The book is well written, has a decent plot. But overall it was not for me, I DNF this book. I wanted to badly to love this book, I love the other one is this series, but this one just didn't do it for me.

This is a fantastic, gripping, and witty novel of blackmailing and kidnapping that turns into flirting and love.

He is an illegitimate son of a duke, she is the only daughter of an earl. He’s been arrested more times than he can count and he’s been shot, stabbed, and thrown overboard, she accepted a marriage of convenience to a duke to pay her father’s debt only to find out that the man she married is worse than she thought. He is charming and sunshine, impulsive and reckless, she is prickly, competent, and determined.

Rob Brooks and Marian Hayes seem a very unlikely couple, but the chemistry between them is clear from their first exchange of letters. It all starts with blackmail. He blackmails her because he knows a secret about her husband, so she kidnaps him, then there is a shooting and a quick escape to the country where they share a bed, alcohol, and much more.

This is such a fun read. I read it in two days, unable to put it down. The story is intriguing and very well-written, but what I liked most about the novel is the two protagonists and their easy banter. Rob is the perfect charming rogue. It is so easy to fall in love with this character, I mean, he rescues invalid cats, how can you not love him? Marian tries her best to resist him, but his charm is on all the time, and he is sweet and caring and he never pushes her to do things she is uncomfortable with. The more time they spend together, the more they learn to trust each other.

The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes will appeal to both romance and mystery lovers. There is blackmail, kidnapping, murder, strong attraction between the two protagonists, only one bed to share, lots of gin, friends and found family. And while this remains an entertaining read that made me laugh most of the time, the author also alludes to some serious issues, like the way women were treated at the time, their right to choice and consent, their struggle with motherhood. This last theme is well-represented by Marian’s insecurities towards motherhood and her relationship with her new-born daughter.

The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes is the sequel to The Queer Principles of Kit Webb, but it can easily read as a stand-alone. It is a sexy, unique, and fabulous novel featuring two bisexual, clever, and likable protagonists in their journey of criminal adventures!

To be honest, the first chapter put me off a little bit. I am glad I returned to this book because in the end it was adventurous and fun!

Worth it for the opening pages of witty epistolary romance alone! I can't remember why I didn't review this at the time but remember it being a four star read so am coming back to leave a rating now.

This book is a funny and sweet take on a grumpy/sunshine. A+ banter and A+ indifference to the aristocracy. As a standalone, it felt low-conflict but high stakes. That means the pacing doesn’t always fit the level of stress Marian is under. The pair spend half the book on a slow moving road trip, with the potential of a murder sentence or an unwanted inheritance hazily winding around them.

I would recommend reading it immediately after the first book in the series to avoid confusion.

I didn’t like this book. This book was boring. I enjoyed Kit and Percy’s book more than I initially expected, so I kept waiting for this book to get better, but I was disappointed.

Marian isn’t a likable character for me. She does good things for the people she loves, but she just did not feel like a fully fleshed out character. She felt very two dimensional despite getting loads of her thoughts (annoying) and trauma backstory. I feel like I should like her, but I just don’t.

Rob is somewhat likable, but then he falls in love with Marian and decides his entire personality will depend on her feelings and whims and etc. It makes him less of an interesting character.

The story isn’t even a story. It just felt like a overly long explanation of Marian’s side of Percy’s story. She has a lot to say while also saying absolutely nothing.

I need to read the first book in this series because I loved the banter between Rob and Marian so much and who could resist the Robin Hood and Maid Marian tone, this story had. It was such a fun read.

Unexpected in all the best ways, this brazen read has a twist around every turn but each one successfully keeps you hooked. Marion Hayes is the type of female protagonist that is headstrong and drives the brazen tone of the story while also balancing humor and charm.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon and Harper Voyager, and Avon for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I am immediately adding Cat Sebastian to my favorite authors list and she is also currently my go-to when someone asks me for historical fiction or historical romance recommendations.

I absolutely loved the first book that I read by this author which is The Queer Principles of Kit Webb. This book was no different. They are both amazing! I also loved how both books connected while also being really different. It made this book just as fun to read as the first book!

I hope that Cat Sebastian writes more books in this series because I will read them all!!!

I received this book for free from netgalley for an honest review.

Really well thought-out book with amazing characters and amazing setting.

Perfect and quintessentially Cat Sebastian - tender and almost cozy with a dramatic, old-school-romance-type plot that urges us to eat the rich. Delightful and revolutionary.

I will preface by saying that I have not read the first book BUT I didn't feel like that hindered my experience!!! I loved these two bi chaos monsters. I am feral for bi characters my husband and I are bi, so this was a slam dunk for me. Rob and Marian had perfect banter and made grumpy sunshine look like a breeze!! I will absolutely go back and read the other novel in this series and follow it it more are published.

I enjoyed this book so much! It was deep and soft and all the things i love in romance: Badass heroine, soft and completely gone hero, plus adventure. I knew I'd love it since the first letter exchange cause, who worries about the safety of the person they're blackmailing? WHO?! Rob was the worst blackmailer in history and i lived for that. 10/10 would recommend.

CW: murder, attempted murder, robbery, mentions of abusive partner, mentions of complications in childbirth, someone gets shot

This was cute, but not one of my fav romances. I liked the MC enough but the romance fell a little flat for me. Enjoyable, but ultimately not super memorable.

Cat Sebastian does it again!!! I swear, she can't write a bad book. This was such a fun historical romp (a Georgian one, what's more!), and I LOVED that we got two bisexual characters as MC's. Sebastian's writing is top notch, and I had such a fun time through the entire book. Strongly recommend to those who love historical (queer!) romances, especially if you're looking for something a bit different than the average Regency romance.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC. This book was unfortunately not for me - I was wanting and ready to like it, but I didn't find finishing it to be as exciting as it presented to be. I wanted to like this more than I did.

Cat Sebastian is becoming something of an auto-read author for me, and this was no exception. It took me a beat to figure out the interconnections between various characters (reader error: it turns out I didn't read the book that came prior to this, though I though I had...), but once I did (or, in some instances, stopped trying to, and just focused on the main storyline), this was a romp of a read.

The plot of this novel is fun and fresh, but what really stood out to me was the tone and scenery. I loved the way the author handled descriptions of Georgian London. If you like the setting, but not flowery language, this one is for you. I loved the queer take on historical fiction. Will definitely be reading more by Cat Sebastian!.

If this story sounds like chaos from first glance, that’s because it is—and in the most delightful way possible.

I loved this. I have such a soft spot for “Kit Webb,” to the point where I honestly wasn’t sure how this book would compare. I was a bit hesitant to have a second book in the series following different characters, just because I loved Kit and Percy so very much. But this was another incredible installment, and I had no reason to fear!

The banter, once again, is top-notch. The characters are utterly ridiculous. But there’s also a great balance between that element of satire and also the characters being extremely well-rounded and heartfelt. Rob and Marian definitely make you laugh and they have a light-hearted dynamic between them, but they’re both fully-realized people who are running away from their own problems and learning how to face them, both together and as individuals.

Rob, for example, carries himself as this masterful, fearless rogue who can commit any crime and have the victim be thanking him for it at the end—which is true. But he’s also very lonely and he leans into that easy charm because he wants to feel wanted, accepted, and liked. Marian, on the other hand, is very no-nonsense, keeps very high walls around her, and maintains very firm boundaries about how far she’s willing to let people in, especially because she’s recovering from an emotionally abusive marriage.

So really her relationship with Rob is a long-term study in how trust herself, trust other people, and trust that there are good people who will take her at her word, see her for who she is, and want her to feel safe. So yes, this is a super fun romp with about criminals committing light crime throughout the countryside as they fall in love and try to run from their past, but much like the first book it also has a lot of great messages about finding yourself.

On a slightly different note, I would also like to say that if you enjoy adult romances that employ praise kinks, you will definitely enjoy this. Without getting too graphic, I would also love to point out that this story does a great job of exploring queerness and queer relationships as being something that defies the norm, that goes beyond societal expectations, that goes against the grain and revels in that difference, especially in how this pairing approaches sex.

Again, I’m not going to get into specifics, but Marian is a character who has sex-related trauma, which means she has very different ways of approaching intimacy in order to feel safe. I love how that was shown so tenderly in the story and I really appreciate that this romance celebrates and centers the experience of unabashedly queer sex, among all the other wonderful things it's doing.

Reading this was such a joy. It further solidified the fact that Cat Sebastian is one of the definitive voices in queer historical romance. This book definitely reminded me that I want to read so much more of Sebastian's back list in addition to these front list gems!