the book has been written. The book opens with the heroine in a carriage to go to Lord Warfield's estate to help Lucien's friend. We do not get the full background story until much later in the story.
The reader has no background on the main characters and I went back nd read twice, to make sure I didn't over look it. Nope, no background.
I get that this is part of a series, but if I was in the book store, and read the first chapter like I always do, I would have put this book back. Because it doesn't make any sense. I did not just read the previous book. I read it about 4 months, or 100 books, ago. As a reader, I need to know the story from the beginning, not the middle.
After reading the whole book, twice, I actually like the last two thirds, because the reader finally gets the information that they needed in the beginning.
And I hate having to give a book that is actually well written, if you read it out of order, a low rating. This might have been a stand alone book, but not the way it is laid out. I give it 2 stars because it is too hard to try to red from the middle, then the beginning, then the end.
And there are very loose ends. One of the main parts of the story is that the hero sold his horse, Arrow, when he came back from the war because the horse was an integral part of the revenge killing of the enemy squad that brutalized, raped and killed the hero's betrothed. The hero agonizes that someone was kind enough to return Arrow to him when the hero was sent home to recover from his wounds, but that he sold his horse, his stalwart companion. This goes on for many paragraphs in many chapters. So, the heroine asks the Theron's friend, Lucien, to find Arrow and purchase him to give to the hero so he can have closure.
So, as a reader, I expected that the horse would be re-United with the hero while the heroine and friend watched, and another broken piece of his heart would be fixed as Arrow nuzzled and whickered in greeting and remembering the hero. But, NO. After the hero jumps in the river to propose to the heroine, and they take a bath and are eating tea, the heroine asks about Arrow and the hero turned to her and says, "...I have not yet thanked you for finding Arrow. I took a short ride late this afternoon and it was as if we’d never been parted. I don’t know why I let him go. I suppose I thought it would be less painful."
And that is all. After the pivotal selling of Arrow and the emotional meaning of the horse, that is all we get. Like, what the heck?? 2 stars, very disappointed.

Delightful!

Miss Ada Treadway's eternal optimism and sunny disposition wear down all of the carefully built walls Max has erected around himself. It is charming how he grunts and growls into seeing things more from her perspective. How she gently shows him how his action, or inaction, affect those around him. She does it all without raising her voice and most of the time without judgement in her voice, there may be stern looks, but no yelling. She is open and caring, very observant and happy to help anyone. There are secrets and dark things in her past but she refuses to give them her time, it would ruin her day and she just won't allow that.

Maximillian Hunt, the unanticipated Viscount Warfield, has wounds you can see and a great many you can't. He would put an angry troll to shame with his incredible grumpiness. Granted, there has been trauma and heartache in his recent past, but holy cow! His guilt over what he considers his failures consumes him. Having grudgingly agreed to letting Ada come look over his estate books he starts to be drawn to her optimism and light.

Ada has a fortnight to complete her task. The changes she brings to Max, his staff, his tenants in that short span is a marvel. Help is given where none had been offered before. That was a huge step in fixing so many broken parts of the whole. When Max asked Ada about her optimism she responded with this..."Life is too fleeting to harbor ill will. Besides, feeling angry or upset isn't pleasant. I'd much rather be happy." (Used with permission) location 732 of 4360. A lesson we should all strive for. This I believe was one of the pivotal moments for Max.

The staff, most having known Max his whole life, were very protective of him when Ada first started asking her questions. They are one of the most charming group of secondary characters I have read/met in a while. They don't want to cause Max stress or discomfort, but know deep down something needs to change. They struggle knowing it's needed, but as staff there is only so much they can really do. Ada is what they need.

This is a very graceful story about being broken on the inside and the right person coming along to start helping put the pieces back together. It's about seeing the pain and not judging it, but gently helping to see the pain differently and learning to adjust to a new normal. Finding the good in yourself when you were convinced it was gone and that you deserve to be happy. Thank you Ms. Burke for handling Max's pain so beautifully.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book via NetGalley and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Ada Treadway has been in love before, and it brought nothing but heartache. Still, she retains her cheerful optimism and is fiercely protective of the independence and respect she’s earned as bookkeeper of the Phoenix Club. When I started reading I couldn't put it down. Darcy Burke is magnifysent and amazing writer.I cannot wait to read more of there books.Keep up the great work.You should definitely read this book.Can't wait for the next book.

Oh, dear. I'm afraid this one didn't work for me at all. Impossible is a regency take on Beauty and the Beast, and I will give the book this: it gave me a lot to think about in terms of what makes a compelling and worthwhile retelling of a classic story. Mostly because this was a much better book when it stopped trying to be one.

The novel opens with Ada Treadway showing up to Stonehill castle, having been hired by a mutual friend to work on the estate ledgers of Lord Warfield. The estate is run-down and forbidding, all the servants look some degree of frightened to tired, and the lord of the castle is rumored to be a mean, wounded, cruel man known as the "beast of Stonehill."

So far, so familiar. And honesty... that's totally fine! I love a good homage. But I'm afraid this book made, to my mind, just about every wrong decision about how to adapt a story that's about a very literal non-human beast who was born a man, suffered a magical enchantment, and has lost hope that anyone will come to return him to his former state.

Because the first element of an adaptation, if one is going to make BATB a non-magical story about human beings, is what makes your hero a "beast." It was pretty clear to me that this book thought the primary beastly thing about Warfield was his personality. Characters went on and on and on about how horrible and ghastly and rude and cruel he was. And when we meet him... he's mostly just a little cranky? Slightly short with people? Not all that bad, actually? Ada stands up to him. His servants read as almost fondly put-out with his "just needs a cup of coffee" levels of grumpiness. I cannot recall one thing he did that rose above the level of mild disgruntlement.

But the problem here, for the reader, is that if Warfield isn't really behaving in a compellingly beastly way... the only way we have to square his characterization as a beast (a word that is used constantly in his own POV, in Ada's, and in the dialogue of everyone who meets him) is that... he has scars and PTSD from his experience in the war. Which ends up being a REALLY problematic deployment of the concept of beastliness. One that gets compounded by the other element of the BATB story that this novel decides to import: the idea that the goal of the heroine is to "reverse a spell" cast on the hero to return him to a former state. Ada's initial response to Warfield is to take on the project of an "investigation" into who he used to be before the war (ie, try to understand the curse), so she can cheerfully return him to that man through the power of positive thinking. Which just made me... so, so angry. Because as a reader, it is abundantly clear that Warfield has a disability and PTSD, and the idea that the heroine is so blatantly not only trying to fix him with toxic positivity, but to return him to a former state, which holy god is not how trauma works... it was honestly upsetting.

And the thing is, about halfway through the book, the BATB framing is entirely abandoned. At which point the characters start to do much more sensible things like talk to each other, recognize their trauma and how it still affects them, talk about how they can support each other through a slow and possibly always-incomplete healing process. Which is good, but at that point the damage was done in terms of my annoyance with the book. It really drove home to me that the repurposing of tropes actually means something. It can be incredibly powerful when done well, and actively damage a story when not.

Anyway, the second non-BATB half of the book takes place in London at a club that's open to both men and women, where Ada works (after she's done dealing with Warfield's ledgers). There were some positive elements to that part of the story: I enjoyed that Ada had a job, one that she loved and didn't give up at the end. The cast of supporting characters were nice, as was the way Ada supported Warfield in his efforts to be able to spend more time with his friends and in society. I was just about ready to regain a bit of goodwill for this book, when randomly we learn that part of Warfield's backstory (CW for assault) is that the woman he loved was killed and gang raped by whatever vague enemy he's been fighting in the war, and he went on a rampage and killed her rapists. This memory is triggered by Ada being assaulted at Vauxhall by a group of men, whom Warfield also tries to kill. An event to which Ada has no other response than worrying about what feelings this might have brought up for Warfield. I'm not going to dwell on this other than to say I am simply begging authors to think twice before making violence against women a plot point that is entirely about the emotional damage it causes their heroes.

As a stray observation, I do appreciate that this book makes it very textually clear that Ada has had an abortion in the past, one that she does not regret and for which nobody in the text judges her. So that's a positive.

I am afraid though that even without the poorly-handled elements around Warfield's past and his supposed "beastliness", this one would not have worked for me for the (admittedly subjective) reason that I found the prose style too explain-y.

I admit though I like the book, the characters seem faulty. Their seems to be little to no conflict with Max and Ada. Ada’s undying belief in Max seems unwarranted. And Max’s gloom and doom realistic seems a bit far fetched that he doesn’t let anyone in considering he has staff that c are. If he let the staff who stayed with him in it would be more realistic. The thing is I think the whole conflict near the end was resolved too easily as well.

Thank you to NetGalley and Zealous Quill Press for this ARC in exchange for honest reviews!

This story was about bookkeeper Ada Treadway who is on a mission to help Lord Max Warfield turn around his estates - but Warfield wants nothing to do with the rainbows and butterflies that are Ada. This gave me HUGE Beauty and the Beast vibes.

I love historical romances and this author did a great job of keeping things historically accurate. There were a few times I said “I’m not sure people in the 1800s would have said this…” but nothing to the point where I disliked the book. Not my *favorite* historical romance book, which is why I’m only giving it a 3.

Spice level: 5/5 🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶

I thoroughly enjoyed this book - the MCs, the background characters, and the history of the MCs. There were some delicious conflicts and the resolution was worth the turmoil. Plenty of heat and romance. Again, the author approaches mental illness with a respectful touch, though they do not use a light hand. The symptoms of PTSD are fairly in your face, and I enjoyed that the characters were nonjudgmental and accepting of each other.

I received an ARC courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher. The opinions are mine alone.

Yay! Another story of the Phoenix club.

Unfortunately not the story of Evie or Lucien (I’m still keeping my fingers crossed for a story for them), but it is Ada in this story On request of Lucien (already in Indecent we read of this request), Ada goes to the estate of the Marquess of Warfield to organize its ledgers.

As a bookkeeper of the Phoenix Club, she is very adept with numbers and organizing stuff. Lucien, and also Ada’s best friend Prudence (from Indecent) have already warned her that this will be an endeavor. Because Max, or Warfield to his peers, is one surly guy. He has even denied Prudence her dowry, even after his father had finally acknowledged his illegemate daughter.

Max never wanted to inherit his father’s estate or title. It was all supposed to go to his older brother, while he would marry his lovely Lucia. But life can throw you a curveball: directly after his father’s death, both his beloved as his brother died under terrible circumstances. And if Lucien hadn’t been there, he would have died as well. Happily. Because now he had the burden of tenants, servants and a title, he didn’t want or need.

Ada is one, never to back down from a challenge. But after her initial meeting with the Warfield estate, she is certainly having doubts. But, in case of doubt: always smile and move forward. Max can’t stand the cheery, sunny and very inquisitive miss Treadwell. She irritates the hell out of him. And she convinces him, he needs to step up. Because, although he might not care, these people are all dependent on him for their salaries and their homes. Slowly, Ada learns that there is so much more below the gruff exterior. And Max learns, that even cheery people can have had a very hard life.

As usual, a wonderful, cute, funny and heartwarming read! Thank you, Darcy, and please make sure that Evie and Lucien get their HEA too. Five out of five stars from me and a special thank you to Netgalley for providing the arc.

4.5 stars

Impossible is the next book in Darcy Burke's Phoenix series, of which I've read some but not all. That said, it's my favorite so far. I do have a few trigger warnings, but I'll put them at the very end, as usual.

Ada, the Phoenix Club's effervescent bookkeeper has agreed to journey to Max's estate to see what she can do to fix the mess that Max--a brooding and angry war hero with a serious case of PTSD--has made of his newly inherited viscountcy. Max doesn't want her there--he doesn't want anyone there--but her incredibly optimistic approach to life makes her virtually impossible to get rid of. It didn't take long before Max realizes he doesn't want to get rid of her. Eventually, Ada returns to London, and Max shortly follows.

The first two thirds of the book are exceptional. Max and Ada both have more than one serious trauma in their pasts, but the differences in how they each deal with those problems are fascinating. Anyone who has suffered a loss of some kind will identify with at least one of the protagonists in one way or another. It's both heartbreaking and inspiring. Most of this happens in the country, with the first part of their time in London following suit.

The last third or so was a little lacking, however, and I'm not entirely sure why I feel that way. I think that so much time was spent with the push-me-pull-you of their initial interactions (in good way), the rest of the novel felt rushed.

Overall, I really liked this book, and I adore both Ada and Max. Up next is Dougal; from the blurb, I think I'm going to like that one too.

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for my honest opinion. Thanks!

Trigger warnings (potential spoilers): PTSD, violence, allusion to rape, abortion, death of loved ones

A charming beauty and the beast type romance. The characters were engaging and multi faceted. It was more of a slow burn but had some elements of heat.
Thank you Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

give me a historical read and I will sign up everytime. I want read all of the regency books i can. love them so much.

I thoroughly enjoy the witty exchanges in this book as she tries to draw him out of his depression. She is the North Star to guide him out of his darkened world. Their past has to be dealt with before happy ever after.

I received an ARC of this book and leaving my review voluntarily.

This book, I’m confident, was a Beauty and The Beast retelling—if not inspired by it. The heroine is sent by Max’s friend to Max’s estate to look over his ledgers and help with his failing estate. He very much is not pleased by her stay. She’s there for a fortnight but it felt longer because this book dragged. I didn’t have a connection to any of the characters until 80% of the way. The trauma that Ada and Max have experienced was mentioned heavily throughout the novel to the point it got frustrating to only see it mentioned in vague terms until the end of the book when their past is revealed to each other. I feel very neutral about this book I don’t love it nor do I hate it, it’s just there.

At first, I believed this is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast but it isn't.

Hunt's past demons were explored extensively, and each were darker than the previous thus, presented a valid justification for him being the way he was, whereas, Ada having equally dark demons, chose a different approach to deal with it, and decided to have a positive approach in her life.

It was well-paced and I really liked the way story unfolded.

WOW! What a rollercoaster ride this book was!... Totally gripped from the beginning… Grab yourself a copy of this book! I absolutely loved this! What a fantastic plot, beautifully written, intertwining the relationships between the characters in such an ingenious and realistic way.