Castle of the Wolf by Sandra SchwabCas­tle of the Wolf by San­dra Schwab, copy­right 2007. Cas­tle of the Wolf has a lot going for it with­out open­ing the cover: It’s set in Ger­many and it’s a his­tor­i­cal romance with a gothic feel to it with­out nary a vam­pire around. This is my first time read­ing Ms. Schwab but it won’t be the last. FWIW, this is her sec­ond novel. I have Lilly Brand in my TBR pile.

Celia Fussell is a 27 year old spin­ster liv­ing with her brother the Baron and his shrewish wife, Dorinda. Celia learns upon her father’s death that she has inher­ited a castle…and maybe it’s owner.  Her father didn’t have the money to give Cissy the proper Lon­don Sea­son she needed to find a hus­band, so off to Baden, Ger­many she goes to start a new life with pos­si­bly a new hus­band. How­ever, things don’t go as planned. Cissy’s jour­ney from spin­ster to wife presents her with quite a few chal­lenges of their own.

First, she inher­its a cas­tle that is old, decrepit and already occu­pied. That occu­pant is Fen­ris von Wolfen­bach. Fen­ris is a recluse whose lived alone in his cas­tle, deep in the Black Forests of Germany.  He has his share of demons to bat­tle since join­ing the British army at age 19, to bat­tle Napoleon that resulted in his family’s finan­cial ruin and social downfall.  Needless to say he is quite angered at this new intru­sion into his life and home. It’s a sore spot as to why the Wolfenbach’s lost their home to Celia’s father. Fen­ris espe­cially feels ashamed to have been the cul­prit behind this trans­ac­tion that took place years ago. The two meet and develop a healthy dis­like for each other. Celia refuses to leave and Fen­ris refuses to wel­come her into his home or his heart. There you have most of the con­flict as Fen­ris spends more than half the book avoid­ing her. In time each reassess the other and delve beneath the sur­face to dis­cover that there is more to it than meets the eye. Can the princess gen­tle the beast? You’ll have to read the book to find out.  Meanwhile, a third party threat­ens to take the Wolfen­bach prop­erty if the stip­u­la­tion of the will is not met within four months. So there you have it.

Enough about the plot, here are my thoughts on the story: I liked it. I think this author has a very inter­est­ing voice that would con­tribute well to the romance genre. The atmos­phere of the story was well done and played a sig­nif­i­cant role in the story. The fairy-tale aspect of the story was charm­ing. Inter­spersed through­out the story we see Celia read­ing roman­tic poetry. The set­ting was nicely done and dif­fer­ent. How many his­tor­i­cal romances are set in Germany? You can feel this oth­er­worldly pres­ence that seemed to have enve­lope and per­me­ate the cas­tle and it’s inhab­i­tants, thereby, providing for it’s dark tone.  Along with decent char­ac­ter­i­za­tions with a some­what, pre­dictable and famil­iar plot made this a decent read for me . My grade, B.