In London after a two-year exile, Lord Blakeney plans to cut a swathe through the bedchambers of the demimonde. Marriage is not on his agenda, especially to an annoying chit like Minerva Montrose, with her superior attitude and a tendency to get into trouble. And certainly the last man Minerva wants is Blake, a careless wastrel without a thought in his handsome head.
The heat and noise of her debutante ball give Minerva a migraine. Surely a moment’s rest could do no harm … until Blake mistakes her for another lady, leaving Minerva’s guests to catch them in a very compromising position. To her horror, the scandal will force them to do the unthinkable: marry. Their mutual loathing blazes into unexpected passion but Blake remains distant, desperate to hide a shameful secret. Minerva’s never been a woman to take things lying down, and she’ll let nothing stop her from winning his trust … and his heart.
Minerva Montrose might be young but she’s got almost her whole life planned out. She’s a very political girl and in her first season she plans to marry a man who is moving fast and furious up the political ladder of success. She has chosen a man and sooner or later she will be the Prime Minister’s wife. During her come out ball though her life changes drastically when the son of the Duke who is sponsoring her ball ends up with his head up Minerva’s gown.
Lord Blakeney is in London after two years in Devon taking care of an estate/farm. He recently procured a wonderful mistress and he plans to spend as much time as possible with her. During Minerva’s come out ball he hears of a assignation that will occur. He himself had been with the woman and in the drunken stupor he’s in decides that he will get to the woman first. He heads to the library a little before the assigned time and finds the woman asleep on the settee. With the devil driving him he plans to wake the woman in an oh so delicious manner. He’s almost to his destination when the library doors are opened and about 10 people are there watching. He pulls his head from the underside of the dress and discovers that he’s under Minerva’s gown, not the other woman. Obviously Minerva & Blake have been found in a compromising position so they must marry. The problem? They really don’t like each other at all. Hate might actually be the appropriate word.
Minerva is resigned to the marriage even though she detests Blake and Blake is pissed that he has to do it and tries to thumb his nose at his father for forcing him into the union. Blake plans to avoid consummating the relationship and therefore stall any mini-Blake’s from appearing which will certainly tic his father right off as the Duke thinks of Minerva more of a brood mare.
The couple head to Paris for there wedding trip and there they come to verbal blows. Neither of them are afraid to tell it like it is and this causes more than a little strife in the marriage. But it also sheds some light on who they are. You see Blake has a secret that he tries to hide and has done so all of his life and as he gets to know Minerva he comes to admire her and eventually think that maybe he can trust her with his secret. When his father falls ill during their trip and they high it back to London the distance between them grows and they may never get to know each other fully.
This was definitely an interesting premise for a romance. The couple isn’t “acting” like they don’t like each other when they really are secretly attracted to each other. No, this couple truly detests each other. Minerva thinks that Blake is a lazy, good for nothing rake and Black thinks that Minerva is a bluestocking with too much ambition. Once they get to know each other a bit better they find that they were wrong about so many things – especially Minerva about Blake.
On one hand I really liked that they story took the route it did – with Blake and Minerva getting to know each other and not falling into bed immediately and thinking all is well. The slow build up of the romance was a definite plus for me. On the other hand I felt that the story lacked a certain punch that it needed to make me want to turn pages more. I think this might have been the characters. While I liked them and I liked seeing each of them grow I didn’t truly love them. Minerva was very one-track minded and was pretty disgusted with Blake for a lot of the book. She was kind of a snob and was looking down her nose at Blake constantly feeling that she knew best about most things. Blake was so concerned with people finding out his secret that he came across as uncaring and though we saw behind the scenes and I did feel for him I thought he could have handled things in a much better way. I did admire his decision to not cheat on Minerva once they were married and that gave him brownie points in my book.
Overall it was a good story that was enjoyable. I stayed up late reading it one night so it obviously had something that kept me interested. Anyone who loves a forced marriage to avoid scandal would definitely like this one.
Rating: 3.75 out of 5
I've seen this cover around and I think it's so pretty. I haven't read your review yet, because I'm still undecided… Do I want to read this or not, argh!! 🙂
It is a really nice cover, Nath. Have you read any of the other books in the series?