Antuniet Chazillen left Alpennia after her brother's execution for treason wiped out the family's honor and standing. She's determined to restore that honor, and the path she has chosen is alchemy. With the aid of a long-hidden book, she'll develop the skills to offer real benefit to Princess Anna, new ruler of Alpennia.

Someone else knows what she's got, though, and is determined to take it from her. Antuniet flees to Prague, and to Heidelberg--and finally has nowhere left to go except back to Rotenek, capital of Alpennia. In Rotenek, she turns up on the doorstep of Jeanne, Vicomtesse de Cherdillac, in the hopes that Jeanne will be daring enough to become her patron. Jeanne can't, not directly, but insists she eat and stay the night, and connects her with someone who can.

What Antuniet is doing is dangerous. It's far too easy for alchemists to be accused of sorcery, and if that happens, she'll have blackened the family name further rather than redeeming it. At first, she's torn between gratitude and annoyance that Jeanne doesn't lose interest in her, but instead continues to drop by her new workshop on a regular basis, bringing meals, and in time stepping in to help with the work. Jeanne is bored with the season's social whirl; she's looking for a distraction.

And that's true, to a point. The interest grows to something, more, though, and Antuniet,f or all her natural reserve and hard-earned distrust of nearly everyone, is starting to return it.

The story unfolds from four viewpoints: Antuniet, Jeanne, and also Barbara and Margerit, whose story wss the driving force of the previous book Daughter of Mystery. Margerit became political due to forces beyond her control; Antuniet has an explicitly political goal, to save her family's name from the disgrace her brother Estefan brought upon it. But introverted Antuniet is perhaps even less naturally political than Margerit, and she doesn't have Barbara as her partner. And while she has Jeanne's natural social skills to call on, she still has to learn to trust before she can unbend enough to do it.

Meanwhile, outside of her view, her political situation is growing more precarious. Princess Anna and her stepmother/cousin Princess Elisabet each have a son who is a potential next heir to the throne. People who don't care about Antuniet or Jeanne, or even Magerit (now Royal Thaumaturge) or Barbara (now Baroness Saveze) at all. do care about any tool they can find to destabilize Alpennia. Political intrigue, romance, and the challenges of Antuniet's alchemical research all intertwine to make an absorbing story.

As should be clear from the above, and will be obvious to anyone who read Daughter of Mystery, lesbian romance plays a significant role in the story. There are two female couples, one established and one just beginning, as well as Jeanne's coterie off friends. There is no explicit sex. This is a "sweet" story in romance terms, and what violence there is, is off-stage.

Recommended.

I received this book as a gift from a friend. ( )

Another delightful Alpennia novel. Like [b:Daughter of Mystery|18167557|Daughter of Mystery (Alpennia, #1)|Heather Rose Jones|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1387770689s/18167557.jpg|25533901], The Mystic Marriage is a wonderfully wholesome, heart-warming love story. Jones has a great talent for writing enchanting characters; the sort that feel like old friends by the end. These books are really the antithesis of 'grimdark' fantasy. They have a fundamental certainty that good intentions, hard work, forgiveness, compassion and a sense of humour really are enough to bridge the divide between hearts. And yet, they're not sappy by any means. Understanding isn't easy, and good will isn't guaranteed. Those characters who fail to do the right thing suffer by their own hands.
More than anything, I like the handling of Jeanne and Antuniet. Both their characters and their relationship. As I read the book, I kept imagining a different, meaner book like a shadow behind this one. A shadow made up of many of the other trashy historical romances I've read.
Jeanne, Vicomtesse de Cherdillac, is a bed-hopping social butterfly with exquisite taste. As a stereotype, she pops up again and again through-out fiction. And invariably, she is a secondary character. There to be mean to the heroine, or to suffer a terrible fall as a moral lesson to the rest of the cast. But here she was allowed to be a whole person: a practised flirt who is perfectly capable of fidelity when her heart is won; a woman whose modishness in no way precludes serious thought or deep emotion.
Antuniet is brittle, defensive, driven and humourless. In a hundred other books, she is the maiden aunt or spinster governess; a figure of mockery or pity. And yet here her defenses are understood as a rational and reasonable response to a harsh world. Her dedication to her work is clearly driven by passion not compensation. And her gentle blossoming when shown trust and acceptance is immensely touching.
And as Antuniet and Jeanne teeter on the edge of social disaster for their scandalous ways, there is no melodramatic hysteria or mournful regret for their sins. Instead, a brave and sober assessment of what they lose and what they gain by being true to themselves.
So the characters were wonderful, but the plot and pacing were sorely lacking. [b:Daughter of Mystery|18167557|Daughter of Mystery (Alpennia, #1)|Heather Rose Jones|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1387770689s/18167557.jpg|25533901] was slow; but The Mystic Marriage is stationary. The faults in both books are the same: strong openings and endings bookend an otherwise utterly turgid plot. And it's disappointing to see the problem getting worse rather than better in the series. It's crying out for a good editor. All the necessary components of a great book are here, and with some harsh pruning and reshuffling of some of the scenes, it could have been acheived. Fingers crossed for the next volume - I will definitely be reading it. ( )

Ah-ha, so (despite getting the summary-of-aftermath at the end of the first in the series) we do get to also see for ourselves some of Margerit's continuing efforts to have her work recognised (and along the way the early stages of her appearing to accidentally found a women's university). But this is really Antuniet's story. In that light, I liked that her relationship with Jeanne developed very differently than Margerit and Barbara's, befitting their very different characters. As always I would have liked more detail of the alchemy: it was a long time before I even had a general idea of what Antuniet was actually working on, and considering that this is her all-consuming passion it felt a little distancing to not know that much (besides my general curiosity in the matter). But again, many other subplots to keep things moving and fill the pages with interest. ( )