After reviewing, The Runaway Duke by Julie Anne Long, Mrs. Julien recommended that I move on to Long’s Pennyroyal Green Series. Dutifully following her expert opinion, I picked up I Kissed an Earl (2010)–one of the middle books of the series–I think. I chose this one primarily because it was immediately available on Kindle from my library.
Violet Redmond is beautiful, smart, spoiled, and bored. She is used to attention and getting whatever she wants. She is also very loyal and loving to her family. So when she discovers that her missing brother might actually be rampaging the seas as the notorious pirate Le Chat, she springs into action to find him and protect him.
Violet’s plan involves sneaking onto the ship of the man ordered by the king to capture Le Chat–the recently appointed Earl of Ardmay. With naivety and optimism, Violet believes she can find her brother and figure out what’s going on before the Earl–thereby saving her brother from a hangman’s noose. Although I found this rather unbelievable, it did get Violet and the Earl on the same ship with cross purposes, guaranteeing some strife and betrayal.
I had mixed feelings about this book, so it might be easiest if I split it up into likes and dislikes.
Read the details here.
Cannonball Read V 
I have the Julie Anne Long books as print books, and can’t say that I’ve noticed the spelling and grammar errors that you’re highlighting here. That’s the sort of thing that can bring me out of a book entirely, as well, so I’m pretty sure I would have noticed if it were the case. I’m sorry this book didn’t entirely work for you, I hope you like What I Did for a Duke better, it’s my favourite Julie Anne Long. It might be good if you’re prepared for the pretty substantial age gap between the hero and heroine before starting the book, as that’s a deal breaker for some people. I was dubious at first, but I think she manages beautifully.
Hmmm, I was wondering if the printed books were better. I have no understanding of publishing, but you’d think that if they had a clean copy of the text, they could just put it into Kindle format. It’s like they used an unedited draft instead of the final draft. Thanks for the heads up on the age difference. That kind of thing sometimes bothers me, but as long as the heroine acts [somewhat] mature, I’ll get over it.
Both Mrs. Julien and I are huge fans of the book. I actually tend to forget that there is a substantial age difference, because the couple are so well matched.
What Malin said. Long pulls off the age difference. I reviewed What I Did for a Duke for CBR IV and consider it a classic of the genre.