After her husband and baby daughter die within days of each other, Emily Foster decides to take in other people's children, both to supplment her income and provide her son with company. The children she settles upon are Amy and Tommy Falk, whose mother has lately died and whose father is a career officer. Colonel Richard Falk is injured and exhausted when he first meets Emily, and they make poor first impressions on each other. However, she likes Amy and Tommy at first sight, and so agrees to take them on. Their acquaintance grows through his letters, filled with imaginative and funny stories, and Emily's letters back about his children. But there's a war on, and Richard's half-brothers seem to be trying to kill him, and so Richard and Emily meet only rarely, often when Richard is desperately ill.This is a story that takes its time, covering three years of Emily's quiet domestic life and Richard's dangerous one. I enjoyed the length of it, but was annoyed at what seemed to me an uneven plot. The first third is all Emily, and then there are long stretches where she doesn't appear at all, or is mentioned off-handedly, as Ricard tries to survive the lurid melodramas his half-brothers and Napoleon are enacting. In fact, I was a little impatient that so much time was spent on the surrounding characters. We get whole chapters of Richard's friend Tom Conway (hero of Lady Elizabeth's Comet) or his sister Sarah and her husband. I like Sarah and Robert, but I'd have much rather had a few more conversations between Richard and Emily in place of them. As it was, Richard and Emily only talk in person a few times "on page", with the remainder of their relationship relegated to a summary of afternoons together and correspondence we never see. I didn't get much of a feel for what they knew about each other, or liked about each other. Still, what I got, I liked. There's a good deal of plot here, although too much of it happens off-page (Richard is repeatedly attacked, but we never see it happen and only hear about his injuries afterward; an odd narrative choice). The dialog is natural, the characters understated but well-drawn. It's nowhere near as good as Simonson's first two books, but those were excellent, and this is just enjoyable.
The Bar Sinister is, I may call, a prequel to Lady Elizabeth's Comet. Some of the characters in the latter book are featured prominently in this book including Tom Conway, one of my beloved fictional heroes. As for this book, in a nutshell -- Richard Falk, a British captain, left his two kids in Emily Foster's charge and went away to war. They corresponded. Tender feelings were developed on both sides. There are some sinister plots against Richard involving his parentage which I found only mildly exciting. The conclusion is too abrupt for my taste. FYI, the leading pair are kept apart almost 3/4 of the book so it's natural if I felt a little bit robbed after such long waiting. And although I love my hero stern and stoic, Richard is too reserved. I didn't get any glimpse of his affection toward Emily like AT ALL until he pronounced it out loud. So excuse me if I find his confession incredible.With all that said I finished the book in one sitting, the writing is that good. There is no point to go around the fact that Sheila Simonson is a gem. She writes real people with their admirable qualities and flaws, the characterization distinct. The dialogues are witty without being pretentious. Those ingredients create genuine type of chemistry between her characters. I'm more thrilled with her hero and heroine's holding hands than all sex scenes in some erotica combined.
What do You think about The Bar Sinister (1987)?
Emily Foster, a widow with a 3 year old son, has agreed to care for widower Captain Richard Falk’s 2 children to supplement her income while he is away in the war. Although it seems odd he has no family to do this and he is rather rude, Emily is practical and her heart goes out to the children. Over the course of the story covering 3 years, trust grows and the children become almost her own. Much of the time they communicate by letter and through stories that the Captain pens for his children. Eventually Richard’s family connections come out and their resultant threats endanger him and the children. This was a very different style of Regency romance from the common genre with a slow advancing story. Really enjoyed.
—Linda C
Sheila Simonson's "The Bar Sinister' As with the other 2 Regency-set books by Sheila Simonson that I have read ("Lady Elizabeth's Comet" and "A Cousinly Connection"), this one also has a great feeling for the period, the way people spoke and dressed and behaved in that time. On the other hand, the characters and the story were lacking in certain respects, and the romance was practically non-existent. The story is about a young widow, Emily, who fosters the 2 very young children of the hero Richard Falk, whose Spanish wife has died and who is still working as an officer in the campaign to drive Napoleon from Portugal and Spain. Richard has a great deal of family trouble (certain members of his family are trying to kill him), so he can't leave the children with them. But of course they find out where he and the children are, so a lot of complications and trouble ensue. In the end it didn't draw me in all that much and I wasn't passionately rooting for any of the good characters. The lack of any romance between the two main characters didn't help (they finally share a kiss on the last page of the book, but that's it, even though the story has gone on for more than 3 years and for almost 400 pages!)
—Ilze
Sheila Simonson's "The Bar Sinister" As with the other 2 Regency-set books by Sheila Simonson that I have read ("Lady Elizabeth's Comet" and "A Cousinly Connection"), this one also has a great feeling for the period, the way people spoke and dressed and behaved in that time. On the other hand, the characters and the story were lacking in certain respects, and the romance was practically non-existent. The story is about a young widow, Emily, who fosters the 2 very young children of the hero Richard Falk, whose Spanish wife has died and who is still working as an officer in the campaign to drive Napoleon from Portugal and Spain. Richard has a great deal of family trouble (certain members of his family are trying to kill him), so he can't leave the children with them. But of course they find out where he and the children are, so a lot of complications and trouble ensue. In the end it didn't draw me in all that much and I wasn't passionately rooting for any of the good characters. The lack of any romance between the two main characters didn't help (they finally share a kiss on the last page of the book, but that's it, even though the story has gone on for more than 3 years and for almost 400 pages!) (I originally posted this review in April of 2014 but somehow it disappeared from Booklikes? I had to retrieve it from Goodreads.)
—Ilze
